Praying that we meet aga.., p.9
Praying That We Meet Again, page 9
A London postmark suggested a letter from her father. She opened it first, was amazed to discover that brother Henry had joined up.
‘He is gone to some sort of hush-hush department, doing what I know not, but he has left England. They have contacted me to say he is in service to the Crown and I should not make any further enquiries. I shall not do so, of course. I had not suspected he was the sort that spies or spy-catchers were made of, yet I am truly glad that he has found a way of being useful to his country. I shall be far happier to keep him in idleness after the war knowing that he has done his bit.’
She had given little thought to spies and their habits but would have expected them to be of above average in intellect, thus thoroughly disqualifying Henry for the trade. However, if he had found a way of making himself useful, she was much in favour and could forgive him his many trespasses.
The other letter was from sister Henrietta, a cheerful but empty recounting of her existence at home. She was doing remarkably little other than to keep her mother’s spirits up. Mama had not been best pleased that neither of her sons had chosen to go to war. She had been happier they had not since poor Lieutenant Robert Griffin had come home as a cripple, but then Henry had gone to the conflict, which could not be wholly desirable now. They had visited with Lieutenant Griffin and had tried to cheer him up, but he was understandably glum, having lost one foot and taken severe injury to the other, poor man! It was a shocking war and they much hoped she would soon come home, having done her part in it.
Augusta tucked the letters away, to be replied to in due course. She would not be returning to civilian life while the war raged, that she was already certain of. The existence was in no way enjoyable – cold and uncomfortable as it was – but she was independent and able to live her own life. Unless and until she chose to wed, she was free, and enjoyed that fact. It was well possible that she would take a man to her, one day; she was in favour of doing so, in fact. It would take very few smiles to bring Captain Darlington to her side, she suspected. Not yet, however. She had a life of her own to live and she was useful in it, doing a valuable job and doing it well.
“Coat and boots for me! I must service that bloody engine!”
There were indrawn breaths at her daring language, but generally they were much in favour of the example she set. The women settled down to their evening, most with nursing texts to hand, one with a motor mechanic’s handbook. They were not to spend their time in tea and gossip.
Mr George Redwood, the young English gentleman banker, accompanied his host from the dinner table, senior of the guests present, and walked with him to the ballroom of the hotel. Naturally, he took the hand of the eldest daughter and joined her in a first waltz, as befitted his status. She was well-dressed, which not all Americans could claim, too many in his opinion substituting money for taste, and was within reason pretty. Importantly, she was not one of these overly-independent modern females of whom there were far too many to be discovered in New York. She was not particularly intelligent, either, another point in her favour. She could, in fact, stand at his side in London and show thoroughly respectable, a perfect wife for a banker.
His father had informed him in his most recent letter that he was to be made baronet within the month and expected another step up in the world if the war lasted another two years. Importantly, the family had not had to pay a penny for the honour. A baronetcy typically cost forty thousand pounds in the Party’s coffers but the Redwoods were to be raised in the world gratis. That was a remarkable recognition of their importance, of the vital work they were doing for the country and in which George was playing a significant role.
The bank had clinched a loan of a little more than fifty million dollars that day, at a remarkably favourable rate. His host had taken a major part on the American side and very likely expected George to offer him some consideration in his turn.
It was necessary to show willing. George smiled his best at the young female, Miss Bindon – he wondered what her first name might be. Bindon was Irish, he recalled, so she was probably a Mary. The music ended and he escorted her to her parents, raised an eyebrow to her father and stepped to one side, taking a drink with him.
“I wonder, sir, if I might request a private word with you at a convenient time?”
Mr Bindon was a man of affairs and was not one to let an opportunity pass by. He had been informed by his London correspondent that Redwood senior was made baronet, a hereditary title, using the cable rather than waiting on a letter. He knew as well that further honours, and a lot of money, awaited the family provided the war endured. He saw no chance of the war ending in the foreseeable future.
“We could find a private room here with some ease, Mr Redwood.”
Bindon nodded to a waiter; the hotel manager came running to his side within two minutes, as he had expected. They were sat comfortably in the manager’s private office almost immediately.
“I must say I like the way things are done here in New York, Mr Bindon! I would wish, if you concur, sir, to wed your daughter. You will be aware that I am the heir to Redwoods but may not know that my father has been awarded a baronetcy, a first hereditary title. I shall on his death become Sir George Redwood and my wife, Lady Redwood. It is not impossible that my good father might rise to a barony, becoming Lord Redwood. He is a most able man and is leading the merchant bank to the heights in the City.”
“I was aware of both facts, Mr Redwood. I know as well that you play a leading part in your bank’s American business. You must know that I have no son, although there are four daughters. Mary, my eldest, must stand in line for a substantial inheritance and she can look where she wishes for a husband. I do not doubt she would be happy to accept you, Mr Redwood, but we must speak to her on the topic. The prospect of joining the English nobility and spending much of her life in Old England, must be attractive to her. It is to me, I will freely admit, sir. I will strongly support your proposal, Mr Redwood, will be happy to call you ‘son’.”
That seemed somewhat enthusiastic to George, a little too much of a good thing, but he was informed that Bindon was already a millionaire several times over and was expected to expand his wealth rapidly. He would do very well as the source of an inheritance.
He entered his own office in the bank next morning at peace with the world. Mary had offered an instant acceptance of his suit and a ring was to be purchased that very afternoon, public announcements to follow.
A glance through the final documents on the latest loan made him even more comfortable. The rate had been one and one-quarter per cent under the accepted level for dollar loans to English borrowers and ten per cent of that difference would end up in his own bank account. One eighth of one per cent on a loan of fifty three million dollars amounted to thirty-three thousand dollars, annually for the twelve year duration of the loan. All over and above his generous salary and expenses! He had every expectation of making other such coups during his time in New York, did not doubt he would eventually come away with more than a hundred thousand a year tucked into his back pocket, and all of it unknown to the Income Tax in England!
All was well with his world. He turned to the mail on his desk, worked his way through the letters, all of them merest routine and passed across to his secretary, coming finally to a personal note from his father.
Henry had joined up! He had entered the employment of one of the secret agencies and was busying himself somewhere overseas. Mr Redwood senior was as pleased as he was amazed, for obvious reasons.
George could only concur. The black sheep had changed his way of life, had attained respectability. Whoever would have expected such a thing! It meant that Henry now had a claim upon his father’s generosity for the remainder of his life, which was not so desirable – he could not fairly be cast out as a wastrel. After the war, however, he would be known to have been ‘something behind the scenes’, to have risked his neck for his country. It would be beneficial to the family, which was wholly unexpected.
He wrote his reply, informing his father of his engagement to the Bindon family and commenting favourably upon Henry. He asked after the Griffins as well, wondering whether their bad luck had changed in this terrible war. Observing from New York, he was anxious to hear that all was well with his friends. He did not mention Augusta, considering her to be well beyond the pale. She had left respectability well behind!
Chapter Six
“A quiet night, sir.”
Alfred peered into the darkness, half an hour before moonrise, the stretch of cut-up turf and mud between the Kents’ trench and the German lines apparently empty.
“It certainly seems so, Captain Soames. How is the Vickers set up for the night?”
“I have stood down the gun party, sir. Let them get a good night’s sleep. The sentry can get them up if need arises.”
“Standing orders are a three-man team always to be present at the gun and alert, Mr Soames. Get them on their feet and at their posts now. Immediately!”
Soames was at least fifteen years older than Alfred and had experience of warfare on the Frontier in India and in Burma as well as the shorter campaign against the Boxers. He was not inclined to regard a jumped-up major, a wartime special, with any particular respect.
“I do think, sir, that my own judgement can be trusted!”
Soames had been one day with the battalion and Alfred had already decided he neither liked nor trusted him. He had been a little too full of his experience of battle and his absolute desire to ‘smell powder’ again.
“If you wish to remain in this battalion, Captain Soames, you will obey orders. Get the Vickers fully manned or be returned to depot as unfit for front line service. Now!”
Soames ran and could be heard shouting within the minute.
“Duty sergeant!”
A figure appeared out of the darkness, smart and alert – no doubt he had been warned of trouble.
“Sergeant Murdoch, sir!”
Murdoch had been D Company and had a good name.
“Standing orders demand four sentries all night.”
“Yes, sir. Instructions were to set sentries as four to cover the whole night, sir. Two hour shifts between twenty-two hundred and o-six hundred hours, sir.”
“Four men at all times, Sergeant. Please correct the misunderstanding.”
“Sir! Vickers gunners to be extra to that, sir?”
“Yes. Vickers to fire on fixed lines immediately upon the alarm being raised.”
“Without further orders, sir?”
“Yes.”
“Very good, sir.”
Murdoch saluted and doubled off towards the machinegun, to clarify their orders, no doubt.
Alfred waited for Soames to return.
“Three men awake and manning the Vickers, sir.”
“Good. I was under the impression that my standing orders were clearly understandable, Captain Soames. I wrote them out with some care. Can you tell me what part of them you could not comprehend?”
Soames stayed silent a few seconds.
“Well, Mr Soames?”
“I am sorry, sir. I merely thought that with my superior experience, I was free to interpret the standing orders in sensible fashion.”
“You are, Mr Soames. You are not free to interpret them stupidly. I expect a night attack this week. Colonel Savager expects a night attack. Brigadier-General Rossiter is certain there will be a night attack. You have no experience in this war. We landed in France on the war’s second day. I would be obliged, sir, if you would simply obey orders for the first few days until you have some slight concept of the sort of war this is. We are not engaged in shooting down mad mullahs in the Khyber Pass, sir!”
Soames debated punching Alfred in the teeth. It would be satisfying, but he would be broken at the ensuing court martial.
“Yes, sir.”
“Very good, Mr Soames. Keep alert! Which of the youngsters is on duty now?”
“Second Lieutenant Gifford, sir. I have given him permission to sleep, sir, he having had a busy day. He is only a youngster, arrived today after long travel.”
“Wake him and get him on duty, Mr Soames. He is an officer. If he cannot perform all of an officer’s duties, train him. If he cannot stay awake, send him to me and I will see him broken. He can learn then as a private soldier. There are five drummers remaining in this company, Mr Soames, all of them younger than him and capable of doing their duty. If he cannot match a drummer, then he is no damned use to me!”
“With respect, sir, one can hardly compare a gentleman with the products of the gutter!”
“I agree, Mr Soames. My experience of the drummers tells me they are strong, reliable and often ambitious. Two of them are on my list of reliable men who can expect to be commissioned from the ranks as soon as that expedient becomes practical. Two more years of war and many of our young men will be our own products, and useful for knowing how to be a modern soldier.”
“I would send my papers in before I served with a ranker in the Mess, sir!”
“How very unwise of you, Mr Soames. An officer who chooses to resign his rank must become a private soldier, you know. The War Office will not permit any man to terminate his enlistment.”
“I think my family would have something to say about that, sir!”
“They might say a lot, but I much doubt Lord Kitchener and Mr Lloyd George would wish to listen, Mr Soames. We are in a new sort of war. Your past experience is worth a lot in many ways, but some parts of soldiering are wildly different. Learn and make yourself useful in my company, Mr Soames.”
Alfred moved out on those words, making his way along the trench to the end of their sector where they joined with the Hampshires.
“Halt! Who goes there?”
A formal challenge, suggesting the sentry had recognised an officer’s uniform.
“Major Griffin, Kents.”
“Advance, sir, and be recognised.”
Definitely the case that the sentry was going by the book. Wise man, treating a foreign senior officer with precise respect and strictly by the book.
“Second battalion Hampshires, sir!”
“Which company, soldier?”
“A and B combined, sir.”
“Same problem as us, it would seem. I have command of C and D of ours, also combined. Have you seen anything?”
“Nothing, sir. No activity at all, sir. Dead silent, sir. Nothing happening at all, sir, not like a normal night.”
“No. I don’t like it either, soldier. Well done.”
Alfred turned back to his own sector, made his way quietly to the First Company at the northern end and then back to his own dugout, arriving soon after moonrise.
“Everything quiet, Bissell. Is that a mug of tea?”
It was, made hot and waiting for him.
“If they ain’t here now, sir, likely they ain’t coming tonight. Waiting till dawn, most like.”
“Or an hour beforehand. They would expect us to be waiting at dawn. Pass the word. Dawn stand-to at o-five hundred hours, Bissell. Inform Mr Bates, tell him to pass the word to the company and to Mr Soames.”
“Have to wake Soames up to tell him, sir.”
“So we might, Bissell. The gentleman has some learning to do. I am going to take a couple of hours myself. Give me a shout for one o’clock if I am not moving earlier.”
Bissell nodded, quietly finding a pair of Alfred’s breeches that needed darning, torn on a trenching timber earlier in the day. He would sleep an hour or two at a time through the day or night, whenever he was not needed. He would remain alert while his officer slept. It was part of the job.
“Stand-to! Rise and shine! Hands off cocks on socks! Move it!”
The men responded, still half-asleep but running to their places, rifles in hand, loading unthinkingly.
A minute or two of silence and then the first moans.
“It’s still the middle of the bloody night, Corp!”
“Officer says ‘stand-to’, that means it’s bloody morning!”
“But…”
“Shuddup and open your bleeding eyes, Jones! The officer’s got his reasons and they’re too clever for you to work out. They got to be because of you being bloody thick!”
“Yes, Corp.”
“Movement to the front, Corp!”
The alarm was called along the trench and white flares were fired.
“Bastards are half-way across!”
Alfred’s voice was heard, bellowing over the alarm.
“Ten rounds rapid. Shoot! Vickers. Shoot. Sergeant Warner, why was the Vickers not firing immediately?”
Warner did not know. He would find out, after the fight.
Colonel Savager would hear the outburst of fire and telephone the guns at the rear, calling for a night shoot on prearranged coordinates. They would delay any second wave but the first line of attackers too close already.
“Fire at will! Bayonets!”
Alfred emptied his revolver into the night, reloaded hopefully. He doubted he had hit anything but any addition to the volume of fire must be useful.
“Here, sir.”
Ames, the other new second lieutenant, had been ordered to come to Alfred’s side to act as his runner as necessary.
“Fix your bayonet, Mr Ames. You are likely to use it any minute now.”
Alfred felt Bissell shoving his own bayonet into his left hand, muttered a word of thanks.
“Three red flares, Warner!”
The sergeant obeyed, knowing this was the emergency signal to the Surreys at their rear, the request for aid. Better to call for help before they were overrun.
Rifle fire was being returned now, the attackers running forward and shooting almost without aiming, trying to keep heads down rather than hit the defenders.
The third flare showed high and red. Alfred spotted Warner kneeling, lighting a safety match. It seemed a strange time to choose for a smoke. There was a fuse guttering and Warner stood and heaved something overarm, lobbing out high before bending to a second. There was the thump of a small explosion, a flash of lightning, sight of a dozen and more men dropping.
