The Waiting Time Page 3

  He had gone out into the night. There was rain on his face, and there were tears.

  He walked fast.

  He had been later than usual that morning, running behind his self-imposed schedule. Been talking on the telephone in his small room above the mess to his sister and the woman, dear soul, had little sense of time and less idea of creating an agenda for a conversation. She’d rambled and he’d not been rude, had allowed her to talk, and now he was later than usual coming to his office in the G/3 building. But, then, Major Perry Johnson could hardly afford to be rude to his sister because in thirteen months he would be moving from bachelor quarters at Ashford to her cottage. Ambleside, the Lake District, would become his retirement home. Nowhere else to go but his sister’s cottage and seasonal work with the National Trust if he was lucky . . . What a goddamn waste.

  ‘Morning, Barnes.’

  ‘Morning, Major.’

  She hadn’t looked up at him, looked instead at the big clock on the wall across her cubbyhole space, above the filing cabinets.

  ‘Well, you know, running a bit late.. . Telephone call just when I was about to leave. . . Rotten morning.’

  He’d barked his excuse. He was fifty-three years old, a primary expert on the old Soviet Army and now on the new Russian Federation Army. He briefed the chief of staff on one to one, and the chief of defence intelligence, and the secretary of state. He as fluent in German, Russian, the Pushtu language of the Afghan tribesmen, and he always felt the need to make an excuse to Corporal Tracy Barnes when he was late to work.

  Her eyes had been on her screen. ‘Careful where you stand, Major, ceiling’s leaking again. I’ve been on to Maintenance and bollocked them. They’re sending someone over — won’t make any difference unless he comes with a bulldozer.

  ‘Of course, excellent — what’s my day?’

  ‘On your desk, waiting for you. Oh, the Captain rang on his mobile, took the dog walking off camp, lost it — his story...’

  He’d unlocked his door.

  ‘Don’t take your coat in there, Major, get wet all over your carpet. I’ll take it outside and shake it.’

  ‘Would you? Thank you.’

  ‘Dogs are as bright as their masters, if you ask me — give us the coat.’

  She’d been beside him, reaching up and helping him off with it, tutting criticism because it dripped a stain on the carpet, and she was gone . . Other than his sister, Corporal Barnes was the only woman he knew. Only went to his sister, the cottage near the water at Ambleside, for his three weeks’ leave a year, but he was with Corporal Barnes for the other forty-nine. Four years she’d been with him — didn’t know where she went for her leave, never asked, assumed she went back to her mother. No one could say it was against her wishes, but he’d quietly put the cap on any question of her promotion to sergeant and he’d blocked any proposal for her transfer. He gazed around his room. Not much that was personal to him, other than the pictures. Leave charts for the section, night-duty rosters, photographs of their new armoured personnel carriers and new mortars and their new minister of defence. The pictures were his own. He was not a happy man, and less happy now that the certain days of the Cold War were consigned to the rubbish bin, and certainly not happy that a working lifetime of deep knowledge was about to be ditched into the same bin.

  The pictures represented the happiest time of his life. The Last Stand of the 44th Regiment at Gundamuck was his favourite, the little knot of men gathered round their officer who had tied the colours around his chest, their ammunition exhausted and bayonets their only defence, the tribesmen circling them in the winter snow of the Khyber Pass — good stuff — and The Remnants of an Army, Lady Butler’s portrayal of the surgeon’s arrival at Jalalabad a couple of days after the Gundamuck massacre, only chap to get through. The happiest time in his life had been in Peshawar, debriefing tribesmen, training them to kill Soviet helicopters with the Blowpipe air-to-ground system. Living in Peshawar, just across the Afghan/Pakistan border, watching from a safe distance the Soviets catch a packet, just as the 44th Regiment had 141 years earlier, at the heart of real intelligence gathering. Happy times, useful times. . . She had been hanging his coat on the hook.

  ‘You haven’t read your day, Major.’

  She nagged at him. It was almost domestic. His sister nagged at him, not unpleasantly but just nagged away until he’d done his chores. Not a great deal of difference between his sister and Corporal Barnes.

  ‘It’s the German thing, isn’t it?’

  ‘On your desk — it’s all day, buffet lunch. Colonel’s hosting. There’s a load coming down from London. In lecture room B/19. Guests is the German with two spooks to hold his hand. Coffee at ten, kick-off half an hour after that. The background brief’s on your desk as well.’

  ‘Have you enough to amuse yourself?’

  She had snorted. There were those in the mess who told him that he permitted her to walk to the bounds of insolence, but he wouldn’t have that talk, not in the mess or anywhere else. He had picked up the brief, two sheets, scanned it, and she was gazing at him, rolling her eyes.

  ‘Don’t know about amusement . There’s the expenses from your Catterick trip. There’s your leave application. I’ve got your paper for Infantry Training School to type up. Have to confirm your dentist. Got to get your car over to Motor Pool for valeting. The stuff you wanted from Library...’

  He had seen the two cars go by, black and unmarked, glistening from the rain, heading towards the B-block complex.

  ‘Morning, Perry. . . Morning, Corporal.’

  He quite liked to be called Perry. It gave him a sort of warmth. The use of his name made him feel wanted. In the mess he always introduced himself with that name, encouraged visitors to use it. He had a need for friends that was seldom gratified. He’d turned towards the door.

  ‘Morning, Ben, bit off schedule, aren’t we?’

  ‘Morning, Captain,’ she’d intoned, as if he was out of order.

  He was young. His hair was a mess. He was red-flushed in the face. The Labrador, black, was soaked wet, on a tight lead and choke chain, close to his heels, the tail curled under the stomach and mourning eyes.

  ‘Went after the rabbits — took a bloody age to catch him. Christ, we’re up against it, aren’t we? Should be moving, should we? Corporal, be an angel, Nelson’s food’s in the car. Half a tin, three handfuls of meal, warm water not boiling to mix in, lunch-time, OK? Oh, those biographies, 49th Mechanized Infantry at. . . God, where is it?’

  ‘At Voronezh, Captain Christie. The 49th Mechanized Infantry is currently at garrison camp at Voronezh.’

  ‘It’s updated, in the safe. Needs retyping — hope you can read

  the writing. Look, I’m short of petrol vouchers. You’ll give Nelson

  a walk. No titbits for him, nothing extra, supposed to be dieting

  · · Be an angel.’

  ‘Time we made a move,’ the Major had said.

  He walked under the lights, and away ahead of him were the high lamps over the wire. There was no one within the wall of wire around Templer Barracks in whom he could confide, so damned unfair, no one to comfort him.

  It would be across the barracks within an hour. The whispering, giggling, gossiping and tittering would be sieved through the officers’ mess, the officers’ married quarters, the sergeants’ mess, their married quarters, junior ranks’ canteen, junior ranks’ quarters. The Colonel had said that it was Perry Johnson’s responsibility, and every bastard out there would have a little story, grist fed to the mill, about the liberties taken by Corporal Tracy Barnes towards her commanding officer. He had not the merest idea why she had attacked the German with such animal savagery.

  The guardhouse sergeant snapped from his chair, stood to attention, but he was sure the damn man had smirked. On the table was a plastic bag holding a tie, a belt and a pair of shoelaces.

  ‘Where is she?’

  ‘Cell block, number four, sir.’

  He went to the steel
-barred door, and the dull-lit corridor stretched into shadows in front of him.

  ‘Well, hurry up, Sergeant.’

  ‘Yes, sir. Captain Christie’s with her, sir, but I’ve kept an eye out just in case she thumps him.’ The sergeant’s face was impassive.

  He smeared his eyes with his coat sleeve. Should have done it before entering the guardhouse. The wet would have been noted. He was admitted to the corridor of the cell block. Good material for the mill of gossip and more bloody tittering.

  He went into the cell. Christie was standing inside the open door, white in the face. A central light shone down, protected by a close-mesh wire. The walls, tiled to waist height and whitewashed above, were covered in graffiti scrawls and line drawings of genitalia that were quite disgusting. He had only ever been in the cells once before, to escort a civilian solicitor when one of his corporals, Russian-language translator, had confessed to selling off hire-purchase video-recorders. A foul smell, urine and vomit. There was a window above her, reinforced opaque glass set into concrete.

  ‘What’s she said?’

  ‘She hasn’t said anything. I haven’t asked her anything.’

  ‘Asked her anything, “Major”...’

  ‘I haven’t asked her anything, Major.’

  A thin mattress was on the bed. The bed was a slab block of concrete. A blanket of serge grey was folded on the mattress. He felt raw anger towards her. She had destroyed him.

  ‘Well, Barnes, what the hell is this about?’

  She sat on the mattress. Her arms were around her knees, which were pulled up against her chest.

  ‘Waiting, Barnes. Why, in God’s name, did you do that?’

  She was pale, except for the red welt at the side of her neck where the chop of the minder’s hand had caught her.

  ‘Don’t play the bloody madam. You’re in a pit of trouble. Bugger me about and you’ll be sorry. Why did you do it?’

  She gazed back at him. Just once she breathed deeply, grimaced, and he remembered the kick she had taken in the ribs. Her body shook, her shoulders and her knees, but her face was expressionless. No insolence, no defiance, no fear.

  ‘Assault, actual bodily harm, grievous bodily harm, could even be Official Secrets Act. Barnes, understand me, you’re for the jump, so don’t fuck with me.’

  Ben Christie glanced at him, contempt. ‘Tracy, you know us and we know you, you work with us and you trust us. Please, Tracy. .

  She said nothing. She gazed at them, through them. She seemed so small, hunched on the mattress, so vulnerable.

  ‘We’ll squeeze it out of you, damn sure we will. Last time, what was it about?’

  Ben Christie said gently, like he was talking with that damn dog, ‘All we want to do is help, Tracy, but we have to know why.’

  There was the shake in her shoulders and knees. It could have been the shock, but he’d have sworn that she was quite in control, so calm. The silence hung around them. The way she sat, the way she held her knees, he could see up her thighs. He turned away. The blood was in the veins of his cheeks.

  ‘Don’t damn well come back to me tomorrow, next week, with your story and expect sympathy from me. Made your own bed, Barnes, and you can bloody well lie on it.’

  Captain Christie reached out his hand to her, as if to touch her. ‘Please, Tracy, I meant it. I meant it absolutely when I said we wanted to help you...’

  She flinched away. She rejected him, said nothing. Johnson looked at his watch. The Colonel had given him two hours and he’d eaten into that time. He turned on his heel and the Captain, no bloody spine, followed him out into the corridor. He called the sergeant and told him to secure the cell, no access, no visitors, without his express permission. Out again into the night.. . Maybe he should have belted her . . . He led. No small-talk between them, Captain Christie stayed a pace behind.

  They were on a gravel path, and Walsh came past them. He was carrying the big cardboard box that held his leaving present, flanked by his chums from Irish postings. He’d heard they were going on to dinner in Ashford. The clique stepped off the gravel, made way for him and Christie, stood silent like an honour guard. They walked on and heard belly laughs behind them. Into G/3. Past the small rooms where the warrant officers and the sergeants worked, doors all closed and locked, no light from underneath. They’d all know by now, in their mess, in their canteen, in their quarters, and damn good fun they’d be having with their knowledge. They’d all know that, in public, he’d been whipped like a clumsy recruit was whipped on the parade-ground by a drill instructor.. . So bloody unfair.

  There was a scraping sound, and a whimpering. He unlocked the door. Christie’s bloody dog bounded at him and he raised his knee to ward it off. Christie was muttering that he’d better take the dog to the grass. He flapped his hand, past caring where the dog peed. He went inside. He was alone. He thought the rooms of G/3/29 were like his mother’s house, after she’d died. She’d used frail strength to clean her house the day before she had gone to the hospital. His room, Christie’s, and the area between them were as ordered as his mother’s house had been. He rocked. On her desk were the neat piles of paper — his typed speech for the Infantry Training School, his expenses-claim form with the stapled receipts of his Catterick trip, her note in copperplate handwriting of the time, date of his dentist appointment, what time in the morning his car would be collected for valeting. Beside his pile was Christie’s — the revised appraisal of the 49th Mechanized Infantry Division at Voronezh, the petrol vouchers held together with a paper clip . . . The dog came from behind him, settled under her desk.

  He said, grimly, ‘Search her area, your desk drawers, I’ll do mine...’

  ‘What are we looking for, Perry?’

  He exploded, ‘How the hell do I know? How should I know why the best corporal in this whole bloody camp makes an unprovoked attack? I don’t know, except that it’s about the past.’

  ‘He leaves when I say so. Don’t care who he is, when he’s in my care he leaves when I’m satisfied that he’s fit to go.’

  The sick bay was the territory of Mavis Fogarty. It was many years since she had left the farm near Balinrobe and enlisted as a nurse in the British Army. She seldom went home because it would embarrass her family, but she retained the big hands suited to work on the Co. Mayo bog fields. She had his trousers off him and his underpants at his knees, and with surprising gentleness examined the bruised testicles of Dieter Krause. She’d done time in the military hospitals at Dortmund and Soest, spoke passable German, and told him there was no lasting damage. She didn’t ask how it was, during a social drink in the officers’ mess, that he’d managed to get so thoroughly battered — she’d learn later, in the canteen. She pulled up his pants, covered him. She started with sterile hot water and cotton wool to clean the raked nail slashes on his face. He wore a wedding ring. If her husband ever came home with scratches like that on his face then he’d be put to sleep in the garage. She’d earmarked a salve for the grazes at the back of his head where the bruising showed through his hair. The minders, sullen and watching her every move, were across the room from her. One nursed his ankle as if he’d kicked something heavy, and the other rubbed the heel of his hand as if he’d hit something solid. She wiped the scratch wounds and established her absolute authority over them.

  ‘Funny thing, shock. Soldiers here get into Saturday-night fights, get back to camp and think they’re fine, then collapse. He stays here, right here, till I’m ready to let him go.’

  The accommodation block for junior ranks (female) knew, each last one of them, that Corporal Barnes was locked in a guardhouse cell. They also knew that she had done heavy damage in the officers’ mess and had put a German guest into Sick Bay for repairs. Her major and the captain with wife trouble were in the block and searching her room. The traffic down the first-floor corridor was brisk, but the fourth door on the right was closed and there was a provost sergeant outside. Those who did pass could only feed to the rumour factory that the room
was being ripped apart.

  They ransacked the privacy of the sleeping area, but Ben Christie backed off when it came to the chest of drawers, left it to the Major. Perry Johnson, frantic, didn’t hesitate, dragged the drawers clear, shook and examined each item of underwear, knickers, bras, tights and slips — all so neatly folded away before Perry’s hands were on them.. . and Trish just dumped her smalls into a drawer, out of sight and out of mind . . . So neat, so small, what she wore against her skin. Christie caught the Major’s eye, hadn’t intended to, but Perry had flushed red. The clothes were out of the drawers, the drawers were out of the chest and on the bed. The bed was already stripped. The sheets and blankets, with her pyjamas, were heaped on the floor. The curtains were off the window. The rug was rolled away. . . He had taken each coat, skirt and blouse, civilian and uniform, from the wardrobe, checked the pockets, felt the collars and the waists where the material was double thickness, and hung them on the door. He would take the wardrobe to pieces because there was a double ceiling in it and a double floor. Out in the corridor a telephone was ringing. For Christ’s sake, the bloody man Johnson was holding up a bra against the light. What was she bloody well going to hide in there? In summer she didn’t wear a tie, or a tunic or a pullover, and she’d the top buttons of the blouse unfastened, and she’d have called him over to check her work on the screen before she printed it up, teasing, and he’d see the bra and what the bra held . . . There was a photograph of a cat, and of an elderly woman, taken from their frames, checked. There was a book, woman’s saga, shaken and then the spine pulled off. Johnson looked at him, and Ben shook his head. Johnson knelt, grunted, and began to rip back the vinyl flooring. A knock.

  ‘Please, sir, what do I do. It’s Tracy’s — Corporal Barnes’s — mum on the phone for her.’

  Ben opened the door. ‘I’ll take it.’

  ‘She always rings this night, this time, clockwork.’

  The girl, lance-corporal, Karen something, fat ankles, pointed down the corridor to the pay phone. The receiver was dangling. Just what he bloody needed. . . He went over and picked it up. He waved the hovering lance-corporal away.