And so we are delivered to the castle. I had not thought to see it again so soon; in fact I half expected never to see it again. I feel foolish, like somebody who has bidden a long and heartfelt farewell to a dear friend at a station, only to discover that through some misunderstanding they are on the same train. Still, as the trucks turn off the main road, leaving the line of refugees behind, I wonder what welcome awaits us. I have been watching for smoke as we approach, apprehensive that the soldiers who appeared yesterday might have sacked our home and set it on fire. So far, however, the sky above the trees where the castle is shows only the grey clouds moving down from the north.
The lieutenant investigates the interior of the carriage while we drive, finding much that fascinates her. I look round as she discovers your jewel box, behind your feet; you bend and hold it to your breast but she prises it from your hands with a deal of soft clucking and gentle admonishment that breaks your grip, I believe, as certainly as her greater strength. She inspects each piece in turn, admiring a few against her breast, around her wrist or on her fingers, before laughing and giving them back to you, save for one small ring of white gold and ruby.
“May I keep this?” she asks you. The carriage jolts, clattering over a pothole and I have to look forward again; your head is pressed up against the small of my back as I pull on the reins, keeping the mares away from a line of holes along the road. I feel you nod to her.
“Thank you, Morgan,” the lieutenant says, and sounds well satisfied.
She seems to doze for the last few minutes (you touch me on the back', to get me to look, and there is a smile on your face as you nod at her, head bobbing slackly). I am not so sure; our lieutenant's face does not appear completely relaxed to me, the way people really look when they are genuinely asleep. Perhaps she is still watching us, tempting us, waiting to see what we shall do.
However that may be, now she rouses herself, looks around, asks where we are and pulls a small radio from her tunic. She talks briefly into it and the trucks ahead of us growl to a stop on the driveway. I pull the carriage up just behind; the jeep idles to our rear. We are perhaps a half kilometre from the entrance to the castle's drive, hidden round a bend beneath the damp dark skeletons of the trees.
“Is there a gatehouse?” she asks me quietly. I nod.
“Any other road or track avoiding the gatehouse?”
“Not for the trucks,” I tell her.
“The jeep?”
“I'd think so.”
She stands quickly, rocking the carriage, tips her cap at you then nods to me. “You lead us. We'll take a jeep.” You glance fearfully at me and put your hand out to me. “Kneecap,” our lieutenant says to one of the men in the jeep. “You look after the horses.”
The lieutenant gives orders I do not hear to the men in the trucks, then swings into the jeep, taking the wheel herself. The fellow sitting in the passenger seat holds a drainpipe diameter olive tube about a metre and a half long. I take it to be a rocket launcher. I am squeezed in the back between the metal post supporting the machine gun and a fat, pale soldier who smells like a week dead fox. Behind us, sitting on the rear lip of the vehicle, crouches a fourth soldier who holds the heavy machinegun.
We take the narrow forest track, round the back of the old estate, beneath the small escarpment fringed with dripping evergreens. The overhanging trees and bushes in places form a tunnel around the track, and the soldier manning the machinegun curses quietly, ducking as snagging branches try to wrest the gun from his grip. The track approaches the stream that feeds the moat. The bridge is rotten, too frail for the jeep, timbers skewed and loose. The lieutenant turns to me, a look of disappointment beginning to form on her face.
“We're close now,” I tell her, keeping my voice low. I nod. “Just over the ridge; there's a clear view.”
She follows my gaze, then says quietly to the soldier at the machine gun, “Karma, take the gun. Let's go.”
It would seem I am included. We leave the jeep unmanned and the five of us the lieutenant and I, the man with the rocket launcher, the fat, pale soldier and the one she called Karma, who totes the jeep's machine gun and several heavy looking loops of belted ammunition cross the bridge and scale the steep bank on the far side. From the top, through bushes, the castle and the nearer gardens are spread out. It is a fine vantage point. The lieutenant takes out a pair of small fieldglasses, training them on our home.
A brief shower comes upon us, the falling drops catching in one last slant of sunlight levered underneath the rain clouds billowing down from the north. I look at my home, as a golden shroud of wind and rain wraps round it, trying to see it as another might; a modest castellation, not large; age smoothed, sitting prettily in a ring of water and surrounded by lawns, hedges, gravel paths and outbuildings. The ancient walls once pierced only by arrow slots, long since remodelled to allow more generous windows are the colour of honey, in that rose red light. It looks peaceful; but still, for all that architectural delicacy, somehow too strong for these brutal, disrespecting times.
Steeped in all this indiscriminate barbarity, anything standing proud invites a razing, like some defiant shout which only draws the hands” attention still faster to the throat, to grasp that moving strand of air by which we hang from and on to life. The only persistence in these unleashed days is achieved through low denominations and banality; in uniformity if not in uniforms, like that shoal of the displaced we tried to become part of. Sometimes the lowest how is the highest guard to offer.
For now, all is still about the castle; no smoke rises, no figures stalk its square of battlements; no flag flies above, no light shines and nothing moves. There are still a few tents on the front lawns; people from the village who'd suffered the attentions of armed bands before and had thought the proximity of the castle might guarantee a degree of safety. Some smoke rises slowly there.
I think the castle never looked so good to me as now, for all that one lot of pirates are in charge of it and I am being forced to help another band even more determined to have it for their own.
The grounds around it are another matter; even before the despoilings inflicted by our mongrel dispossessed cutting wood for fires, digging latrines in our lawns the fields, woods and policies were running down, going to seed, becoming neglected. We lost our estate manager two years ago, and I only ever distantly interested in the running of the estate could not find it in me to take his place. Thereafter, gradually, all the other estate workers were taken by the war, one way or the other, and nature, unrestrained, began to renew its old authority over the burden of our lands.
“There, at the stables,” the lieutenant whispers, over the noise of raindrops pattering through the foliage around us. “Those two four wheel drives.”
“Ours,” I tell her. We left them there, and the stable doors unlocked, knowing that to attempt to secure anything would only invite more damage. “Although we didn't leave the doors open like that.”
“That building with the slatted sides at the back of the garages,” the lieutenant says. “Is that a generator house?”
“Yes.”
“Any fuel for it?” She looks at me hopefully.
Only under our carriage. “The tank ran dry last month,” I tell her, truthfully enough. Saving our last few drums of diesel, we have mostly used candles for light and open fires for heating since then; the kitchen stoves burn wood too. There were fires and lamps that ran off propane, but we used up the final cylinder last night, before we left.
“Hmm,” our lieutenant says, as the soldier to her other side nudges her and points. We watch as a man another irregular, as far as I can see appears from the stable block, puts a drum in the back of one of the four wheel drives and then starts it, bringing it round to the front of the castle, out of sight from us.
“Much fuel in those cars?” the lieutenant asks quietly.
“Only what we couldn't siphon,” I reply.
“Can you take a vehicle into the castle itself?”
“Not one of those,” I tell her. “Too tall. There's a small courtyard, with enough room to rum something the size of a jeep around.”
“No drawbridge?” she says, looking at me. I shake my head. She smiles thinly. “I think you mentioned a gate, though, didn't you, Abel?”
“A thin one, and a portcullis of wrought iron. I doubt either would stop “
The lieutenant's radio chirps. She holds up one hand to me, and answers the radio, listening then making a snuffing noise. “Yes, if you can do it cleanly. We're on the ridge just behind the castle.”
She puts the instrument away. “Amateurs,” she says, sneering, and shakes her head. “They've nobody in the gatehouse.” She looks at the man to her other side. “Psycho's in the trees by the drive, over there,” she tells him. “Says there's only two loading the car. Nothing heavy in sight. He's about to start shooting, then one of the trucks and the other jeep are going to make a dash for the front. Give them cover.” She turns to me. “These aren't soldiers,” she says with seeming disgust, “they're just looters.” She shakes her head, then puts the binoculars away and readies her long gun, steadying it and sighting. “Deathwish,” she says to the soldier with the rocket launcher. “Save it. Not unless I tell you, okay?”
The fellow looks disappointed.
Gunfire comes from beyond the castle, near where the driveway leaves the trees and climbs up the shallow slope to the main lawn. There is nothing to see for a moment, then the four wheel drive reappears racing round the gravel track from the front of the castle, back towards the stable block. The car drifts across the gravel, rear door swinging wildly, still open. Its windscreen is starred white and somebody is trying to punch through it from behind. The lieutenant's gun barks suddenly, making me start; the heavy machine gun they brought from the jeep opens up and I put my hands to my ears. The four wheel drive shakes, pieces fly off it and it turns sharply, front wheel seeming to buckle, almost tipping it into the moat (the machine gun's rounds kick tall thin splashes in the water for a moment); the car swerves the other way, losing speed; it straightens out briefly and crashes into the corner of the stable block.
“Stop!” shouts our lieutenant, and the firing ceases.
Steam curls upwards from the car's crushed bonnet. The driver's door opens and somebody falls out, crawling on all fours on the ground, then collapsing.
Another motor sounds, there is more firing from the front of the castle, and then one of the lieutenant's trucks appears, roaring up the drive, straight for the castle. The gunfire stops; the truck disappears from view, obscured by the castle. We hear its engine rev, then stop altogether.
The rain has ceased. For a few moments there is silence and the only movement comes from the wisps of steam escaping the fourwheel drive's engine. Then we hear a few shouts, and some shots. The lieutenant takes out her radio. “Mr C?” she says. I hear a crackle in reply.
“Ah, Dopple; what's happening?”
She listens. “Okay. We got the four wheel drive; it's out of action. We're coming in now, from the ridge behind. Three minutes..” She puts the radio away. “Psycho got one at the bridge,” she tells us. “There's another two or three inside the castle, but the truck got to the gate in time; we're in.” She shoulders her gun. “Tootight,” she says to the fat soldier I shared the rear of the jeep with. “You stay here; pop anybody running away who's not one of us.” The fat soldier nods slowly.
Crouched, we move at a half run between the bushes and trees down to the rear gardens. Isolated shots sound from inside the castle. We go first to the man fallen by the side of the steaming, hissing four wheel drive. A man lies dead in the passenger seat, his uniform weltered in blood, his jaw half torn off. The driver lying on the ground is still moaning; blood seeps on to the gravel beneath him. He is a tall, gawky young man with the spotted complexion of adolescence. Our lieutenant squats to slap his face, trying to get some sense from him but extracting only whimpers. Finally she rises, shakes her head, exasperated.
She looks from the wounded man to the soldier with the machinegun, the one called Karma. He has taken off his steel helmet to wipe his brow; he is red haired. “Your turn,” she mutters. “Come on,” she says to me, as Karma puts his helmet back on, clicks something on the machine gun and points the weapon at the head of the man lying on the ground. The lieutenant strides off, her boots crunching over the gravel.
I turn quickly and follow her and the soldier with the rocket launcher, a strange tenseness between my shoulder blades, as
though vicariously preparing for the coup de grace. The single, loud bang still makes me jump.
We staid, you and I, in the centre of the castle's courtyard, by the well. We look up and around. The looters have done little damage. The lieutenant quizzed old Arthur who chose to stay with the castle rather than come with us and discovered the men arrived only an hour earlier; they barely had time to start sacking our home before our brave lieutenant arrived to the rescue. Now it is hers.
Her men are scrambling everywhere, like children with a new toy. They have a lookout on the battlements, another sentry at the gatehouse; they have mastered the castle's main gate and the portcullis a recent wrought iron replacement, perhaps more decorative than effective, but it seems to please them all the same and are now investigating the cellars, stores and rooms; our servants surprised, confused have been told to let them do as they wish; all the doors have been unlocked. The men though now most of them seem more like boys are choosing their rooms; it appears they will be our guests for longer than a weekend.
The two jeeps are parked here in the courtyard, the trucks sit outside on the far side of the moat, just over the small stone bridge; our carriage has been returned to the stables, the horses to their paddock. A few of the villagers camping on the lawns, who fled at the approach of the looters, are now returning, warily, to their tents.
The lieutenant appears at the main keep door, sauntering towards us, wearing a new tunic top; a vividly red jacket strung about with bright ropes of gold and studded with medal ribbons. She holds a bottle of our best champagne, already opened.
“There,” she says, looking around at the courtyard walls. “Not much damage done.” She smiles at you. “Like my new outfit? She spins once for us; the red dress jacket swings out.
She fastens a couple of the buttons. “This was your grandfather's or something?” she asks..
“Some relation; I forget which,” I tell her evenly, as old Arthur, patently the most venerable of our servants, appears at the door with a tray and makes his way slowly towards us.
The lieutenant smiles indulgently at the old man and indicates he should put the tray on the bonnet of one of the jeeps. There are three glasses. “Thank you… Arthur, isn't it?” she says.
The old fellow rotund, bespectacled, flush faced, head sparsely yellow haired looks uncertain; he nods to the lieutenant, then bows and mutters something to us, before hesitating and walking away. “Champagne,” the lieutenant says, laughing, already pouring; the ring which she took from you, now encircling her left small finger, clinks against the thick green bulk of the bottle and the long flutes” delicate stems.
We take our glasses. “To a pleasant stay,” she says, clinking crystal with us. We sip; she gulps.
“Quite how long do you intend to be with us?” I ask.
She says, “A while. We've been too long on the road, in fields and barns, dossing in half burnt houses and damp tents. We need some leave from all this soldiering; it gets to you after a while.” She swills her drink around, gazing at it. “I can see why you left, but we can defend a place like this.”
“We could not,” I agree. “That's why we chose to leave. May we leave now?”
,You're safer here, now,” she tells us.
I glance at you. “Still, we would like to leave. May we?”
“No,” the lieutenant says, and sighs. “I'd like you to stay.”
She shrugs, makes to inspect her fine tunic. “It's my wish.” She adjusts a cuff. “And rank has its privileges.” Het smile is quite, if briefly, dazzling as she glances about. “We are your guests, and you are ours. We are willingly your guests; how willing you are ours is up to you.” Another shrug. “But however that may be, we intend to stay here.”
“And if anyone turns up with a tank, what then?”
She shrugs. “Then we'd have to leave.” She drinks, and moves the wine around in her mouth for a moment before swallowing. “But there aren't that many tanks around these days, Abel; there isn't much of anything organised, opposition or otherwise, hereabouts just now. A very fluid situation we have at the moment, after all this mobilisation and waging and prosecuting and attrition and…” she waves one hand airily, Just general breakdown, I suppose.” She puts her head to one side. “When did you last see a tank, Abel? Or an aircraft, or a helicopter?”
I think for a moment, then just nod to accede.
I sense you looking up. You grab my arm.
The looters; the three our irregulars discovered inside the castle. They surrendered after a few shots and the lieutenant has apparently been questioning them. Now they appear on the roof above, bundled on to the walkway from the tower above the winding stair by a half dozen of the lieutenant's soldiers. The three have bags or hoods over their heads and ropes round their necks; they stumble and the way they move makes me think they've been beaten; I can hear what sound like sobs and entreaties from inside the dark hoods. They are being led to the castle's two south facing towers, whose bases flank the main gate and look over the bridge and moat towards the front lawns and the drive.
Your eyes are wide, your face pale; the gloved hand clutching at me tightens. The lieutenant drinks, watching you closely, something cold and calibratory about her expression. Then, while you still stare at the line of men on the stone skyline, her face animates, becomes relaxed, even cheerful. “Let's go
inside, shall we?” She takes up the tray. “It's getting cold out here, and it looks like rain.”
Above us, as we troop inside, a young man calls out for his mother.
The lieutenant tethers us in a wing, so that we may fly no more. We dine behind locked doors, on bread and salted meats. in the great hall, our captor entertains her troops with all our roaring kitchens can provide. Predictably, they shot the peacocks. I expected a night of wild debauchery from our new guests, but the lieutenant according to the whispers of our servants, as they come, escorted, to deliver and remove our meal has ordered a double guard, no more than one bottle of wine per man, and decreed that our staff and those camping on the lawns be left unmolested. She is wary of attack on this first night, perhaps, and besides her men are weary, with no strength for celebration, only tired relief.
Fires burn in grates, candies flicker before mirrors on manybranched candelabra, and garden torches, unearthed from an outbuilding, burn smokily on walls or stuck in vases, a graceless caricature of medievality.
Meanwhile our looters their lives negated by a knot, and by that length shortened swing in the air from towers, stranded in the evening air as a grim signal to the outside world; perhaps the good lieutenant hopes that their swaying will so sway others. To keep them company, the lieutenant and her men have raised a fitting standard on the flagpole; a little joke, they say. It is the skin of a long dead carnivore they've found; stalked down some long neglected corridor, hunted out within a dusty storeroom then finally cornered inside a creaking trunk. And so the old snow tiger skin flies in the rain troubled air.
Later, fuelled by their banquet, the lieutenant takes her most trusted men and goes down to those scarred plains we left, to search for what booty, materiel or men she can, far into a torch lit night.