A History Maker

THREE WARRIOR WORK

LIKE ALL WHO LOVED VISITORS Annie had a room with a door onto the veranda of her home, so Wat left Craig Douglas that morning almost unnoticed at first. Near the stables he heard musical jangling and shrill shouts of, “Fall down you’re dead!” — ” No I clonked you first!”

In a sandpit by the path a jumble of colourful shelled creatures were hitting each other with tiny swords: infants in helmets and armour which pinged, twanged or clonked under different strengths of blow. They stood still as he drew level then the smallest ran to him and stuttered breathlessly, “When I grow up I’ll be a Amazon and kill men like you do cousin Wattie!”

She was a very wee girl. Wat paused and said politely, “Name and age?”

“Betty. Four.”

“Soldiers don’t fight to kill each other, Betty. We fight to win the respect due to courage.”

“Aye but killing men is still fun intit cousin Wattie?”

He shook his head hopelessly and entered the stable.

Three twelve-year-old lads knelt on the floor playing jorries. They sprang up, led the dapple grey from her stall, saddled and bridled her.

“Are you for the Warrior house Wat?” said one,

“Can we come with ye?”

“I’m for a quiet ride on my lonesome lone, men,” Wat told them sombrely, “I’m sorry your brothers got killed.”

“But they helped us draw with Northumbria,” said one gently as if offering consolation.

“Don’t fool yourselves, men. Geneva will declare our draw a foul. I know because I was chief fouler. Open that door.”

On the common he found his hands had healed enough to let him mount Sophia with dignity and after waving goodbye rode down to Yarrow. He suspected many eyes now watched him from the big house with the wood behind so did not look back. Wanting solitude he headed downstream toward Mountbenger along a mossy track between tangled hedges which followed the line of an old motorway.

The air felt close and heavy this morning though little gusts of wind sometimes refreshed it. A dull sky looked full of rain which never fell. Yellow gorse on the hillside was the only vivid colour. A mile above Mountbenger he soaked his legs fording the river and rode up the glen behind White Law, avoiding the houses of Altrieve and Hartleap by keeping to the hillside, and ascending Altrieve burn to the saddle between Peat Law and the Wiss. Though still brooding on the affection and respect he might lose by his quarrel with Annie he was soothed for a while by lonely distances which grew more visible the higher he came. Houses, cultivation, everything human was hidden in dips between a wilderness of grey heights. Vapour from powerplants was buried in ragged cloud which dimmed the highest summits. Nothing he now saw had changed since these hills divided Scotland from England in the historical epoch, the killing time when huge governments had split the world into nations warring for each other’s property. He recalled with pride that for centuries the border clans had held aloof from England and Scotland, siding with whichever nation was too weak to tax them. But theft and murder had flourished in these rough hills too. The old ballads were full of it. The only wealth here had been small black cattle and when illness or famine thinned the herds the wife of a homestead set a plate with a pair of spurs on it before her man when he sat down to eat, a hint that he must now raid the English farms or starve. Yes, it was luxury to fear the ill opinion of the Ettrick aunts more than an empty belly, to worry about an unfair blow struck in a war between willing fighters, to suffer because he had frightened a healthy young girl in a moment of rage. He smiled and heard wind stir the grasses, near and distant cries of the whaups, and once what sounded like voices behind a clump of whins. Crossing a shoulder of hillside with a view into the gardens of Hartleap he saw what seemed half the family down there looking up at him. Later he glimpsed tiny figures withdraw behind the cairn on the summit of Bowerhope Law.

Signs of being watched and followed increased until he emerged from the woods above Thirlstane burn where the watchers and followers stopped trying to keep out of sight. He went down the gully with children of every age between eight and fifteen scrambling and leaping and dodging along the slopes on each side. The smallest rode ponies, two or three to a back. A surprising number were girls and the whole crowd was too big to be local — several must have come over from Eskdale or farther. Obviously something he did not know had made him interesting yet untouchable; only a huge, communal, fascinated shyness explained the movements of this company which covered the slopes beside him yet stayed out of talking range. His killing of the Northumbrian who held the standard had likely been condemned as a war crime so that Ettrick was now a shamed and beaten clan. Did these children hate or sympathize with him? They probably did not know themselves; they were waiting to learn how he would be received at the Warrior house. Wat feared nobody in the Warrior house, he dreaded nothing but the ill opinion of the women. Determined to learn the worst he sat upright and rode forward with a bold front unlike his usual brooding slouch.

A line of water as pale as the sky appeared above trees below; it was the head of Saint Mary’s Loch and the Warrior house flag wagged against it. With various shouts the children raced downhill away from him and in less than five minutes he was alone again. If Sophia had not been a tired old pony he would have raced ahead of them; instead he paused, tempted by a track which ran sideways to Bowerhope where he was sure of a private welcome from a couple of sisters. Then a gleaming globe spun up from behind a blaeberry clump and hung before his face saying, “What is your reaction to the news from Geneva, Major Dryhope?”

He shut his eyes, clapped the pony’s flanks with his heels and was carried straight downhill. He heard another voice, soft and female, say, “By all means treat the public eye with contempt Major Dryhope, but you must have something to say against Geneva’s condemnation of your father and clan.”

With an effort he kept his face immobile and eyes shut for at least three minutes. When he opened them the globe had vanished.

The Warrior house was built over the short river flowing into Saint Mary’s Loch from Loch of the Lowes. Four steep glass-fronted gables, a central pyramidal skylight, a hexagonal tower faceted with mirrors made it look like a futuristic village in a 1930s Hollywood movie or a postmodern art gallery designed sixty years later. This archaic appearance was enhanced by an absence of powerplant. Wat saw that the plain before the eastern gable was covered by a standing horde of children too young to be cadets, and adolescents of both sexes, and older men on horseback from houses normally indifferent to warrior business. A greybeard and three younger men from the musical house of Henderland were conspicuous by the instruments they held. The horsemen and pony riders stood right and left of the path to the entrance. As Sophia ambled down it Wat had a dream-like sense of having done this before, then remembered his walk from the stable through the children of Craig Douglas. Passing a group of boys with Annie in it he noticed many of the Craig Douglas children were here too. She was staring open-mouthed with hand half raised as if wanting yet fearing to catch his attention. He nodded absent-mindedly to her for he was trying to understand the mood of this dense crowd gazing at him with no obvious sign of anger or pleasure. Then a shrill voice from behind (and it sounded like Annie’s) cried,

“Hooray for Wattie Dryhope!” and the whole crowd began roaring, howling, yelling that too. Through the roar he heard powerful drones followed by vivid squeals. The Henderlands were piping. Their tune swelled up and overwhelmed the welter of cheering and it was the tune of a song everyone had known since childhood. In less than a minute the crowd was singing —

“March, march, Ettrick and Teviotdale,

Why my lads dinna ye march

forward in order?

March, march, Eskdale and Liddesdale,

All the Blue Bonnets are over the Border!”

— so they liked him. Tears of relief streamed down his face though he kept it rigid. He also noticed, without pleasure, public eyes spinning over the heads of the crowd. Recovering most of the assurance he had lost since rolling off the cliff he began to notice something unpleasant in this unanimous bellowing of what had once seemed a nostalgic old marching song —

“Come from the hills

where your hirsels are grazing,

Come from the glen

of the buck and the roe;

Come to the crag where

the beacon is blazing,

Come with the buckler,

the lance and the bow!”

He reacted by scowling while Sophia, also disliking the noise, broke into a clumsy little gallop which brought him to the porch. Here Boys’ Brigade captains, one of them Wat’s twelve-year-old brother Sandy, swarmed round him grinning like lunatics and jabbering something in which standard was the only distinct word. He yelled, “Give Sophia a feed ye gowks — let Sandy get me a whisky,” and leapt down and rushed inside.

Within the door he was stopped by a group of veterans: men over forty whose thick beards and moustaches did not hide their scars. Each shook his hand in turn, looking him straight in the eye and giving a firm little nod which struck him as more farcical than the communal roaring outside. Behind the veterans every cadet in Ettrick between eleven and fourteen years seemed crowded into the eastern lobby, grinning or open-mouthed or trying to look as grim as he felt himself. On the stair to the officers’ mess the house servants stood like servants in the mansion of a Victorian duke assembled to welcome the young laird home. They were ranked behind the major domo, a stately giant with whiskers bushier than the fiercest veteran’s. He said, “Master Wattie, I hope at last I may persuade you to a dram?”

“Thanks Jenny. I have asked Sandy for one.”

“Master Sandy will receive it from my hands.” The major domo led Wat upstairs processionally with Sandy beside him and the veterans in the rear. Martial discipline ensured a decent silence among them but did not lessen the deafening bellow outside which still made sense to those who knew the words —

“England shall many a day

tell of the bloody fray,

When the Blue Bonnets

came over the Border!”

The officers’ mess was under the gable above the eastern lobby. Wat was appalled by its emptiness. A week ago over two hundred cheerful men most of them in their late teens and twenties, had been drinking, laughing and chatting there; the dozen veterans now converging on the bar emphasized the difference. So did three cripples in orthopaedic chairs playing a game of whist: Colonel Tam Wardlaw, Rab Gillkeeket and Davie Deuchar. Wat had not seen them since the charge downhill with the standard. He went over and stood looking down on the game but they gave no sign of recognition though the Colonel said to the others, “Here comes trouble. I pass.”

“Solo,” said Rab.

“Misère,” said Davie.

Wat covered his embarrassment by saying,

“Northumbria has made a bonny mess of you three.”

“We might have been as fit as you if we’d rolled off a cliff,” muttered Rab.

“True,” said Wat abruptly, “Public eyeballs are snooping outside. D’ye mind doing with less daylight, Colonel?”

Colonel Wardlaw shrugged a shoulder.

“Frost the window, Jenny!” Wat called to the major domo behind the bar. Between the double sheets of glass a paperthin water fall slid down then froze into starry white patterns which broke the appearance of the crowd and the hills outside into jagged shadows. Wat pulled a chair up to the table and sat watching the players until the Colonel said, “Do you want a hand?”

“I want news from Geneva.”

Tam Wardlaw handed him a printed sheet. Wat held it without reading until his young brother put a whisky in the other hand.

“Wattie Dryhope is at The Macallan,” sang Davie softly.

“Not possible!” said Rab, “Dryhope never touches alcohol. It upsets his chemistry.”

“He’s drinking it now,” said the Colonel, “His chemistry must be out of order.”

“Give us peace,” muttered Wat and read the printout.

The Global and Interplanetary Council for War Regulation Sitting in Geneva has considered General Dodds’s complaint against the recent draw between Ettrick and Northumbria United. General Dodds accuses Ettrick of obtaining the result by a foul pretence of surrender which did not take place, resulting in the murder of at least three Northumbrians who dropped their guard having been deceived into thinking the battle over. As proof of this he refers the Council to the public eye battle archive.

The Council has scrutinized the battle archive closely and believes there is good reason to condemn Ettrick but not for the action to which General Dodds objects. That a certain amount of deception is an inevitable and accepted part of combat is proved by that sword stroke known as a feint, nor is it unusual for hard-pressed troops to relinquish their standard to an enemy in order to counterattack more strongly. The Northumbrians holding the Ettrick standard believed the momentary pause signified surrender because they knew Ettrick could not win, being hopelessly outnumbered; but the Geneva Convention expressly states NO SOLDIER IS DEEMED TO HAVE SURRENDERED BEFORE HE DROPS HIS WEAPON OR OFFERS THE HILT, BUTT OR HANDLE TO THE OPPONENT. This did not happen. In the slaughter following the resumption of fighting after a twelve-second pause nearly every Ettrick warrior died sword in hand. If any dropped them or flung them away General Dodds’s troops did not notice.

But the Global and Interplanetary Council for War Regulation Sitting in Geneva is forced to condemn General Jardine Craig Douglas for a war crime worthy of the twentieth century. He was wrong to lead his clan into a third day of battle which must end in the death of nearly all his men, many of them cadets recently promoted from the Boys’ Brigade. His own death — however gladly embraced — is no compensation for theirs, however gladly they embraced it. The purpose of warfare is not scoring points over an opponent: it is to show human contempt of pain and annihilation. Most armies do this without exploiting the self-sacrificial urge of trainees who admire their senior officers. When such exploitation is proposed it is not treachery for officers to defy the general who proposes it. The Global and Interplanetary Council for War Regulation Sitting in Geneva regrets that Major Wat Dryhope was the only Ettrick warrior who appeared to recognize this fact …

Wat chuckled and said loudly, “I’ve just read the bit that explains why you chaps don’t like me now.”

“Aye,” said the Colonel, “You’re suffering the doom of everyone too good for their kindred.”

“Wat Dryhope, humanity’s darling,” sang Davie.

“Wattie! The standard!” whispered Sandy urgently, “Ask them when we can — ”

“Wheesht,” said Wat and continued reading.

For the past twenty years the Council has noticed a tendency for small, competitive clans to throw younger and younger cadets into the battle line. True lovers of fighting must deplore the harm this does to the noble art of war. By his holocaust of young lives General Jardine Craig Douglas has broken the splendid line of Ettrick victories which began with the century. At least a decade must pass before Ettrick breeds and trains enough adult soldiers to fight again at a professional level.

So the Global and Interplanetary Council for War Regulation Sitting in Geneva proposes three additions to the Geneva Convention.

1 — No war will extend to a third day of battle.

2 — No cadets of less than sixteen years shall be admitted to the battle line.

3 — When a standard leaves a field of battle by the interposition of a natural feature or phenomenon (cliff, crag, hill, cavern, canyon, pot-hole, volcanic vent or other geological formation; bog, swamp, shifting sands, stream, pond, river, lake, lagoon, sea, ocean or other body of water; breeze, wind, gale, tempest, sandstorm, hurricane, cyclone, tornado, lightning, fireball, aerolith or other meteorological event) the battle will be judged to have ended at that moment of the standard’s departure from the field of battle, and victory will belong to the side which has lost fewest men.

The Global and Interplanetary Council for War Regulation Sitting in Geneva hereby declares a moratorium upon all armed conflict until a global and interplanetary referendum decides by a simple majority that each of these rules is accepted or rejected as part of the Geneva Convention. Everyone over fifteen years of age will be eligible to vote.

Meanwhile the Global Council for War Regulation Sitting in Geneva declares that these humanitarian proposals in no way disparage the honesty and courage of the Ettrick soldiers who carried out General Jardine Craig Douglas’s plan, while still condemning absolutely their recklessness in obeying him. The Global and Interplanetary Council for War Regulation Sitting in Geneva agrees with the public eye and the mass of public opinion, in declaring the battle between Northumbria and Ettrick a draw; but also declare it a battle fought in circumstances degrading to the senior officers responsible, a kind of battle which must never be repeated.

Wat screwed the printout into a ball, cried, “Good for Geneva!” and flung the ball lightly at Colonel Wardlaw so that it bounced off his ear. The Colonel flinched then muttered, “Hard on your dad.”

“It’s right about the Dad! But we’ll forgive his bloody craziness if it gets three good rules like that made law.”

“You havenae drunk your whisky,” said Rab.

“I don’t need it now,” said Wat, standing and going to them. They too were drinking Macallan. He tipped a neat third of his glass into each of theirs then signed to the barman for a strong coffee. It was brought.

“I hate Dryhope, he’s a smug bastard,” sang Davie softly.

“He cannae help it,” said Rab, “He wins a world-famous draw by cheatery, fails in his suicide attempt and gets praised by Geneva for standing up to his daddy, though he did exactly what the old man telt him. Do you hate him too, Colonel?”

“Aye, but I hate his wee brother worse. Cadet Dryhope!” yelled the Colonel, “Stop standing there like a replica of Michel-fucking-angelo’s David! In the days before the establishment of our democratic Utopia pretty wee soldiers who stood straight and cocky in front of crippled officers were given a hundred lashes. Slouch like your brother.”

“But the standard!” whispered the boy trying to slouch and plead frantically at the same time. “Clear out Sandy,” said Wat. Sandy left. As he opened and shut the door they heard a burst of hubbub from below pierced by the music of pipes playing a coronach.

“Colonel Wardlaw!” said Wat sharply, “Tell me now why grown men like the Henderlands and Foulshiels — men with no interest in warrior business — are waiting downstairs among a crowd of weans and lassies.”

“I don’t know,” muttered Wardlaw.

“Will I go down and find out?” asked Wat.

“The game’s a bogie, men,” said the colonel to the other players. He flung his cards on the table and turned his chair to face Wat. Davie dealt the cards again and went on playing with Rab.

In a low voice pitched for Wat’s ears only Colonel Wardlaw said, “Look at my face, Dryhope.”

Wat did so with frank pleasure because it took his attention away from the surgical corset holding the Colonel’s body together; then he saw that only a pale-blue left eye showed intelligence. The bloodshot right stared fixedly sideways from a pupil so big it blotted out the iris.

“Sorry, Tam,” said Wat quietly, “I thought only your lower parts were hurt.”

“No. The head has the worst damage and not where you see it. There’s a sore buzzing inside that I try to think isnae an insect. I wish you’d spent a month wandering the hills, Wattie, because I need peace. I said Here comes trouble when you arrived because you make us a quorum — the three officers and one colonel needed to dispatch urgent regimental business. Wattie, neither me nor Rab nor Davie could dispatch a paper aeroplane. We’re as queer and gruesome as a week with nine Mondays. I’m done with soldiering, Wattie. We’re all done with soldiering. The knocks we got from Northumbria are mainly why but that message from Geneva finished us. A spate of others marked urgent followed it. They’re in this pouch — ” (Tam clapped a satchel under the armrest of his chair) “ — I darena look at them.”

“Gie’s them,” said Wat, stretching out a hand,

“Jenny could have answered them but I’ll do it faster. I bet half can be ignored and the rest answered with Thanks for your friendly letter. And forget Geneva, Tam. It said the truth, but no honest soldier or kind woman will scorn us for obeying our elected commander.”

Wat put the wad of sheets on a nearby table and quickly sorted it into two piles, one of blue sheets from public eye companies, one of pink sheets meaning warrior business. Tam watched with an expression in which weariness, indifference and anxiety oddly blended. Two minutes later Wat lifted the blue pile and said, “These are from every big eye company there is, the nearest in the Lothians, the farthest in the satellite belt. We know they want to exploit public excitement about a battle which for us is past and done, so we answer them this way.” With a sharp wrench Wat tore that pile in two, laid the bits on a chair then sorted through the other, this time glancing at a line or two before laying each one aside. Once he paused and said, “Colonel Tam, why were our wee lads yattering about standards?”

“They want permission to fish our old pole out of the North Sea. They’re feart some of Dodds’s tykes will get it first and melt it intae the roots of a Northumbrian powerplant.”

Tam sipped his whisky. Wat finished reading then turned and said, “Cellini’s Cosmopolitan Cloud Circus remind you that tomorrow night they will pay homage to mankind’s most famous draw with a completely new spectacle called From the Big Bang to the Battle of the Ettrick Standard: a Creative Evolutionary Opera to be performed on the hills round Selkirk. The rest are congratulations from clan chiefs everywhere, some of them world champions. Many blame Geneva for what some call a nursemaid attitude to the noble art of war. And here’s one to cheer you — Shafto of Northumbria wishes us well and says he didn’t subscribe to Dodds’s protest against the draw. This other is the only one needing a careful answer. Border United — the chiefs of Eskdale, Teviotdale, Liddesdale and the Merse — regret our loss of folk fit to train the next generation of Ettrick fighters. They will lend us officers of their own, on a rotation basis, not to fight battles of course but to get our youngsters ready for them. What do you say to that?”

“Answer it yourself. Answer it how you like,” said Tam, “I telt the truth when I said I’m done with every game but cards.”

His haunted expression did not change but something like a smile twisted it. In a hollow, resounding voice which all in the mess turned to hear he announced: “As Colonel of the Ettrick Army met in a quorum of my fellow officers in the absence of our dearly deceased General Jardine Craig Douglas, I appoint YOU, Major Dryhope, my successor with full plenary powers to do what the hell you like until such time as you get yourself — or someone else — elected general in Jardine’s stead. Arise Colonel Dryhope, greatest of Ettrick’s sons! I also declare that I and Rab Gillkeeket and Davie Deuchar are henceforth a trio of clapped-out veterans fit for nothing but games our grannies taught us. Deal me a hand, lads.” He turned his chair back to the card table where Davie Deuchar, after slowly clapping his hands together twice, shuffled and dealt.

Wat had risen to his feet when the Colonel told him to. He now stood wondering why his new appointment did not surprise him, though he had certainly never expected it. The obvious answer was that only he was fit for it. He wished Colonel Wardlaw had passed on the job in kinder language. The veterans at the bar saluted him then raised and drained their glasses. He saluted back and was wondering what to do next when the major domo approached, bowed, murmured that the crowd downstairs had been long awaiting an announcement, and asked if Colonel Dryhope wished the decision the quorum had just expressed through Colonel Wardlaw to be made public.

“Verbatim?” said Wat, sharply.

“No sir: in a form suitably edited for the public ear,” said Jenny as reproachfully as if his intelligence had been questioned.

“Go ahead Jenny.”

Jenny left by a door behind the bar and Wat stood listening intently. He heard throbbings of a speaker then a swelling cheer which got louder until even here it was uncomfortably loud. It did not stop. Wat wondered why there was something soothing in the sound.

“Shut them up Dryhope!” yelled Tam, “Talk to them! The glaikit sumphs want their new sweetheart to simper audibly.”

Jenny approached again, bowed, put his moustache ticklingly close to Wat’s right ear and said, “Does Colonel Dryhope wish to respond to the ovation by loudspeaker, or will he prefer to personally address the Boys’ Brigade in the hall of the standards? In either case his words will be relayed to the crowd outside.”

Wat felt the moustache withdraw and saw Jenny’s large flat ear presented to his mouth. He said thoughtfully, “Tell them that in fifteen minutes I’ll speak from the roof of the eastern porch — that will give the Boy’s Brigade time to go outside. But first tell their captains to come here to the mess. And … and I must make a private call to Northumbria first. The speech will start in thirty minutes, not fifteen.” He went out with Jenny and the cheering stopped soon after.

Later he returned, spoke briefly with veterans at the bar, went to the door, admitted six Boys’ Brigade captains and talked to them while Jenny served them half pints of shandy. This was their first time in the officers’ mess and they behaved with fitting dignity. Then Wat approached Tam, Rab and Davie and said quietly, “One last request, lads.”

“Request refused,” said Wardlaw, “What is it?”

“I’m making a speech from the porch roof and want you with me.”

“Ye want us for a balcony appearance, Colonel Dryhope?” sang Davie loudly, “Like the clique who stood about behind Hitler above the Potsdamstrasse? Or made Stalin look less lonely outside the Kremlin? An hour ago you frosted that window to shut out public eyeballs. I knew power corrupts but didnae know it corrupted that fast!”

“You don’t need our support, Dryhope,” said Tam Wardlaw sourly.

“O I do, I need all three of you,” said Wat, kneeling so that his face was level with theirs, “Our families want to be proud of Ettrick, no matter what Geneva says. That’s why folk of every sort except aunts and grannies are waiting outside. We can make them proud if we stand together. I’ll be out there with old Megget and Cappercleuch and Hartleap, veterans who fought at Ilkley and Kettering and Sunningdale. I’ll have captains of the Boys’ Brigade beside me, champions of the future. How can I inspire pride when the best soldiers to survive our hardest fight — three of the quorum who made me Colonel — sit girning in the shadows like sulky bairns while the rest of us stand in the sunlight trying to look brave? Ye dour lazy bitches, ye don’t even need to stand! You’ve nae legs! All ye need do is roll your chairs through the door ahint ye.”

“Does he persuade, Deuchar?” wondered Rab Gillkeeket, “If my glands were not disjaskit his rhetoric would get the adrenalin flowing, but does he persuade?”

“He appealed to our clan patriotism,” pondered Davie, “Then flattered, shamed and mocked. This blend of the pawkie, couthie and earthy was once thought characteristic of the Scottish peasantry but Wat isnae a peasant and we’re naething but wrecks. What says Wardlaw?”

Tam Wardlaw said violently, “We’ll do it and be done with it.”

Wat nodded, told them to be ready in five minutes then went to a table where Jenny had laid a tumbler of milk and plate of sandwiches, his first meal that day.

The starry film of frost vaporized and drifted up leaving the wall transparent. A section of it opened onto a roof garden over the porch. Wat sent the veterans and boys’ captains out with drinks in their hands to sit where they liked, then he and the cripples followed, wending through the tables to the rail that served as parapet. He put a chair between Wardlaw and Deuchar and sat with arms folded on the rail, waiting.

This informal arrival drew little attention. The cloud had broken letting afternoon sunlight through. The crowd, much bigger than when he arrived, was now in a holiday mood. Picnic parties sat chatting on the turf; groups surrounded fiddlers, wrestlers, singers, debaters. The kind of alcohol and snuff no housemother would synthesize was being traded by gangrels in return for wristcoms and items of clothing. Some people in bright outlandish garb were advertising the cloud circus. He noticed a woman on twenty-foot-tall stilts covered by red and white striped trousers. She wore a star-spangled top hat and tail coat, and stepped about over the heads of the crowd waving in a comically threatening way a parasol shaped like a nuclear bomb cloud. Children on the verge of the crowd raced ponies through bracken and heather. The only solemn touches were groups of horsemen who had been waiting since morning, some mounted, some standing at their animals’ heads. One thing that worried him was a public eye a yard from his face. No open-air meeting as big as this had met in peacetime for a century so public eyes would intercut his speech with film of leaders haranguing huge crowds in the late historical era. Since he and his comrades were not standing in formal groups he would look, as well as sound, very different. He glanced at the tiny microphone on his chest and decided to speak seated, with folded arms.

Suddenly he noticed part of the crowd he had overlooked. On the ground before the porch the Boys’ Brigade stood in six straight ranks. Feet apart, arms clasped behind them, faces tilted up toward Wat, the exact stance of each one made him a childish replica of the rest. Captainless, ordered outside by a servant to hear the new colonel’s speech, they had chosen this way to show the discipline that divided them from civilians. Wat stood up, smiling, and bent toward them. He muffled the microphone with one hand, saluted with the other and called down, “Break ranks, men, this — ”

He had been going to say is not a military occasion but a huge hollow woofing drowned his words: the microphone was more sensitive than he had known. He stood erect and saw everyone was now attending; the only sound was the fading drone of a bagpipe and the rustle of folk turning or standing to see him more clearly. He said quietly, “This is Wat Dryhope about to speak to friends. Will the public eye please shift from between us?”

The eye moved slightly aside. His voice had carried to the back of the crowd without manic-sounding reverberations but he sensed an immediate excitement, a hunger for the emotional unity that had greeted his descent from the hillside. This excitement gave him a feeling of righteous power because, unlike dark-age politicians, he was going to dissolve that mindless unity by the calm delivery of sensible information. He said, “I havenae much to say but most of you have been waiting here for hours so I’ll sit here and say it. If you’ve any sense you’ll follow my example — that’s a suggestion. The junior cadets will meanwhile break ranks and sit on the ground — that’s an order.”

He sat down with arms folded on the railing. The Boys’ Brigade did as he commanded. With a murmur suggesting amusement all but the horsemen followed their example. Wat gave his speech.

“I suppose you’ve come here to learn things you might not get from the public eye, which exists to make entertainment out of serious war games. Here are the straight facts. Colonel Tam Wardlaw here has given me his job because I’m the only soldier in Ettrick with two arms, two legs and no internal injuries. I am in this healthy state because General Craig Douglas ordered me to lead the vanguard, which was the safest job in our last battle. Our whole army was organized to get me safe to the cliff top where I did my wee trick with the standard. While getting me there our army was almost wholly destroyed but I’m all right. No wonder Geneva condemned that tactic.

“My present health is also due to me rolling off the cliff when the massacre started, and to a bush that caught me after I’d done that, and to General Shafto of Northumbria who pulled me off it. Less than an hour ago I spoke to General Shafto and told him we feared that North Sea currents might wash our old pole out of reach. He is sending divers from Whitby to locate it and attach a buoy. Tomorrow we can recover it when we like. Good men, the Northumbrians.

“What of the future? As Geneva says, ten years must pass before we can breed and train another professional army so there is no urgent need to elect a new general. Our wounded officers will recover, though we cannot say how completely. Some of our veterans may return to active service. In three or four years young captains beside me here will be old enough to fight. There are potential generals on this platform, and standing among you, and many more at home with their aunts. Building an army comes before choosing a general. Luckily our neighbours on the banks of Tweed and Leader, Teviot and Esk will lend officers to train youngsters and new recruits.”

He stood up and said, “That was my news. Goodbye.”

He saluted and was turning to leave when a voice said, “Can I say a word to you Colonel Dryhope?”

It was a firm voice, quiet, adult, male and it came from the crowd.

“You’ve said several already,” said Wat turning back, “Seven at least. How did you say them through the Warrior house speakers?”

“I’m Archie Crook Cot,” said the voice. This caused a burst of laughter; the Crook Cots were famous for their electronic expertise.

“That explains it,” said Wat, looking amiably toward a group of horsemen with one stout rider a little before the rest, “What have you to say, Archie?”

“Just that Geneva’s wrong about the ten years. More than two hundred full-grown Ettrick men are here to sign on as recruits today and you may get as many tomorrow. Our average age is eighteen or so. If we put our backs into the training … and we will lads, won’t we?” he asked turning in his saddle — there was a widespread shout of “Aye!” — “Then you’ll have a full adult fighting force in less than a year.” The last words were drowned in a storm of cheering as the whole crowd of younger folk jumped to their feet shouting and clapping and laughing. The Henderlands raised their pipes, puffed their cheeks and were obviously about to raise the sound level.

“YE GOWK ARCHIE!” yelled Wat, “YE DOITED GOMERIL! YE STUPIT NYAFF! YE BLIRT!”

The amplification was so great that the crowd was silenced, many clapped their hands to their ears, Tam Wardlaw turned his chair and sped back to the mess. With an effort Wat said more quietly, “Men become soldiers, Archie Crook Cot, because we’re no good at anything else! The Crook Cots are teachers, wizards, gurus in the mandarin network! When I was in the satellite belt people who heard my voice said, ‘You’re Scottish. Which part?’ ‘Ettrick,’ said I. ‘Ettrick?’ said they, ‘Do you know the Crook Cots?’ and because I had played with ye when we were bairns their respect for me doubled. Whenever crazy chemicals provoke a new virus — or maybe it’s the other way round, I’m too ignorant to ken — the star seeders want the problem keyed into a mandarin web with at least one Crook Cot guru in it. Why should anyone with an ounce of intellectual talent train for a life of grievous bodily harm?”

“You think we havenae the spunk for it Wat?” jeered a voice from somewhere and provoked scattered laughter.

“Wattie,” said Archie pleasantly, “There’s no use saying what our aunties told us this morning. You’re a great soldier and have no illusions about fighting. I’m a guru and don’t think much of my job either. I enjoy playing mandarin on keyboards, spinning threads in a web of knowledge that will join the stars one day, but I’m no immortal genius. Immortals talk to me like an equal because I know their language and they find me useful, but when my cousin Willie told me yesterday he was off to join the army I discovered I was an Ettrick patriot before anything else.”

“WHY?” said Wat sharply enough to quell the beginnings of another cheer.

“For fun,” said Archie and across the sea of heads Wat saw a toothy grin divide the round face of the squat figure on the horse, “I enjoyed spreading consternation through an eternal network which thought me a dependable unit. I like the amazement, admiration and grief my sisters, aunts and grannies now feel for me. But I most like astonishing myself. What! Will a guru like me drill for months in the martial arts and sleep in his cloak during forced marches over the hills? The notion is too fantastic to be resisted. Mibby I’ll crack under the strain. I doubt it. We’ll see.”

The cheer which now arose was too loud to be quelled. Wat strolled up and down the platform waiting for it to fade. He noticed that the veterans and Boys’ Brigade captains now stood behind him in the formal groups he had meant to avoid, but now they would have looked silly seated so he gave them an approving nod. The more he thought about this renewal of the army the more exciting it seemed. When he again faced the crowd a small tight smile twisted his mouth. He silenced the fading din with a gesture and said, “There is no law to stop any man in Ettrick joining us if he’s healthy and crazy enough to do it. If I tried to keep ye out now you’d think I wanted all the wee boys to myself. Go back to your homes and send your names and physical profiles here. If you’re fit you’ll get word saying what to bring for your first term of training which, I promise, will be no picnic. You’ve seven days to change your minds while I work out a completely new training programme. Goodbye.”

He turned his back on a new wave of cheering and went quickly into the mess where a fit of huge yawning seized him.

“You need a rest, Colonel Dryhope,” murmured Jenny.

“Rest and privacy, Jenny.”

“The commander’s quarters are ready for you sir,” said Jenny and led him from the mess into the communications room, led him from there by lift to an apartment he was visiting for the first time. The last man to use it had been his father.