Wyatt's Hurricane

I

Causton marched to the sound of the guns.

He sweated in the hot sun as he stepped out briskly in response to the lashing voice of the sergeant and wondered how he was going to get out of this pickle. If he could get out of the ranks for a few minutes, all he had to do was to rip off the tunic, drop the rifle and he would be a civilian again; but there did not seem much chance of that. The erstwhile deserters were watched carefully by troopers armed with submachine-guns and the officer, driven in a jeep, passed continually from one end of the column to the other.

He stumbled a little, then picked up the step again, and the man next to him turned and addressed him in the island patois, obviously asking a question. Causton played dumb — quite literally; he made some complicated gestures with his fingers, hoping to God that the soldier would not know he was faking. The man let out a shrill cackle of laughter and poked the soldier in front in the small of the back. He evidently thought it a good joke that they should have a dumb soldier in their midst and curious eyes were turned on Causton. He hoped the sweat was not making the boot-polish run.

Not far ahead he could hear the sound of small-arms firing — the tac-a-tac of machine-guns and the more uncoordinated and sporadic rattle of rifles — much closer than he had expected. Favel had pushed the firing line far into the suburbs of St Pierre and, from the sound of it, was expending ammunition at a fantastic rate. Causton winced as a shell burst a hundred yards to the right, ruining a shack, and there came a perceptible and hesitant slowing down of the column of men.

The sergeant screamed, the officer cursed, the column speeded up again. Presently they turned off into a side street and the column halted. Causton looked with interest at the army trucks which were parked nose to tail along the street, noting that most of them were empty. He also saw that men were siphoning petrol from the tanks of some of the trucks and refilling the tanks of others.

The officer stepped forward and harangued them again. At what was apparently a question several of the men in the ranks lifted rifles and waved them, so Causton did the same. At a curt command from the officer, those men broke ranks and lined up on the other side of the street, Causton with them. The officer was evidently sorting out the armed men from those who had thrown away their rifles.

A sergeant passed along the thin line of armed men. To every man he put a question and doled out ammunition from a box carried by two men who followed along behind. When he came to Causton and snapped out his question Causton merely snapped open the breech of his rifle to show that the magazine was empty. The sergeant thrust two clips of ammunition into his hands and passed on.

Causton looked across at the trucks. Rifles were being unloaded from one of them and issued to the unarmed men. There were not nearly enough to go round. He tossed the two clips of ammunition in his hand thoughtfully and looked at one lorry as it pulled away, replenished with petrol at the sacrifice of the others. Serrurier was running short of petrol, guns and ammunition, or, more probably, he had plenty but in the wrong place at the wrong time. It was very likely that his supply corps was in a hell of a mess, disrupted by Favel’s unexpectedly successful thrust.

He loaded the rifle and put the other clip in his pocket. Serrurier’s logistic difficulties were likely to be the death of a good foreign correspondent; this was definitely not a good place to be. Despite his aversion to guns, he thought it would be as well to be prepared. He looked about and weighed his chances of getting away and decided dismally that they were nil. But who knew what a change in the fortunes of war would bring?

More orders were barked and the men tramped off again, this time at right angles to their original march from the centre of the town, and Causton judged that they were moving parallel to the firing line. They entered one of the poorest areas of St Pierre, a shanty town of huts built from kerosene cans beaten flat and corrugated iron. There were no civilians visible; either they were cowering in the ram-shackle dwellings or they had hurriedly departed.

The line of march changed again towards the noise of battle and they emerged on to an open place, an incursive tongue of the countryside licking into the suburbs. Here they were halted and spread out into a long line, and Causton judged that this was where they would make their stand. The men started to dig in, using no tools but their bayonets, and Causton, with alacrity, followed suit.

He found that a malodorous spot had been picked for him to die in. This open ground, so near to the shanty town, was a rubbish dump in which the unhygienic citizens deposited anything for which they had no further use. Incautiously he stabbed a borrowed bayonet into the bloated corpse of a dead dog which lay half-buried under a pile of ashes — the gases burst from it with a soft sigh and a terrible stench and Causton gagged. He moved away slightly and attacked the ground again, this time with better results, and found that digging in a rubbish dump did have advantages — it was very easy to excavate a man-sized hole.

Having got dug-in, he looked around, first to the rear in search of an avenue of escape. Directly behind him was the sergeant, tough-looking and implacable, the muzzle of whose rifle poked forward, perhaps intentionally, right at Causton. Behind the sergeant and just in front of the first line of shacks were the captain’s bully-boys spread in a thin line, their submachine-guns ready to cut down any man who attempted to run; and behind the troopers was the captain himself, leading from the rear and sheltering in the lee of a shack. Beside the shack the jeep stood with idling engine and Causton judged that the captain was ready to take off if the line broke. No joy there.

He turned his attention to the front. The strip of open ground stretched as far as he could see on either side, and was about a quarter of a mile across — maybe four hundred yards. On the other side were the better constructed houses of the more prosperous citizens of St Pierre whose exclusiveness was accentuated and protected from the shanties by this strip of no-man’s-land. A battle seemed to be going on across there; shells and mortar bombs were exploding with frightful regularity, tossing pieces of desirable residence about with abandon; the fusillade of small-arms fire was continuous, and once a badly aimed projectile landed only fifty yards to Causton’s front and he drew in his head and felt the patter of earth fragments all about him.

He judged that this was the front line and that the Government forces were losing. Why else would the army have whipped together a hasty second line of ill-equipped deserters? Still, the position was not badly chosen; if the front line broke then Favel’s men would have to advance across four hundred yards of open ground. But then he thought of the meagre two clips of ammunition with which he had been issued — perhaps Favel’s men would not find it too difficult, after all. It depended on whether the Government troops over there could retreat in good order.

Nothing happened for a long time and Causton, lying there in the hot sun, actually began to feel sleepy. He had been informed by soldiers that war is a period during which long stretches of boredom are punctuated by brief moments of fright, and he was quite prepared to believe this, although he had not encountered it in his own experience. But then, his own job had mainly consisted of flitting from one hot spot to another, the intervals being filled in by a judicious sampling of the flesh-pots of a dozen assorted countries. He definitely found this small sample of soldiering very dreary.

Occasionally he turned to see if his chance of escape had improved, but there was never any change. The sergeant stared at him, stony-faced, and the rearguard troopers were always in position. The captain alternated between smoking cigarettes with quick puffs and gazing across at the front line through field glasses. Once, in order to ingratiate himself with the sergeant and in hope of future favours, Causton tossed him a cigarette. The sergeant stretched out an arm, looked at the cigarette in puzzlement, then smiled and lit it. Causton smiled back, then turned again to his front, hoping that a small bond of friendship had been joined.

Presently the uproar in the front line rose to a crescendo and Causton caught the first sight of human movement — a few distant figures flitting furtively on the nearside of the distant houses. He strained his eyes and wished he had the captain’s binoculars. From behind him he heard the captain’s voice issuing sharp orders and the nearer brazen scream of the sergeant, but he took no notice because he had just identified the distant figures as Government troops and they were running as hard as they could — the front line had broken.

The man nearest to him pushed his rifle forward and cocked it, and Causton heard a series of metallic clicks run down the line, but he did not take his eyes from the scene before him. The nearest blue-clad figure was half-way across — about two hundred yards away — when he suddenly threw up his hands and pitched helplessly forward as though he had stumbled over something. He collapsed into a crumpled heap, heaved convulsively and then lay still.

The field was now filled with running men, retreating in no form of order. Some ran with experience born of battle in short, scuttling zigzags, constantly changing direction in order to throw the marksmen behind off their aim; these were the more intelligent. The stupid ones, or those crazed with fear, ran straight across, and it was these who were picked off by the rattling machine-guns and the cracking rifles.

Causton was abruptly astonished to find himself under fire. There was a constant twittering in the air about him which, at first, he could not identify. But when the dog in the periphery of his vision suddenly jerked its hind leg as though chasing rabbits in its sleep and the dry ground ten yards ahead of him fountained into a row of spurts of dust, he drew himself into his foxhole like a tortoise drawing into its shell. However, his journalist’s curiosity got the better of him, and he raised his head once more to see what was going on.

Mortar shells were beginning to drop into the field, raising huge dust plumes which drifted slowly with the wind. The first of the retreating men was quite near and Causton could see his wide-open mouth and staring eyes and could hear the hard thud of his boots on the dry earth. He was not ten yards away when he fell, a flailing tangle of arms and legs, and as he lurched into stillness Causton saw the gaping hole in the back of his head.

The soldier behind him swerved and came on, legs working like pistons. He jumped clear over Causton and disappeared behind in a panic of terror. Then there was another — and another — and still more — all bolting in panic through the second line of defence. The sergeant’s voice rose in a scream as the men in the foxholes nervously twitched as though to run, and there was a near-by shot. We get killed if we run and killed if we don’t — later on, thought Causton. Better not to run — yet.

For over half an hour the demoralized survivors of the front line passed through and soon Causton heard scattered shots coming from the rear. The survivors were being whipped back into shape. He stared across the field, expecting to see the assault of Favel’s army, but nothing happened except that the mortar fire lifted briefly and then plunged down again, this time directly on their position. In that small moment of time, when the smoke of battle was drifting away, Causton saw dozens of bodies scattered over the field and heard a few distant cries and wails.

Then he had no time even to think of anything else as the shells began to rain down in an iron hail. He crouched in his foxhole and dug his fingers into the nauseous detritus as the ground shook and heaved underneath him. It seemed to go on for an eternity although, on later recollection, he supposed it to have lasted for not more than fifteen minutes. But at the time he thought it would never end. Jesus, God! he prayed; let me get out of here.

Then the barrage lifted as suddenly as it had started. Causton was stunned and lay for a while in the foxhole before he was able to raise his head. When he did so, he expected to see the first wave of Favel’s assault upon them and strained to peer through the slowly dispersing dust and smoke. But there was still nothing — merely the field empty but for the crumpled bodies.

Slowly he turned his head. The tin shacks immediately behind the position had been destroyed, some of them totally, and the ground was pitted with craters. The captain’s jeep, its rear wheels blown off, was burning furiously, and of the captain himself there was no sign. Near-by lay the torso of a man — no head, arms or legs — and Causton wondered drearily if it was the sergeant. He stretched his legs painfully and thought that if he was going to run for it, then this was the time to do it.

From the next foxhole a man emerged, his face grey with dust and fear. His eyes were glazed and blank as he levered himself up and began to stagger away. The sergeant appeared from beneath the level of the ground and shouted at him, but the man took no notice, so the sergeant lifted his rifle and fired and the man collapsed grotesquely.

Causton sank back as a tirade of mashed French broke from the sergeant’s foxhole. He had to admire the man — this was a tough, professional soldier who would brook no nonsense about desertion in the face of the enemy — but he was confoundedly inconvenient.

He looked about at the heads which were lifted, did a rough count and was surprised at the number of men who had survived the bombardment. He had read that troops well dug in could survive an enormous amount of punishment in the way of shelling — it had been the thing that had kept the First World War going — but experiencing the fact personally was quite a different thing. He looked across the field but could detect no movement that would presage an assault. Even the small-arms fire had ceased.

He turned to see the sergeant clamber out of his hole and walk boldly along the line to check on the men. Still not a shot came from across the field and Causton began to wonder what had happened. He looked uneasily at the steely blue sky as though expecting another storm of metal, and scratched his cheek reflectively as he watched the sergeant.

Suddenly the small-arms fire started up again. A machine-gun opened up shockingly closely and from an unexpected direction. A hail of bullets swept across the position and the sergeant spun like a top, punched by bullets, to fall sprawling and disappear into a foxhole. Causton ducked his head and listened to the heavy fire coming from the left and to the rear.

The position had been outflanked.

He heard the yells and the running steps as the rest of the men broke and ran, but he stayed put. He had a hunch they were running into trouble, and anyway be was fed up with being a part of Serrurier’s army; the further that unit and he were separated, the better he would feel. So he lay in the foxhole and played dead.

The machine-gun fire stopped abruptly, but he lay there for fifteen minutes more before even poking his nose above the level of the ground. When he did so, the first thing he saw was a long line of men emerging from the houses on the other side of the field — Favel’s men were coming over to mop up. Hastily he wormed his way out of the foxhole and crawled on his belly back towards the shacks, expecting to feel the thud of bullets at any moment. But there was plenty of cover since the ground had been churned up by the mortar fire and he found he could crawl from shell-hole to shell-hole with the minimum of exposure.

Finally he got to the cover of the shacks and looked back. Favel’s men were nearly across the field and he had the notion they would shoot anything that moved and he had better find somewhere safer. He listened to the racket coming from the left flank — someone was putting up a fight there, but that would collapse as soon as these oncoming troops hit them. He began to move to the right, dodging from the cover of one shack to another, and always trying to move back.

As he went he ripped off the tunic he was wearing and rubbed at his face. Perhaps the sight of a white skin would cause hesitation of the trigger-finger — at least it was worth trying. He saw no sign of the Government army and all the indications were that Favel was on the verge of punching a hole right through the middle — there did not seem much to stop him.

Presently he had an idea and tried the door of one of the shacks. It had occurred to him that there was no point in running away; after all, he did not want to catch up with Serrurier’s forces, did he? It would be much better to hide and then emerge in the middle of Favel’s army.

The door was not barred, so he pushed it open with a creak and went inside. The shack was deserted; it consisted merely of two rooms and needed a minimum of inspection to show there was no one there. He looked about and saw a wash-basin on a rickety stand below a fly-blown and peeling mirror, which was flanked on one side by a highly coloured oleograph of the Madonna and on the other by the standard official portrait of Serrurier.

Hastily he pulled down the idealized photograph of Serrurier and kicked it under the bed. If anyone interrupted him, he did not want them getting any wrong ideas. Then he poured tepid water into the basin and began to wash his face, keeping a sharp ear cocked for anything going on outside. At the end of five minutes he realized in despair that he was still a light-complexioned Negro; the boot-polish was waterproof and would not come off, no matter how hard he rubbed. Many of the inhabitants of San Fernandez were even lighter complexioned and also had European features.

He was struck by an idea and unbuttoned the front of his shirt to look at his chest. Two days earlier he had been somewhat embarrassed at his pallidity, but now he thanked God that he had not felt the urge to sunbathe. As he stripped off his shirt he prepared for a long wait.

What brought him out was the sound of an engine. He thought that anyone driving a vehicle around there would be civilized enough not to shoot him on sight, so he came out of the cupboard and into the front room and looked through the window. The Land-Rover that was passing was driven by a white man.

‘Hey — you!’ he shouted, and dashed to the door. ‘You there — arrêtez!’

The man driving the Land-Rover looked back and the vehicle bumped to a halt. Causton ran up and the man looked at him curiously. ‘Who the devil are you?’ he asked.

‘Thank God!’ said Causton. ‘You speak English — you are English. My name’s Causton — I suppose you could call me a war correspondent.’

The man looked at him unbelievingly. ‘You got off the mark pretty quickly, didn’t you? The war only started yesterday afternoon. You don’t look much like a war correspondent — you look more like a nigger minstrel who got on the wrong side of his audience.’

‘I’m genuine enough,’ assured Causton.

The man hefted a submachine-gun which was on the seat next to him. ‘I think Favel had better have a look at you,’ he said. ‘Get in.’

‘Just the man I want to see,’ said Causton, climbing into the Land-Rover and keeping a careful eye on the sub-machine-gun. ‘You a friend of his?’

‘I suppose you could say so,’ said the man. ‘My name is Manning.’

II

‘It’s too hot,’ said Mrs Warmington querulously.

Julie agreed but did not say so aloud — Mrs Warmington was the last person she felt like agreeing with about anything. She wriggled slightly, trying to unstick her blouse from the small of her back, and looked ahead through the windscreen. She saw exactly what she had seen for the last half-hour — a small handcart piled perilously high with trumpery household goods being pushed by an old man and a small boy who obstinately stuck to the crown of the road and refused to draw to the side.

Rawsthorne irritably changed down again from second gear to first. ‘The engine will boil if we carry on like this in this heat,’ he said.

‘We mustn’t stop,’ said Julie in alarm.

‘Stopping might prove more difficult than moving,’ said Rawsthorne. ‘Have you looked behind lately?’

Julie twisted in her seat and looked through the back window of the car, which was now cresting a small rise. Behind, as far as she could see, stretched the long line of refugees fleeing from St Pierre. She had seen this kind of thing on old newsreels but had never expected to see it in actuality. This was a people on the move, trudging wearily from the coming desolation of war, carrying as much of the material minutiae of their lives as they could on an incredible variety of vehicles. There were perambulators loaded not with babies but with clocks, clothing, pictures, ornaments; there were carts pushed by hand or drawn by donkeys; there were beat-up cars of incredible vintage, buses, trucks and the better cars of the more prosperous.

But primarily there were people: men and women, old and young, rich and poor, the hale and the sick. These were people who did not laugh or speak, who moved along quietly like driven cattle with grey faces and downcast eyes, whose only visible sign of emotion was the quick, nervous twitch of the head to look back along the road.

Julie turned as Rawsthorne blasted on the horn at the obstinate old man ahead. ‘The damned fellow won’t move aside,’ he grumbled. ‘If he’d move just a little to the side I could get through.’

Eumenides said, ‘The road — it drop on side.’ He pointed to the cart. ‘ ’E fright ’e fall.’

‘Yes,’ said Rawsthorne. ‘That cart is grossly overloaded and there is a steep camber.’

Julie said, ‘How much farther do we have to go?’

‘About two miles.’ Rawsthorne nodded ahead. ‘You see where the road turns round that headland over there? We have to get to the other side.’

‘How long do you think it will take?’

Rawsthorne drew to a halt to avoid ramming the old man. ‘At this rate it will be another two hours.’

The car crept on by jerks and starts. The refugees on foot were actually moving faster than those in vehicles and Rawsthorne contemplated abandoning the car. But he rejected the idea almost as soon as he thought of it; there was the food and water to be carried, and the blankets, too — those would be much too valuable in the coming week to leave behind with the car. He said, ‘At least this war is having one good result — it’s getting the people out of St Pierre.’

‘They won’t all get out,’ said Julie. ‘And what about the armies?’

‘It’s damn’ bad luck on Favel,’ said Rawsthorne. ‘Imagine taking a town and then being smashed by a hurricane. I’ve read a lot of military history but I’ve never heard of a parallel to it.’

‘It will smash Serrurier, too,’ said Julie.

‘Yes, it will,’ said Rawsthorne thoughtfully. ‘I wonder who’ll pick up the pieces.’ He stared ahead. ‘I like Wyatt, but I hope he’s wrong about this hurricane. There’s a chance he might be, you know; he’s relying a lot on his intuition. I’d like Favel to have a fighting chance.’

‘I hope he’s wrong, too,’ said Julie sombrely. ‘He’s trapped back there.’

Rawsthorne glanced at her drawn face, then bit his lip and lapsed into silence. The time dragged on as slowly as the car. Presently he pointed out a group of young men who were passing. They were fit and able-bodied, if poorly dressed; one had a fistful of bank-notes which he was counting, and another was twirling a gleaming necklace on his forefinger. He said meditatively, ‘I wish Causton hadn’t taken your gun, Eumenides; it might have come in handy. Those boys have been looting. They’ve taken money and jewellery but soon they’ll get hungry and try to take food from whoever has it.’

Eumenides shrugged. ‘Too late; ’e took gun — I look.’

At last they rounded the headland and Rawsthorne said, ‘Another few hundred yards and we’ll pull off. Look for a convenient place to run the car off the road — what we really need is a side turning.’

They ground on, still in bottom gear, and after a while Eumenides said, ‘Turn ‘ere.’

Rawsthorne craned his neck. ‘Yes, this looks all right. I wonder where it leads.’

‘Let’s try,’ said Julie. ‘There’s no one going up there.’

Rawsthorne turned the car on to the unmetalled side road and was immediately able to change up to second gear. They bumped along for a few hundred yards and then came into the wide space of a quarry. ‘Damn!’ he said. ‘It’s a dead end.’

Julie wriggled in her seat. ‘At least we can get out and stretch our legs before going back. And I think we ought to eat again while we have the chance, too,’ she said.

The bread was stale, the butter melted and going rancid, the water tepid and, on top of that, the heat had not improved their appetites, but they ate a little while sitting in the shade of the quarry huts and discussed their next move. Mrs Warmington said, ‘I don’t see why we can’t stay here — it’s a quiet place.’

‘I’m afraid not,’ said Rawsthorne. ‘We can still see the sea from here — to the south. According to Wyatt, the hurricane will come from the south.’

Mrs Warmington made an impatient noise. ‘I think that young man is a scaremonger; I don’t think there is going to be a hurricane. I looked back when we could still see the Base and there are still ships there at anchor. Commodore Brooks doesn’t think there’ll be a hurricane, so why should we?’

‘We can’t take the chance that he’ll be wrong,’ said Julie quietly. She turned to Rawsthorne. ‘We’ll have to go back to the road and try again.’

‘I don’t think so,’ said Rawsthorne. ‘I don’t really think we can. This track left the road at an acute angle — I don’t see how we could turn the car into the traffic stream. Nobody would stop to let us through.’ He looked up at the quarry face. ‘We’ve got to get on the other side of that.’

Mrs Warmington snorted. ‘I’m not even going to try to climb that. I’m staying here.’

Rawsthorne laughed. ‘We don’t have to climb it — we go round it. There’s a convenient place to climb a little farther back down the track.’ He chewed the stale bread distastefully. ‘Wyatt said we must get on the north side of a ridge, didn’t he? Well, that’s what we’re going to do.’

Eumenides asked abruptly, ‘We leave car?’

‘We’ll have to. We’ll take all we need from it, then park it behind these huts. With a bit of luck no one will find it.’

They finished their brief meal and began to pack up. Julie looked at the wilting Mrs Warmington and forced some humour into her voice. ‘Well, there’s no dish-washing to be done.’ But Mrs Warmington was past caring; she just sat in the shade and gasped, and Julie thought cattily, This is better than a diet for reducing her surplus poundage.

Rawsthorne ran the car down the track and they unpacked all the supplies. He said, ‘It’s better we do this here; it’s a nice out-of-the-way spot with none of those young thugs snooping at us.’ He looked up the hill. ‘It’s not far to the top — I suppose this ridge isn’t much more than two hundred feet high.’

He took the car back to the quarry. Mrs Warmington said pettishly, ‘I suppose we must, although I think this is nonsense.’ She turned to Eumenides. ‘Don’t just stand there; pick up something.’

Julie looked at Mrs Warmington with a glint in her eye. ‘You’ll have to do your share of carrying.’

Mrs Warmington looked doubtfully at the scrub-covered hill. ‘Oh, but I can’t — my heart, you know.’

Julie thought that Mrs Warmington’s heart was as sound as a bell and just as hard. ‘The blankets aren’t heavy,’ she said. ‘Take some of those.’ She thrust a bundle of blankets into Mrs Warmington’s unready arms and she dropped her bag. It fell with a dull thud into the dust and they both stooped for it.

Julie picked it up and found it curiously heavy. ‘Whatever have you got in here?’

Mrs Warmington snatched the bag from her, dropping the blankets. ‘My jewels, darling. You don’t suppose I’d leave those behind.’

Julie indicated the blankets. ‘Those might keep you alive — your jewels won’t.’ She stared hard at Mrs Warmington. ‘I suggest you concentrate more on doing work and less on giving orders; you haven’t been right about a damn’ thing so far, and you’re just a dead weight.’

‘All right,’ said Mrs Warmington, perhaps alarmed at the expression on Julie’s face. ‘Don’t drive so. You’re too mannish, my dear; it’s no wonder you haven’t caught yourself a husband.’

Julie ignored her and lifted a cardboard box full of bottled water. As she climbed the hill, she smiled to herself. A few days ago that gibe might have rankled, but not now. At one time she had thought that perhaps she was too self-reliant to appeal to a man; perhaps men did like the clinging ultra-feminine type, which she herself had always regarded as parasitic and not giving value for value received. Well, to hell with it! She was not going to disguise her natural intelligence for any man, and a man who was fooled by that sort of thing wasn’t worth marrying, anyway. She would rather be herself than be a foolish, ineffectual, overstuffed creature like the Warmington woman.

But her heart turned over at the thought that she might not see Wyatt ever again.

It took them a long time to transport their supplies to the top of the ridge. Rawsthorne, although willing, was not a young man and had neither the strength nor the stamina for the sustained effort. Mrs Warmington was totally unfit for any kind of work and after she had toiled to the top with her small load of blankets, she sat back and watched the others work. Julie was fit enough, but she was not used to the intense heat and the strong sun made her head swim. So it was Eumenides who carried the bulk of the supplies, willingly and without complaint. All he allowed himself was a contemptuous glance at Mrs Warmington each time he deposited a load at the top.

At last all the stores had been moved and they rested for a while on the ridge-top. On the seaward side they could see the main coast road, still as warm with refugees heading east away from St Pierre. The city itself was out of sight behind the headland, but they could hear the distant thud of guns and could see a growing smudge of smoke in the western sky.

On the other side of the ridge the ground sloped down into a small green valley, heavily planted with bananas in long rows. Over a mile away was a long, low building with a few smaller huts scattered about it. Rawsthorne looked at the banana plantation with satisfaction. ‘At least we’ll have plenty of shade. And the ground is cultivated and easy to dig. And a banana plant blowing down on one wouldn’t hurt.’

‘I’ve always liked bananas,’ said Mrs Warmington.

‘I wouldn’t eat any you find down there; they’re unripe and they’ll give you the collywobbles.’ Rawsthorne meditated for a moment. ‘I’m no expert on hurricanes like Wyatt, but I do know something about them. If the hurricane is coming from the south, then the wind will blow from the east to begin with — so we must have protection from that side. Later, the wind will come from the west, and that makes things complicated.’

Eumenides pointed. ‘Over there — li’l ’ollow.’

‘So there is,’ said Rawsthorne. He arose and picked up a spade. ‘I thought these might come in useful when I put them in the car. Shall we go? We can leave all this stuff here until we’re sure we know where we’re going to take it.’

They descended into the plantation, which was quite deserted. ‘We’ll keep away from that building,’ said Rawsthorne. ‘That’s the barracks for the convict labour. I imagine Serrurier has given orders that the men be kept locked up, but there’s no point in taking chances.’ He poked at the ground beneath a banana plant and snorted in disgust. ‘Very bad cultivation here; these plants need pruning — if they’re not careful they’re going to get Panama disease. But it’s the same all over the island since Serrurier took over — the whole place is running down.’

They reached the hollow and Rawsthorne adjudged it a good place. ‘It’s nicely protected,’ he said, and thrust his spade into the earth. ‘Now we dig.’

‘How dig?’ asked Eumenides.

‘Foxholes — as in the army.’ Rawsthorne began to measure out on the ground. ‘Five of them — one for each of us and one for the supplies.’

They took it in turns digging — Rawsthorne, Eumenides and Julie — while Mrs Warmington panted in the shade. It was not very hard work because the ground was soft as Rawsthorne had predicted, but the sun was hot and they sweated copiously. Near the end of their labours Julie paused for a drink of water and looked at the five... graves? She thought sombrely of the unofficial motto of the Seabees — First we dig ’em, then we die in ’em. In spite of the hot sun, she shivered.

When they had finally completed the foxholes and had brought down the supplies it was near to sunset, although it seemed hotter than ever. Rawsthorne cut some of the huge leaves from some near-by plants and strewed them over the raw earth. ‘In the middle of a civil war camouflage does no harm. Anyway, these plants need cutting.’

Julie lifted her head. ‘Talking of the war — don’t the guns sound louder... closer?’

Rawsthorne listened intently. ‘They do, don’t they?’ He frowned. ‘I wonder if...’ He clicked his tongue and shook his head.

‘If what?’

‘I thought the battle might come this way,’ he said. ‘But I don’t think so. Even if Favel takes St Pierre he must attack Serrurier’s forces between St Pierre and Cap Sarrat — and that’s on the other side.’

‘But the guns do sound nearer,’ said Julie.

‘A trick of the wind,’ said Rawsthorne. He said it with dubiety. There was no wind.

As the sun dipped down they prepared for the night and arranged watches. Mrs Warmington, by common consent, was left to sleep all night as being too unreliable. They talked desultorily for a while and then turned in, leaving Julie to stand first watch.

She sat in the sudden darkness and listened to the sound of the guns. To her untutored ear they sounded as though they were just down the valley and round the corner, but she consoled herself with Rawsthorne’s reasoning. But there was a fitful red glare in the west from the direction of St Pierre — there were fires in the town.

She searched her pockets and found a crumpled cigarette, which she lit, inhaling the smoke greedily. It had been a bad day; she was tense and the cigarette relaxed her. She sat with her back against a banana tree — or plant, or whatever it was — and thought about Wyatt, wondering what had happened to him. Perhaps he was already dead, caught up in the turmoil of war. Or maybe raging in a cell, waiting for the deadly wind he alone knew was going to strike. She wished with all her heart they had not been separated — whatever was going to happen, she wanted to be with him.

And Causton — what had happened to Causton? If he found his way back to the hotel he would find the note they had pinned on the door of the store-room under the stairs and know they had fled to safety. But he would not know enough to be able to join them. She hoped he would be safe — but her thoughts dwelt longer on Wyatt.

The moon had just risen when she awoke Eumenides as planned. ‘Everything quiet,’ she said in a low voice. ‘Nothing is happening.’

He nodded and said, ‘The guns ver’ close — more close than before.’

‘You think so?’

He nodded again but said nothing more, so she went to her own foxhole and settled down for the night. It is like a grave, she thought as she stretched on the blanket which lay on the bottom. She thought of Wyatt again, very hazily and drowsily, and then fell asleep before she had completed the thought.

She was awakened by something touching her face and she started up, only to be held down. ‘Ssssh,’ hissed a voice. ‘Keep ver’ still.’

‘What’s wrong, Eumenides?’ she whispered.

‘I don’ know,’ he said in a low voice. ‘Man’ peoples ’ere — lis’en!’

She strained her ears and caught an indefinable sound which seemed to emanate from nowhere in particular and everywhere at once. ‘It’s the wind in the banana leaves,’ she murmured.

‘No win’,’ said Eumenides definitely.

She listened again and caught what seemed to be a faraway voice. ‘I don’t know if you’re right or wrong,’ she said. ‘But I think we ought to wake the others.’

He went to shake Rawsthorne, while Julie woke Mrs Warmington, who squealed in surprise. ‘Damn you, be quiet,’ snapped Julie, and clapped her hand over Mrs Warmington’s mouth as it opened again. ‘We might be in trouble. Just stay there and be prepared to move in a hurry. And don’t make a sound.’

She went over to where Rawsthorne and Eumenides were conferring in low tones. ‘There’s something going on,’ said Rawsthorne. ‘The guns have stopped, too. Eumenides, you go up to the top and see what’s happened on the seaward side of the ridge; I’ll scout down the valley. The moon’s bright enough to see for quite a distance.’ His voice held a note of perplexity. ‘But these damn’ noises are coming from all round.’

He stood up. ‘Will you be all right, Julie?’

‘I’ll be fine,’ she said. ‘And I’ll keep that damned woman quiet if I have to slug her.’

The two men went off and she lost sight of them as they disappeared in the plantation. Rawsthorne flitted among the rows, edging nearer and nearer to the convict barracks. Soon he came to a service road driven through the plantation and paused before he crossed — which was just as well for he heard a voice from quite close.

He froze and waited while a group of men went up the road. They were Government soldiers and from the sound of their voices they were weary and dispirited. From a word and a half-heard phrase he gathered that they had been defeated in a battle and had not liked it at all. He waited until they had gone by, then crossed the road and penetrated the plantation on the other side.

Here he literally fell over a wounded man lying just off the road. The man cried aloud in anguish and Rawsthorne ran away, afraid the noise would attract attention. He blundered about in the plantation, suddenly aware that there were men all about him in the leaf-shadowed moonlight. They were drifting through the rows of plants from the direction of St Pierre in no form of order and with no discipline.

Suddenly he saw a spurt of flame and then the growing glow of a newly lit fire. He shrank back and went another way, only to be confronted by the sight of another fire being kindled. All around the fires sprang into being like glow-worms, and as he cautiously approached one of them he saw a dozen men sitting and lying before the flames, toasting unripe bananas on twigs to make them palatable enough to eat.

It was then that he knew he was in the middle of Serrurier’s defeated army, and when he heard the roar of trucks on the service road he had just crossed and the sharp voice of command from close behind him, he knew also that this army was beginning to regroup for tomorrow’s battle, which would probably be on the very ground on which he was standing.

III

Dawson felt better once he had left the Place de la Libération Noire and the sights that had sickened him. There was nothing wrong with his legs and he had no trouble keeping up with Wyatt who was in a great hurry. Although the town centre was not being shelled any more the noise of battle to the north had greatly intensified, and Wyatt felt he had to get to the Imperiale before the battle moved in. He had to make certain that Julie was safe.

As they moved from the square and the area of government administrative buildings they began to encounter people, at first in ones and twos, and then in greater numbers. By the time they got near to the Imperiale, which fortunately was not far, the press of people in the streets was great, and Wyatt realized he was witnessing the panic of a civilian population caught in war.

Already the criminal elements had begun to take advantage of the situation and most of the expensive shops near the Imperiale had been sacked and looted. Bodies lying on the pavement testified that the police had taken strong measures, but Wyatt’s lips tightened as he noted two dead policemen sprawled outside a jewellery shop — the streets of St Pierre were fast ceasing to be safe.

He pushed through the screaming, excited crowds, ran up the steps of the hotel and through the revolving doors into the foyer. ‘Julie!’ he called. ‘Causton!’

There was no answer.

He ran across the foyer and stumbled over the body of a soldier which lay near an overturned table just outside the bar. He shouted again, then turned to Dawson. ‘I’m going upstairs — you see what you can find down there.’

Dawson walked into the bar, crunching broken glass underfoot, and looked about. Someone had a hell of a party, he thought. He nudged at a half-empty bottle of Scotch with one bandaged hand and shook his head sadly. He would have liked a drink, but this was not the time for it.

He turned away, feeling a surge of triumph within him. Not long before he would have taken a drink at any time, but since he had survived the attentions of Sous-Inspecteur Roseau he felt a growing strength and a breaking of bonds. As he defied Roseau, stubbornly keeping his mouth shut, so he now defied what he recognized to be the worst in himself and, in that, found a new freedom, the freedom to be himself. ‘Big Jim’ Dawson was dead and young Jimmy Dawson reborn — maybe a little older in appearance and a bit shrivelled about the edges, but still as new and shining and uncorrupted as that young man had been so many years ago. The only added quality was wisdom, and perhaps a deep sense of shame for what he had done to himself in the name of success.

He searched the ground floor of the hotel — discovered nothing, and returned to the foyer, where he found Wyatt. ‘Nothing down there,’ he said.

Wyatt’s face was gaunt. ‘They’ve gone.’ He was looking at the dead soldier sprawled with bloody chest near the upturned table. There was a buzzing of flies about him.

Dawson said tentatively, ‘You think — maybe — the soldiers took them?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Wyatt heavily.

‘I’m sorry it happened,’ said Dawson. ‘I’m sorry it happened because of me.’

Wyatt turned his head. ‘We don’t know it was because of you. It might have happened anyway.’ He felt suddenly dizzy and sat down.

Dawson looked at him with concern. ‘You know what?’ he said. ‘I think we could both do with some food. When did we eat last?’ He held out his bandaged hands and said apologetically, ‘I’d get it myself but I don’t think I can open a can.’

‘What did they do to you?’

Dawson shrugged and put his hands behind his back. ‘Beat me up — roughed me around a bit. Nothing I couldn’t take.’

‘You’re right, of course,’ said Wyatt. ‘We must eat. I’ll see what I can find.’

Ten minutes later they were wolfing cold meat stew right out of the cans. Dawson found he could just hold a spoon in his left hand and by holding the can in the crook of his right arm he could feed himself tolerably well. It was painful because his left hand hurt like hell when he gripped the spoon, but the last thing he wanted was for Wyatt to feed him like a baby — he could not have borne that.

He said, ‘What do we do now?’

Wyatt listened to the guns. ‘I don’t know,’ he said slowly. ‘I wish Causton or Julie had left a message.’

‘Maybe they did.’

‘There was nothing in their rooms.’

Dawson thought about that. ‘Maybe they weren’t in their rooms; maybe they were in the cellar. The guns were firing at the square, and that’s not very far away — maybe they sheltered in the cellar.’

‘There is no cellar.’

‘Okay — but they might have sheltered somewhere else. Where would you go in a bombardment?’ He shifted in his chair and the cane creaked. ‘I know a guy who was in the London blitz; he said that under the stairs was the best place. Maybe those stairs there.’

Awkwardly he put down the spoon and walked over to the staircase. ‘Hey!’ he called. ‘There’s something pinned on this door.’

Wyatt dropped his can with a clatter and ran after Dawson. He ripped the note from the door. ‘Causton’s vanished,’ he said. ‘But the others got away in Rawsthorne’s car. They’ve gone east — out of the bay area.’ He drew a deep breath. ‘Thank God for that.’

‘I’m glad they got away,’ said Dawson. ‘What do we do — follow them?’

‘You’d better do that,’ said Wyatt. ‘I’ll give you all the necessary directions.’

Dawson looked at him in surprise. ‘Me? What are you going to do?’

‘I’ve been listening to the guns,’ said Wyatt. ‘I think Favel is making a breakthrough. I want to see him.’

‘Are you out of your cotton-picking mind? You hang round in the middle of a goddam war and you’ll get shot. You’d better come east with me.’

‘I’m staying,’ said Wyatt stubbornly. ‘Someone’s got to tell Favel about the hurricane.’

‘What makes you think Favel will listen to you?’ demanded Dawson. ‘What makes you think you’ll even get to see him? There’ll be bloody murder going on in this city when Favel comes in — you won’t have a chance.’

‘I don’t think Favel is like that. I think he’s a reasonable man, not a psychopath like Serrurier. If I can get to him I think he’ll listen.’

Dawson groaned, but one look at Wyatt’s inflexible face showed the uselessness of argument. He said, ‘You’re a goddam, pigheaded, one-track man, Wyatt; a stupid dope with not enough sense to come in out of the rain. But if you feel like that about it, I guess I’ll stick around long enough to see you get your comeuppance.’

Wyatt looked at him in surprise. ‘You don’t have to do that,’ he said gently.

‘I know I don’t,’ complained Dawson. ‘But I’m staying, anyway. Maybe Causton had the right idea — maybe there’s the makings of a good book in all this.’ He slanted a glance at Wyatt, half-humorous, half-frowning. ‘You’d make a good hero.’

‘Keep me out of anything you write,’ warned Wyatt.

‘It’s all right,’ said Dawson. ‘A dead hero can’t sue me.’

‘And a dead writer can’t write books. I think you’d better get out.’

‘I’m staying,’ said Dawson. He felt he owed a debt to Wyatt, something he had to repay; perhaps he would get the chance if he stayed around with him.

‘As you wish,’ said Wyatt indifferently, and moved towards the door.

‘Wait a minute,’ said Dawson. ‘Let’s not get shot right away. Let’s figure out what’s going on. What makes you think Favel is making a breakthrough?’

‘There was a heavy barrage going on not long ago — now it’s stopped.’

‘Stopped? Sounds just the same to me.’

‘Listen closely,’ said Wyatt. ‘Those guns you hear are on the east and west — there’s nothing from the centre.’

Dawson cocked his head on one side. ‘You’re right. You think Favel has bust through the middle?’

‘Perhaps.’

Dawson sat down. ‘Then all we’ve got to do is to wait here and Favel will come to us. Take it easy, Wyatt.’

Wyatt looked through a glassless window. ‘You could be right; the street is deserted now — not a soul in sight.’

‘Those people have brains,’ said Dawson. ‘No one wants to tangle with a driving army — not even Favel’s. He may be as reasonable as you say, but reasonableness doesn’t show from behind a gun. It’s wiser to wait here and see what happens next.’

Wyatt commenced to pace up and down the foyer and Dawson watched him, seeing the irritability boiling up. He said abruptly, ‘Got a cigarette — the cops took mine.’

‘They took mine, too.’ Wyatt stopped his restless pacing. ‘There should be some in the bar.’

He went into the bar, found a pack of cigarettes, stuck one in Dawson’s mouth and lit it. Dawson drew on it deeply, then said, ‘When are you expecting this hurricane of yours?’

‘It could be tomorrow; it could be the day after. I’m cut off from information.’

‘Then take it easy, for Christ’s sake! Favel’s on his way, and your girl-friend is tucked away safely.’ Dawson’s eyes crinkled as he saw Wyatt’s head swing round. ‘Well, she is your girl-friend, isn’t she?’

Wyatt did not say anything, so Dawson changed the subject. ‘What do you expect Favel to do about the hurricane? The guy’s got a war on his hands.’

‘He won’t have,’ promised Wyatt. ‘Not in two days from now. And if he stays in St Pierre he won’t have an army, either. He’s got to listen to me.’

‘I surely hope he does,’ said Dawson philosophically. ‘Because he’s the only chance we have of getting out of here.’ He lifted his left hand clumsily to take the cigarette from his mouth and knocked it against the edge of the table. He winced and a suppressed sound escaped his lips.

Wyatt said, ‘We’d better have a look at those hands.’

‘They’re all right.’

‘You don’t want them turning bad on you. Let’s have a look at them.’

‘They’re all right, I tell you,’ Dawson protested.

Wyatt looked at Dawson’s drawn face. ‘I want to look at them,’ he said. ‘Things that are all right anywhere else go sour in the tropics.’ He began to unfasten one of the bandages and his breath hissed as he saw what it covered. ‘Good Christ! What did they do to you?’

The hand was mashed to a pulp. As he slowly drew the bandage away he saw, to his horror, two finger-nails come away with it, and the fingers were blue with one huge bruise where they weren’t red-raw as beefsteak.

Dawson lay back in the chair. ‘They held me down and beat my hands with a rubber hose. I don’t think they broke any bones, but I’ll not be able to handle a typewriter for quite a while.’

Wyatt had once caught his finger in a door — a trivial thing but the most painful happening of his life. The fingernail had turned blue but his doctor saved it, and he had been careful of his hands ever since. Now, looking down at Dawson’s raw hand, he felt sick inside; he could imagine how painful the battered nerve-endings would be. He said glumly, ‘Now I can stop being sorry I killed Roseau.’

Dawson grinned faintly. ‘I never was sorry.’

Wyatt was puzzled. There was more to Dawson than he had thought; this was not the same man who had tried to steal a car because he was scared — something must have happened to him. ‘You’ll need some embrocation on that,’ he said abruptly. ‘And a shot of penicillin wouldn’t do any harm, either. There’s a place across the street — I’ll see what I can find.’

‘Take it easy,’ said Dawson in alarm. ‘That street is not the safest place in the world right now.’

‘I’ll watch it,’ said Wyatt, and went to the door. Opposite was an American-style drugstore; it had been broken into already but he hoped the drug supplies had not been touched. Before going out, he carefully inspected the street and, finding no movement, he stepped out and ran across.

The drugstore was in a mess but he ignored the chaos and went straight to the dispensary at the back, where he rummaged through the neat drawers looking for what he needed. He found bandages and codeine tablets and embrocation but no antibiotics, and he wasted little time on a further search. At the door of the drugstore he paused again to check the street and froze as he saw a man scuttle across to hide in a doorway.

The man peered out behind the muzzle of a gun, then waved, and three more men ran up the street, hugging the walls and darting from door to door. They were not in uniform and Wyatt thought they must be the forward skirmishers of Favel’s army. Gently he opened the door and stepped out, holding his hands above his head and clutching his medical supplies.

Strangely, he was not immediately seen, and had got half-way across the street before he was challenged. He turned to face the oncoming soldier, who looked at him with suspicion. ‘There are none of Serrurier’s men here,’ said Wyatt. ‘Where is Favel?’

The man jerked his rifle threateningly. ‘What is that?’

‘Bandages,’ said Wyatt. ‘For my friend who is hurt. He is in the hotel over there. Where is Favel?’

He felt the muzzle of a gun press into his back but did not turn. The man in front of him moved his rifle fractionally sideways. ‘To the hotel,’ he ordered. Wyatt shrugged and stepped out, surrounded by the small group. One of them pushed through the revolving door, his rifle at the ready, and Wyatt called out in English, ‘Stay where you are, Dawson — we’ve got visitors.’

The man in front of him whirled and pressed his gun into Wyatt’s stomach. ‘Pren’ gar’,’ he said threateningly.

‘I was just telling my friend not to be afraid,’ said Wyatt evenly.

He went into the hotel, to find Dawson sitting tensely in his chair looking at a soldier who was covering him with a rifle. He said, ‘I’ve got some bandages and some codeine — that should kill the pain a bit.’

Favel’s men fanned out and scattered through the ground floor, moving like professionals. Finding nothing, they reassembled in the foyer and gathered round their leader, whom Wyatt took to be a sergeant although he wore no insignia. The sergeant prodded the dead soldier with his foot. ‘Who killed this one?’

Wyatt, bending over Dawson, looked up and shrugged. ‘I don’t know,’ he said, and turned back to his work.

The sergeant stepped over and looked at Dawson’s hands. ‘Who did that?’

‘Serrurier’s police,’ said Wyatt, keeping his eyes down.

The sergeant grunted. ‘Then you do not like Serrurier. Good!’

‘I must find Favel,’ said Wyatt. ‘I have important news for him.’

‘What is this important news, blanc?’

‘It is for Favel only. If he wants you to know he will tell you.’

Dawson stirred. ‘What’s going on?’

‘I’m trying to get this man to take me to Favel. I can’t tell him there’s going to be a hurricane — he might not believe it and then I’d never get to see Favel.’

The sergeant said, ‘You talk big, ti blanc; your so important news had better be good or Favel will tear out your liver.’ He paused, then said with a grim smile, ‘And mine.’

He turned to issue a string of rapid instructions, and Wyatt sighed deeply. ‘Thank God!’ he said. ‘Now we’re getting somewhere.’