‘I hear that you and the boy stopped an armour column, but you still stink. You should get yourself a bath or a shower and some soap. You smell like a carcass out on the steppe, in summer, a rotten carcass… She is saying she will take them into Kirkuk tomorrow, and they are arguing about whose fighters should lead the attack. They are shit.’
The shells still whined overhead and hit the road to the north. Gus could not, for the life of him, understand why the order was not given to target the crossroads. He thought that three thousand men made the circle, and she was in the middle of it with agha Bekir and agha Ibrahim. One salvo would be enough. Agha Bekir and agha Ibrahim had come in separate convoys, had run the gauntlet down the road, with escorts of jeeps and pickups. He watched the body language. If one agreed, the other disputed it. Sometimes she threw up her arms and sometimes, to their faces, she cursed them.
Rybinsky said, ‘She is saying that she will take them into the headquarters of Fifth Army tomorrow, and they are arguing about whose foot should be first through the gate.
That’s the sort of shits they are.’
The two aghas sat on metal-framed deckchairs. She was between them, on her knees, with the maps held down by stones. Gus watched them, animated in distrust or sulking.
‘You know what she said? She said she’d tie Bekir’s left foot to Ibrahim’s right foot, and they would go into Fifth Army together – then she’d tie Bekir’s right foot to Ibrahim’s left foot, and they’ll go into the governor’s offices. Look at the hatred behind the smiles, because she’s leading them where they cannot lead themselves. And she’s a woman, that is very painful for them – on that they are united, the one thing. And they have a very great fear of Baghdad, but if they get to Kirkuk they will be famous in Kurdish history. They want to believe her, but still they have the fear.’
She had ripped the bandanna from her forehead, and her hair hung loose. She gripped their ankles, above their smart polished footwear. With a decisive movement she tied her bandanna around one’s left leg and the other’s right. She stood. She held out her arms as if to demonstrate to the circle the unity of their commanders. Above the whistle of the shells and the rumble of the detonation, there was a creeping growl of approval.
‘It is always the same with army commanders, the jealousy. I know, I was in the army.
I was in Germany, in Minsk, I was in Afghanistan – always commanders of men have an envy. Then I transferred to Strategic Nuclear Forces. I was at Krasnie Sosenki guarding the SS-25 intercontinental ballistic missiles – perhaps one was targeted on where you lived, worked. The only thing good about Krasnie Sosenki was that it was not Chechnya.
I left, I walked out six years ago. I had not been paid for eight months, so I went my own way, into import-export.’
Gus saw Haquim on the far side of the circle. There was a great sadness in Haquim’s eyes. He was squatted down and his hand cupped his ear so that he could hear better. If he survived, came through, he would tell his grandfather about Haquim and about a boy who climbed onto the hulks of tanks. There would be much to tell his grandfather, but import and bloody export would not be a part of it.
‘In import-export in Kurdistan, I have no competitors. I have the market. That is why I am here. For me there is a big opportunity. These are a very unsophisticated people: for a percentage they will sign anything. Around the Kirkuk oil fields there is chrome, copper, iron, coal. I will get the licence to exploit the wealth of Kirkuk – an honourable financial agreement, of course. Then I can retire…’
She was back on her knees, very close to them and their tied ankles. He watched the softness of the movement of her hands and the persuasion in her eyes. He could not look away from her, and neither could the tied men. He knew it, he would follow her where she led.
‘Do you know Cannes? Do you know the South of France? I would like a little apartment over the harbour, with a view of the sea, when I retire. I have never been there but I have seen the postcards. I think an apartment over the harbour in Cannes is very expensive. Are you a rich man, tank killer?’
There was a bank account that had been emptied, and a job that he had walked out of.
Three days before, or it might have been five – because those days now slipped by unnoticed, merged with each other, and he no longer knew the day of the week or the date – the mortgage payment would have been triggered, and would not have been paid.
Perhaps Meg used her key, came in, sorted his post on the mat and made a pile of the brown envelopes, but her teaching salary was not enough to meet the gas, electricity, tax and water. In terms of the life he had turned his back on, he was as destitute as the men who crowded shop doorways, when the light fell and the businesses closed in Guildford’s high street, with blankets and carton boxes. He had nothing but his rifle, the kit in the rucksack under his head, and his love.
‘What do they pay you for killing tanks? Five thousand a week, dollars? No, that is not enough – ten thousand a week? Will you have a bonus for reaching Kirkuk? What’s the package, fifty thousand?’
It would not have happened unless she had done it. She took agha Bekir’s hand and agha Ibrahim’s hand. She held their two hands up high, so that each man was jerked off his chair and the handkerchief and the umbrella they held were dropped. Slowly, so that every man in the circle could see it, she brought their hands together, and the fingers clasped. The great circle bayed their names. It was a moment of power. The men kissed
… Gus thought that the next day he would stand in Kirkuk.
‘She is fantastic. She is incredible. I think she is a virgin. I, myself, would trade in all that package, fifty thousand dollars, to take away that virginity. Would you? I tell you, tank killer, if you want to trade in the package then you should first find a bath or a shower, and some soap. I wish it were me – I think I have to be satisfied with the licences to exploit the chrome at Kirkuk, and the copper, iron and coal.’
Gus closed his eyes. If he had not shut his eyes, lost sight of the Russian’s leering face, he would have hit him.
‘I suppose I’ve been expecting you – someone like you and like the lady.’
The sergeant sat on a camping stool. The rain drove in from the west and the sea. The slope of the Common ran away and up in front of him. His binoculars were up to his eyes, never left them, as he scanned the gorse, dead bracken and heather.
‘I was expecting to meet you. That’s why I asked for you by name,’ Willet said.
It had been a dreadful drive down from London. Two coned-off roadworks on the motorway and the start of the Easter holiday had snarled the traffic. He and Ms Manning hadn’t talked much, and mostly he’d relied on the radio for company. When they had finally turned off the road south of Exeter and reached the guarded main gate of the Commando Training College – Royal Marines, they’d been eighty minutes late for their appointment. A pleasant-faced major had met them, given them coffee, accepted Ms Manning’s grudging apology, then shaken his head in puzzlement and said, without equivocation, that he’d never heard of Augustus Henderson Peake – and, anyway, it was quite impossible for a civilian to receive the advanced sniper training conducted by the Lympstone base. Ms Manning had sworn, and Willet had proffered a name.
‘Does this drop me in the shit?’
‘I wouldn’t have thought so, Mr Billings, I wouldn’t have thought there’s any call for that.’