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'I read this story once, Harry—a sort of ghost story, by some foreign writer chap . . . never heard of him before —can't remember his name now . . . about this Austrian cavalry patrol in the fourteen-eighteen War, scouting in the Carpathian Mountains or somewhere ...' Wimpy tailed off, suddenly even more embarrassed. 'Oh, damn! It doesn't matter, anyway.'

But it did matter, Bastable knew that as surely as he knew the wholesale and retail prices of soft furnishings, ladies' gloves dummy4

and dining-room suites. The chap wanted to talk, and when a chap wanted to talk—especially a naturally talkative chap like Wimpy—it was better to let him get it off his chest. Batty was taking his time backing the car, anyway.

'No, do go on, old chap,' he said. 'Sounds a jolly interesting story—let's hear it.'

Wimpy remained silent for a moment. 'All right, then . ..

They were scouting, and they ambushed a Russian force at a bridge—charged over the bridge and cut 'em to pieces ... and then they pushed on. Only the country was empty, or almost empty—the people in it were strange ... and so were the narrator's fellow officers—he was a cavalry lieutenant, the fellow telling the story—and they got stranger and stranger.

And so did the countryside—kind of misty and shimmery as well as empty. Until they came to another bridge.'

He stopped again. He was no longer looking at Bastable, who now thought it sounded a damn funny story, and that Wimpy was behaving in a damn funny way, too. But then he hadn't exactly covered himsef with glory back in the car. In fact, he had nearly covered himself with something else.

'Another bridge—yes?' If Wimpy was windy, it was best to know about it here and now.

Wimpy swallowed. 'A great golden bridge over a shining river of silver. And then he knew.'

'Knew where they were, you mean?'

Wimpy swung towards him. 'He knew they were all dead.

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They'd been ambushed at the first bridge, not the Russians—

They'd been cut to pieces, not the Russians. All except him, and he was badly wounded, hovering between life and death.

So that was where they were—he was still in the no-man'sland between life and death, where time stands almost stationary. Only they were fading as they crossed their final bridge, a second or two after they'd been killed, but he had a final choice—don't you see?'

Bastable didn't see at all. Except that it was a damn weird story, and this was not the time or place for it, and he was glad no one else was around to hear it.

'Don't you see?' repeated Wimpy.

'Yes.' Bastable humoured him. 'Jolly interesting ... in a creepy sort of way — ghost story, of course, you said? So I take it he made the right choice, what? Obviously he did —otherwise there wouldn't have been any story!'

'No—I don't mean that —' Wimpy gestured despairingly, and then swept his hand towards the ridge and the wood. 'It was like the country we're in, Harry . . . It's not right, somehow.

And now we're making our decision.'

Bastable stared up the road which wound between its sunken banks and occasional bushes to another wood on the skyline.

It was undeniably empty, but it was no stranger than any other bit of French countryside. It was rather dull really, not nearly as steep as his own beautiful downland above Eastbourne and between Polegate and Lewes ... a bit like the Lewes road, maybe . . . But certainly neither misty nor dummy4

shimmery. And with no golden bridges and silver rivers.

Perhaps Wirnpy was sickening for the mumps, it occurred to him. It couldn't be drink, because the fellow had been in plain sight for the last hour or more, and there wasn't a whiff of it on his breath.

'Sir!' squeaked Fusilier Batty Evans at his elbow.

With a very great effort Bastable clapped Wimpy on the shoulder. Normally he hated touching people—anyone —

beyond the obligatory handshake. But Harry Bastable wasn't Henry Barstable. And there was that line from his favourite peom, by Sir Henry Newbolt, to remember —

But his Captain's hand on his shoulder smote —

'Play up! play up! and play the game!'

—which really summed up the situation, literally. Because by those three weeks of seniority he, Harry Bastable, was Wimpy's Captain, by God!

'Don't worry, old boy—I'll keep my eyes open—'Qui vive' and

'verb.sap.' and all that. Don't worry!'

He had quoted those lines in the mess once, on a rather drunken evening a few months ago, and everyone had roared with laughter—Wimpy most of all.

But Wimpy wasn't laughing now, he was pleased to observe.

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IV

The road was definitely not misty and shimmery, any more than it was in the Carpathian Mountains. But it was deceptively steep in spite of its zig-zag and, because of that zigzag, much longer than it had seemed from below, even to an officer used to Prince Regent's Own's route-marches. Or perhaps his legs had simply stiffened up in the constriction of DPT 912's rear seat.

Also, its high banks prevented ready observation of the land on either side except at the cost of regular side-scrambles, which further delayed the reconnaissance; and as Wimpy's scout through the wood must necessarily be more quickly completed, and the sooner they were on their way again the better, Bastable contented himself with cautious peerings round each blind bend after the first few hundred yards, with Batty crunching along stolidly five paces behind him.

At length, however, they began to get closer to the trees at the top, and through the thick spring vegetation Bastable made out the shape of what must be farm buildings.

The last turning revealed these as presenting a solid blank wall, topped by an orange-red tiled roof in a sorry state of repair, along some seventy-five yards of empty roadside—a barn, or stable, or collection of covered pens of some sort opening on to an inner courtyard, decided Bastable. He had seen run-down farms like this, more or less, on the outskirts dummy4

of Colembert, unwelcoming from the front but with an entrance round the side. And in this case that entrance must be at the far end, judging by the lack of any side track through the trees at this end. It would be at the far end, too, that he would most likely get a view of the plain—or the next empty undulation—beyond.

But now, quite clearly, was the moment of maximum danger, if there was any. Which there probably wasn't, because he could still hear no other sounds than the distant rumble of bombs and drone of aircraft engines which were as natural and unremarkable now as the birdsong in his own garden, and the raucous squawking of the gulls in Devonshire Park in the morning.

The memory was suddenly painful, as he longed for those other long-lost sounds, and smells, and all the sensations of England, Eastbourne, Home and Beauty —even girls with fat legs.

He turned back towards Fusilier Batty Evans and put his finger to his lips, and pointed to the scatter of weeds and coarse grass and young stinging nettles growing under the barn wall alongside the road, which would deaden their footfalls. Then he set out along the side of the wall.

Half-way along he thought he'd caught the sound of voices, but a renewed rumble from the east... or maybe it was from the north, he couldn't mate out . . . overlaid the sound before he could confirm it in liis mind. But at least it served to draw his attention to the emptiness of his hands.

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He unbuttoned the flap of his webbing holster and drew out the Webley.

This, it occurred to him, was the first time he had ever drawn the weapon in what might loosely be called 'anger', though now it was happening 'trepidation' seemed a more appropriate word.

Yet, oddly enough, it was not trepidation—damn it! that was only jargon for windiness —fear— fear of what might be round the next corner, but only of not doing things right, according to the book, and thereby making an ass of himself.