He ambled over to where the officer was inspecting his tank. The words almost stuck in his craw. “Sir, I — may I ask you a favour?”
The tank commander cocked his head to one side, intrigued, and invited Atkins to continue.
“I’ve got a letter from my sweetheart. I — I can’t smell her perfume anymore. I was wondering if you could tell me if there’s any trace of it left.”
“Hrm.” The masked subaltern seemed to consider the request. From the tone in his voice, the idea seemed to amuse him. “Let me see it.”
Reluctantly, Atkins took out the worn envelope from his tunic pocket and eased the sharply creased writing paper from it. Mathers snatched the folded note with more haste and less care than Atkins would have liked, and held it up to his chainmail and leather mask. He noticed the welts and insects bites on Mathers’ hands as he held the letter. Atkins heard a quick audible sniff from beneath the chainmail. Mathers’ head lolled back in a languorous manner, as he inhaled again, this time more slowly, deeper, relishing what he found there.
“Hey!” Atkins snatched the letter from his hands, scowling at the officer as if he’d just insulted the lady.
“Merely making sure, Corporal,” said Mathers, his head moving as though sucking up the last faint dregs of scent, his chainmail rattling faintly.
Atkins reverently slipped the letter back into its envelope and returned it to his pocket. “Is there anything left, sir?”
Mathers appeared to be lost in a reverie.
“Sir?”
Mathers looked at him. “Yes. I can still smell it.” He turned on his heel and went back to inspecting the tank.
Atkins sighed with relief. He hadn’t even been aware of holding his breath. He closed his eyes, tipped back his head to the heavens and offered a muttered, but heartfelt, thank-you. He would see the day out and that, at least, gave him some little comfort.
He returned to 1 Section, who were packing their gear and getting ready to move off, and approached Nellie Abbott.
“I’m worried about Lieutenant Mathers,” said Atkins. “Can you give him the once over? The last thing we need is a windy ruddy officer.” Nellie looked uncomfortable with the idea. Atkins pressed the point. “Look, Alfie’s life depends on this man. Do you really want that if he’s funked it?”
“That’s not fair, corporal.”
“Maybe not, Miss Abbott, but it’s true. Will you do it? If not for me, for Alfie?”
There was a stony silence and he felt himself wither under Nellie’s glare. Yet another thing of which he wasn’t proud. As she turned on her heel, he grabbed her earnestly by the wrist. “He’s been badly bitten by insects,” he confided. She looked down at the importunate hand on her wrist, arching an eyebrow, and he released her. With a dismissive huff, she strode over to Lieutenant Mathers, who was still inspecting the tank.
“Lieutenant?”
“Yes, nurse?”
“I hear you were bitten a lot last night, I was wondering if you’d just let me look and make sure that you’re all right?”
He waved her away. “There’s no need.”
“Mr Mathers, it’s my job. It’ll only take ’alf a mo’. An’ if it’s serious, then maybe I’ve got something that’ll help, and if not, I’m sure Napoo could whip up one of his poultices.”
“This isn’t necessary.”
She reached up to lift his chainmail curtain and he slapped her hand away.
“I said it isn’t necessary. I’m perfectly fine.”
“Mr Mathers,” she said with wounded dignity. “I’ll be the judge of that. Now let me help you.”
Mathers turned to go, but Nellie, surprised by her own audacity, caught hold of the chainmail curtain in his mask and ripped it upwards and back, knocking off his toughened leather turtle helmet in the process. It clattered to the ground as he wheeled round and turned on the small FANY, who now held his mask in her hand.
She gasped as she saw his face. It wasn’t the usual impetigo and rashes from petrol fumes that she normally saw on tank crews. Large raised red plaques covered his skin and there were swellings at his throat, but his eyes — his eyes were completely black, upon which a shifting rainbow film swirled continually, like petrol on water.
He turned those eyes upon her now. “How dare you!” he snarled, before crumpling with a groan and clutching his stomach.
“Are you all right?” asked Nellie, putting her hand on his shoulder and noticing the growth at the base of his skull. “Let me help you.”
Mathers forced himself upright. “You’ve done enough. The fuel fumes help me all I need. They stop it spreading.” He snatched back his mask from Nellie’s hand and, stooping to pick up his fallen helmet, he stormed off to the tank.
“Wait, stops what spreading? Stops what, Lieutenant?”
The chunter of the tank’s engine filled the clearing, drowning out the possibility of any further conversation as Clegg ran the engine up.
“Did you see?” said Nellie, still shocked.
“Yes. Yes, I did,” said Atkins, thoughtfully.
“But his eyes!”
“The petrol fruit.”
“Alfie doesn’t have that, none of them have.”
Atkins shook his head. “No, they haven’t been drinking the stuff. Mathers has.”
“He has some kind of infection, too. Those plaques on his face and the swellings on his neck, I’ve never seen anything like them.”
Atkins hadn’t either, but then this world was full of particularly unpleasant surprises. “I think he’s drinking the petrol fruit to relieve the pain of it, but it makes him see things. Believe me, I know. I think he’s mad, Miss Abbott, but he has a great influence over his men. They’re fiercely loyal. If we move against him, they’ll do everything they can to protect him, which will get us nowhere, and we need that tank. Lieutenant Everson needs that tank.”
Napoo had a different opinion on Mathers and had no qualms about telling the rest of the section. “Someone has cursed him, and he has been possessed by an evil spirit. Who might have the power to do such a thing?”
“Jeffries,” exclaimed Chalky. “Jeffries could do it, couldn’t he, Only?”
Mercy clipped him round the back of his head. “Prat!” Some people just saw Jeffries everywhere.
Jeffries had sprung to Atkins’ mind, too, but he dismissed the idea. Despite all the claims and the stories, his own encounter with Jeffries suggested that he was nothing more than a man. “Can you help him?”
Napoo shook his head sadly. “Those possessed by dulgur are cast out of the clan for fear of the harm or bad fortune they bring. I do not understand why the Tohmii keep theirs around.”
Atkins frowned. It took him a moment to realise that he was talking about the shell-shocked. No wonder the urmen gave the Bird Cage a wide berth.
“So,” said Atkins, none the wiser. “Mathers is either possessed, or mad.”
“Well, that’s nothing new, he’s an officer,” said Mercy.
1 SECTION MOVED out behind the tank as it rolled forwards, crushing a path through the undergrowth as they set off in the direction in which the smoke creatures had dragged the Zohtakarrii. The chatts had been hauled through the jungle at speed, even without the thin oily residue that coated the trees and undergrowth, the trail of snapped branches, gouged ground, and occasional chatt limb wasn’t hard to follow.
Atkins dropped back and matched his stride with that of Chandar’s. The chatt was silent, fidgeting with the tassels of its shoulder cloth, watching the tank closely as if still debating with itself on the matter of its divinity.