William Boyd - An Ice-Cream War

“Or my moniplies. My jag. Yes my jag even.”

Felix felt confused; by now he’d come almost to understand Gilzean, but when the man was upset his language retreated into the obscurities of his arcane Celtic vocabulary. He knew suddenly that Wheech-Browning had news of Gabriel.

“I shouldn’t worry,” he told Gilzean, “If you’re not feeling too bad otherwise. I’m sure it’ll clear up, um, whatever it is. See the MO if any complications arise.” That seemed to cover everything.

“Thank you very much indeed, sir,” Gilzean said gratefully, saluted and walked off with his curious tin.

“That’s remarkable,” Wheech-Browning said. “What language was that man speaking?”

“English.”

“Never! Quite incomprehensible.”

“A Scottish version, anyway.”

“Can you understand him?”

“It took a while, but I can catch the basic drift now.” He paused. “You said you had some news.”

“Yes,” said Wheech-Browning. “About your brother. We’ve come across some traces of him. You remember that American chap, Smith? He telephoned yesterday from a place called Nanda.”

Felix felt a sinking feeling in his body, as if all its vital fluids were being dragged towards his feet.

“Have you found him?”

“Not exactly. But we do know where he was up to a few days ago. I’ve cleared it with your captain. You can come along with me.”

♦

Wheech-Browning explained what had happened as they bounced down the road towards Nanda in his Ford. ‘Kilforce’, moving parallel to but faster than ‘Linforce’, had captured Nambindinga the day before, found it deserted and had advanced on to the next village down the road, Nanda, where they had discovered a small POW camp. The prisoners had passed on information about Gabriel. How he had escaped just two days previously.

Felix and Wheech-Browning drove past columns of ‘Lin-force’ troops marching briskly down the road. Loveday’s mine crater had already been filled in by the pioneers. Felix wondered if anyone really knew what was going on in this war. Why had ‘Kilforce’ been halted and ‘Linforce’ advanced? He could have marched into Nanda…He felt a spine-snapping tension in his body. He was buoyant with a kind of nervous expectation and yet couldn’t ignore the forebodings that nagged at him. What would happen when he met Gabriel again? Could he tell him his fateful news?

Wheech-Browning was in a chatty mood.

“Remember that Zeppelin I told you about? Well, it set off all right a few days ago. The twenty-first, I think. Crossed the Med. and headed down over the desert in Sudan. Just as it got to Khartoum, our chaps in signals sent it a message in code, German code, saying: “German forces in East Africa have surrendered.” We’ve got the jerry codes, you see. We captured them in 1915. Bilderbeck’s work again. Great loss, that man.” His face looked solemn for an instant. “What do you think happened?”

Felix wasn’t really listening. “What? Oh, um, no idea.”

“Turned right round and went straight back home, that’s what. Bloody marvellous, don’t you think?”

♦

Nanda was full of King’s African Rifles. Felix looked about him as he drove into the little town. He saw the row of cramped mud-walled, tin-roofed buildings lining the main street; the shade trees planted here and there; the tin and wood bungalows of the planters’ families; the long stone buildings of the former agricultural research station; the wire enclosure of the small POW stockade.

Wheech-Browning reported to battalion headquarters, which had taken over one of the larger bungalows. They were told where they might find Temple Smith and walked down the main street in search of him.

Behind the hospital, sitting in the shade of a large mango tree, were a disconsolate group of German women and children. Some little way off Temple was talking to one of them. Felix and Wheech-Browning approached. Temple broke off his interrogation and greeted Felix with some enthusiasm and Wheech-Browning with less.

“What are you doing here?” he demanded of Wheech-Browning suspiciously.

“I’m GSO II (Intelligence), for Heaven’s sake,” Wheech-Browning protested. “This is a matter for my department.”

Temple inclined his head in the direction of the German woman.

“That woman is the wife of the bastard I’m chasing,” he said. “But wait for this. He’s chasing your brother. Isn’t that extraordinary?”

Felix wasn’t interested in the American’s observations: what was coincidence to him was merely irrelevant to Felix.

“But why? Why is he chasing him?”

“Your brother escaped two days ago. It seems they think he was a spy.”

“A spy? ” It didn’t make any sense. “Gabriel?”

“Yes. But Frau von Bishop says he wasn’t a spy.” Temple frowned, as if he too were having trouble comprehending everything. “Anyway,” he went on, “the Germans believe your brother is in possession of vital information, which is why they’re after him.”

“I wonder what it is?” Wheech-Browning said.

“Doesn’t she know?” Felix asked.

“No. Or at least she isn’t saying. She says she has no interest in the war at all.”

“But where’s he gone?” Felix said. It seemed the most malevolent cruelty to have allowed him to get so close.

“North,” Temple said. “That’s all she knows. She keeps saying not to worry. She says your brother will come back here any day. She says he’s just hiding out in the bush somewhere.”

“How does she know all this?”

“Your brother was in the hospital here for a long time as her patient. It seems she got to know him then.”

Felix felt lost. He couldn’t really grasp what was going on.

“Look,” Temple said. “I’m going after this von Bishop. They won’t be long off. If I catch him your brother might not be far away.”

“I’m coming too,” Felix said. “But I must ask this woman a question first.”

“Let’s get out of the damned sun first,” Wheech-Browning said, pushing open the door of an outhouse. “Cooler in here. I’ll just have a look.” He ducked inside. Ten seconds later he came out, red-faced, scrupulously wiping his hand with a handkerchief.

“Good God!” he seemed genuinely shocked. “Barbarians! The place is covered in…human ordure!”

“That’s right,” Temple said calmly. “I should have warned you.”

Felix walked over to the German woman, Temple and Wheech-Browning following. The woman was plump and strong-looking, with a pale freckly face. She had a mango leaf in her hands and was tearing it methodically into tiny pieces.

“ Guten Tag, gnadige Frau ,” Felix said, striving to remember his German.

“She speaks English,” Temple said.

“Oh good.” Felix started again. “I believe you know my brother, Gabriel Cobb. He escaped from here two days ago.”

The woman’s placid expression suddenly became curious. She stared at Felix’s face.

“You are Gabriel’s brother?” she said.

“Yes. I just want to ask you one question,” Felix said slowly. “Can you tell me if, during the time he was here, he ever received a letter? A letter from England.”

“A letter? ”

“Yes.”

“No. No, I’m sure.”

“Sure he didn’t?”

“He never had any letter.”

Felix felt a delicious sensation momentarily envelop him. A feeling of supernatural release, a floating, an ecstatic removal of terrible worries and tormenting fears. Gabriel knew nothing. Now all he had to do was find him.

“Thank you,” he said with heartfelt sincerity to the woman, and rejoined Temple and Wheech-Browning.

“Were you speaking German then?” Wheech-Browning asked.