Do the Birds Still Sing in Hell? (5 page)

‘No shagging for a while, eh, Jim?’

‘No, I suppose not, Arthur.’

‘My girlfriend Jane’s a pal of Eva’s, didn’t you know?’

‘No, I didn’t.’

‘Eva tells Jane everything. She reckons you’re a bit of a lad, an unlimited supply of dobbers – and boy do you put them to the test.’

Horace smiled. He couldn’t quite believe that Eva had shared so much information with her friend.

‘How long do you think it’ll last, Jim? How long before you’re back home rattling Eva’s bones again?’

Horace shrugged his shoulders and gazed out of the window as the train pulled out of the station. ‘That all depends on Mr Hitler, Arthur. He wants peace with us, of that there’s no doubt, but Chamberlain won’t have it.’

‘Rumour has it there are 200,000 British troops in France now. Surely the dozy bastard will call it a day and pull his squareheads back home?’

‘I hope so, Arthur. I hope so. Then I can get back to Eva and give her a good seeing to.’

The two soldiers laughed but despite their vocal optimism both feared the worst. The French Premier, Edouard Daladier, had rejected Hitler’s offer of peace, and earlier that month Hitler had orchestrated the first air attack on Britain when the Luftwaffe had bombed ships in the Firth of Forth. Just a few days ago, the British government had released information about the Nazis building concentration camps for the Jews. Horace wasn’t daft; he knew that in modern warfare the battle of propaganda needed to be worked on too. But building camps to exterminate an entire race? That was just plain daft. It was like something out of the dark ages, Genghis Khan reincarnated. Surely Hitler wasn’t that evil?

The train eventually arrived at Folkestone under the cover of darkness and the regiment of the 2nd/5th Battalion
Leicesters waited patiently on the dockside to be loaded onto the huge cross-channel ferry. As the ship set sail for France, Horace cast his eye on the fast-disappearing silhouette of the English coastline as a cramp gnawed away in the pit of his stomach. He couldn’t explain it and couldn’t understand the feeling that he was experiencing. Something in his head told him this was his last look at England for a long time.

The regiment arrived in the early hours of the morning at the small town of Carentan, 30 miles south of Cherbourg. The following morning they were set to work on the railway. It was backbreaking work and the men moaned constantly.

‘Fuck me, Jim, it isn’t what I expected,’ shouted Arthur Newbold from across the other side of the track as he shovelled another spade full of stones onto the already huge pile. They moved to one side, glad of the two-minute break as a steamroller followed in their wake to compact the stones into the earth, ready for the next sleeper to be laid.

‘Nor me. Give me a few Germans to shoot at any day of the week.’

Mile after mile they laid the stones and the sleepers for the new railway line that would run from Cherbourg to Bayeux and eventually on to Paris. They worked ten hours a day, but were fed and watered well and spent their evenings reading and listening to the war reports on the radio in a huge, stone-fronted building on the outskirts of the village. It was two weeks before they were given a night out in Carentan.

Two lorries dropped the troops off in the centre of town and strict instructions were given to be in the same place to be picked up three hours later. Horace and Arthur had an amble around the town before making their way into what looked like a dated, run-down old hotel. The paint flaked off the blue-fronted shutters, their hinges and clasps worn and rusted.
The English troops were greeted warmly as they ordered a few beers and sauntered over to a table. The bar was almost deserted but for a few more Allied troops from a different regiment and two old men conversing in French. The bar smelled musty and damp and the wallpaper peeled from the walls at the corners. Not like a good old traditional English bar, Horace thought to himself. He tasted the beer. Not bad, but not as good as a nice dark bitter.

A lady in her mid-forties approached the table and spoke in broken but good English.

‘Gentlemen, I have some entertainment lined up for you.’

Oh well, thought Horace, it’s getting a little better. The lady pointed up to the top of a rickety old staircase. Pictures of scenes from Paris and Versailles lined the stairs and a huge dusty chandelier hung from the ceiling where the staircase turned and led to a red-carpeted landing. Three young ladies stood in their frilly finery, hands on hips, smiling down at the soldiers below.

‘Oh well,’ said Arthur cheerfully, ‘looks like we’re going to get a few dancers.’

‘Possibly singers,’ commented Horace innocently.

Sergeant Thompson, a regular soldier in his late thirties, who’d just taken a mouthful of French ale, sprayed his beer across the table, unable to control his laugh.

‘You dozy bastards,’ he guffawed with a huge grin. ‘They’re prostitutes… French fucking whores. The only thing they’ll be singing to is your dicks.’

As the truth dawned on the two young men from Ibstock, their mouths gaped open. It all fell into place, the red carpet, the madame with too much makeup and a hard face standing next to the table and the oh, so expensive French beer. There were no prostitutes in Ibstock. Horace didn’t think he’d even heard the word mentioned in 21 years at 101 Pretoria Road. A woman spreading her legs for any man on earth as long as
he had a pocket full of money. It was simply unthinkable… quite disgusting.

By now Arthur had turned a ghostly shade of white. His beer glass trembled nervously in his hand as he held it in front of his face in a vain attempt to look unruffled. Sergeant Thompson answered the madame.

‘No thanks, luv,’ he said in a rough Derbyshire accent that surely the madame couldn’t make out. ‘I’ve got everything I need back home.’

She turned her attention to Horace who sat in a stunned silence. Sergeant Thompson and Arthur looked across the table too. Arthur gave a nervous laugh and shook his head. ‘Who could do such a thing?’ he asked his companions.

Horace grinned, bundled a fistful of French francs into the madame’s hands and took the stairs two at a time. He had no time to make a choice – he was simply grabbed unceremoniously by the oldest-looking of the three girls, a slim, large-breasted redhead named Collette, no more than 25 years of age. She led him to a room at the far end of the corridor, opened the door and pushed him inside. She stood with her back to the door and defrocked, revealing a red basque with matching stockings and suspenders.

‘And now, Englishman,’ she said with a seductive smile, ‘it’s time for you to find out what a lady’s tongue is for.’

As she moved forward she untied the basque and it fell to the floor, exposing her breasts. Her hand reached out instinctively for Horace’s groin and with an expert twist of her wrist his flies were unbuttoned and his trousers at his ankles. Her small delicate hand squeezed at his already erect penis as she lowered herself to her knees. She pushed at him gently with her free hand as Horace’s knees buckled against the bed. As he fell backwards and felt the girl’s wet mouth on him he lay back and thought of England.

Back in the camp dormitory as they prepared for lights out, Arthur and Sergeant Thompson ridiculed and teased him relentlessly. Horace didn’t care. Collette had taught him things he didn’t think possible in the two hours he’d spent in her company and she’d made good her promise about finding out what exactly a girl’s tongue was for.

Exactly two weeks later the first letter arrived from Eva. Horace was excited and settled down on his bunk to savour each word. He was not to know that Arthur had written to his girlfriend the week before, or that Jane Butler had a mouth bigger than the Humber estuary.

The letter started off nicely, asked how the accommodation and food was and when he was likely to see any action. He was already formulating his replies to her questions in his mind, thinking he might start the letter that evening, when he went on to the second page.

I know all about your indiscretions with the French prostitute and quite frankly Horace I am disgusted. I hope she was worth it. I cannot understand how you could have stooped so low, especially after I gave myself so freely to you. Your words seem so empty now; your actions so false and insincere and I wonder if I have it in my heart to ever forgive you. I do not think it possible at this stage to take you into my arms again.

Eva went on to say that when Horace returned home he would get a piece of her mind. Horace would not be looking forward to that day. But neither Horace Greasley nor Eva Bell knew at the time just how many years it would be before that meeting took place.

CHAPTER
THREE

I
t was mid-May 1940 when the 2nd/5th Battalion Leicesters got the call for action. Germany had invaded France, Belgium and the Netherlands. Neville Chamberlain had resigned and Winston Churchill became Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.

The Third Reich was on the march. Luxembourg had been occupied and General Guderian’s Panzer Corps had broken through into Sedan in France, a strategic disaster for the Allies. Churchill tried to rally the country with his ‘blood, toil, tears and sweat’ speech. Rotterdam had been carpet-bombed by the Luftwaffe, causing thousands of civilian deaths, and the Dutch army had capitulated. Churchill had made a surprise visit to Paris and to his dismay found that French resistance was all but over. Effectively the United Kingdom stood alone in Europe.

Only the rumbling of the slow, four-ton troop-carrier could be heard; the lorry’s occupants were silent. There were unsubstantiated rumours that the Maginot Line had been breached by the Germans and they were advancing through France. The Maginot Line – made up of concrete fortifications, tank obstacles, artillery casemates and machine gun posts – had been established during the First World
War. It was designed to repel any attack by the Germans and thought to be impregnable.

Sergeant Major Aberfield had denied the rumour and said the line had held firm. He’d also said the battalion was on its way to Belgium to welcome the Hun. Horace had asked his sergeant, a high-ranking lieutenant and then Sergeant Major Aberfield how the war was going and where exactly they were heading. Each time he received a different answer. He got the impression that nobody really knew.

Horace held a roughly drawn diagram he’d sketched from the one map of northern France his section of 29 men had in their possession. It belonged to Sergeant Major Aberfield, who’d left it unattended while eating dinner the previous evening. Horace had sketched it in pencil and had filled in the towns of Lille and Lorraine, and several little villages in the Alsace region. He’d carefully shaded the borders of Belgium and Luxembourg, and plotted his section’s progress as they passed through the villages and towns en route.

So now he was more than a little puzzled. Only a little while ago they’d passed through Caudry and, he supposed, on to Hirson in the direction of the Belgian border. To his surprise they’d turned and headed north and now, in the town of Hautmont just 25 miles from the border, the convoy had stopped and the men told to disembark for a quick fag and a pee. Several officers had assembled and were chatting over a large map spread on the ground. Sergeant Major Aberfield was pointing a stick at the map, but Horace couldn’t quite hear what he was saying.

They all returned to the truck and the driver now turned west in the direction of Cambrai. Horace held his drawing on his knees, and his hands began to tremble as the awful truth dawned on him. The battalion had about turned… they were on the retreat.

An hour later the lorry stopped and the troops were told to disembark again. It was if the whole section heard it at the same time, just a split second after the engine of the lorry had spluttered to a halt. Gunfire. There was no mistake.

Gunfire and artillery shells – the sound wafted in on the wind from the east. It was hard to tell exactly how far away the sound was: maybe two, three miles. Horace smiled as a burst of adrenaline caused a shiver up the entire length of his spine, and he was ready. He’d never felt so sure about anything in his life. At last it seemed he was going to see some action.

They had stopped by the side of the road near a wooded area. The lorry Horace had been travelling in pulled into a firebreak in the forest and drove in about half a kilometre. The rest of the convoy left. Horace’s group were on their own, ready for some sort of scrap, though in what form he didn’t know. Horace sensed it and so too did some of the other troops, who were strangely subdued. Aberfield stood under the cover of the trees pulling on a cigarette with trembling fingers. He was a deathly shade of white, a walking corpse.

Horace was instructed to climb up onto the canvas roof of the lorry with a Bren gun. The rest of the men stood around the lorry, Lee Enfield 303 single-shot rifles at the ready. He was told by the corporal that a German reconnaissance plane was close by and it was Horace’s job to bring it down with a continuous burst of fire from the machine gun. ‘You’re the best shot, Greasley,’ the corporal said by way of explanation as Horace climbed up and was handed the Bren gun. Horace didn’t need any justification… he was ready. In fact he couldn’t have been more excited.

Horace lay on his back on top of the tight tarpaulin for nearly two hours. The safety catch on the Bren gun had been disengaged, his finger poised on the trigger as he held the gun pointing to the sky. A couple of times he thought he heard
the drone of an aeroplane engine in the distance, but to his disappointment it had faded away.

‘Down you come, Greasley,’ the corporal shouted up to him. ‘You’ve been up there long enough.’

‘I’m fine, Corporal, never felt better. I’m…’

‘Get your arse down here when I tell you, Greasley! Two hours up there is enough for anyone’s concentration. Come on, we haven’t got all day.’

‘But Corporal, I…’

‘Now, for fuck’s sake! That’s an order!’

Another youthful squaddie was making his way up onto the roof looking none too pleased. Horace smiled as he held out a hand to pull him up.