The Animal Stars Collection Read online

  He was young—one o’ those who had lied about his age, mebbe. This one wasn’t even old enough for bumfluff on his chin. Cut on the face—bit o’ flying shrapnel mebbe…and then he saw the boy’s eyes, brown eyes, wide open to the sky.

  No helping this one then. Dead, and by the feel of it already cooling. He shut the boy’s eyes automatically—all you could do for the poor sod now—and noticed blood in the hair. Head wound then, he’d never have known what hit him.

  Please, he thought suddenly. When my time comes, let it be like that for me. The world bright, the sky blue, then suddenly nowt, before I know it.

  He glanced around. Another body, where a smaller gully twisted into this one, all rutted dirt and stones and scrub. The wounded man had seen him. His eyes showed hope as well as pain. Jack ran over to him, bent again. A Tommy, same age as him by the look, brown eyes, brown hair under his cap.

  ‘Thank God—’

  Jack cut him off. ‘Can’t take you back, matey. Sorry.’ He nodded at the man’s wound, the blood bright on the uniform across his stomach. His stomach bulged above the wound, too. Already Jack had learnt that meant more bleeding inside you, a worse sign than blood outside. ‘I’d likely kill you lugging you back down.’ He paused. The Tommy deserved honesty, but he needed a bit o’ hope too. ‘I’ll do what I can, though. I’ll send someone with a stretcher.’

  …if there was one to send. But you couldn’t tell a man that, not with his guts split open for the sky to see.

  He pulled bandages from his bag, applied a pad to slow the bleeding down, waiting for the Tommy to argue, plead. But he only gasped at the added pain, his lips dry and already cracked. ‘Water?’

  Jack hesitated. You didn’t give abdominals water. But if he was any judge this one didn’t have much of a chance anyhow. He held the canteen to the boy’s lips long enough for him to take a sip.

  ‘My mate,’ he gasped. ‘Snowy, over there.’

  Jack followed his gaze. Another youngster by the look of it. Leg wounds, one trouser leg torn in half a dozen places, blood welling from three or four.

  ‘I can take him.’

  ‘Letter in my pocket…’

  Jack fished inside the bloody uniform and pulled out a sealed envelope. ‘Give it to Snowy. For my mum…’ The voice was just a whisper now.

  ‘I’ll give it him. You stay quiet now.’

  Stupid words, what with the shells screaming overhead, the booms and shrieks and noises from every type of explosion known to man. What could the poor blighter do except rest here?

  ‘I’ll see your ma gets it.’

  The Tommy closed his eyes.

  Jack had never written a last letter to Ma and Annie, for someone to give them if he died. He supposed he’d better try, though he’d make a poor fist of it. What could you say? I love you? Nay, they knew that—a bloke didn’t give his ma and sister most of his wages all his life unless he loved them. Tell them he’d done his best? Jack shook his head. But he’d have to get round to it.

  When there was time.

  Jack made his way across to Snowy.

  ‘Jeez it hurts, jeez…me leg, it hit me leg. Thought we was going to make it…then Harry got it and then me…’

  This one was a talker then. Jack let the words flow over him while he bound the wounds—one of them bad, the bone splintered. The boy stopped chatting long enough to scream, his hands scrabbling at the rocks.

  ‘Got that out of you, then? Right. I’m going to turn me back. You put your arms around me neck and I’ll haul you up…’

  ‘Stretcher…’

  ‘Ain’t none.’

  The boy didn’t move. He muttered something else.

  ‘What was that? Come on now.’

  ‘Billy…there’s three of us. We was at school together…Take Billy too.’

  Jack cast a brief glance at the young man a few feet away. ‘Next time,’ he mouthed to him—the guns had decided to give an extra roar for some reason.

  And finally Snowy’s hands were around his neck. Jack grasped them, rose as gently as he could and heard the gasp of pain and then more words again, even more hurried now, as though the poor lad wanted to get rid of every word he wanted to say in his whole life, afraid there were only minutes left.

  Well, let him talk. Kept his mind off things.

  A bit. Mebbe.

  He began to walk, the body on his back jolting him at every step and him jolting the poor blighter too.

  He’d got down into the gully now, but it was hard to keep a foothold on the rough slope. I need a donkey, he thought grimly, and smiled at the idea. A donkey walking out of the carnival back home, with bells on its reins and glass jewels on its saddle, all ready to carry the wounded off to a Punch and Judy show while the hurdy-gurdy played.

  A donkey…

  For a moment he thought he had been hit himself. In the head maybe, that would be it. For there it was, chomping the grass like its life depended on it.

  A flaming donkey.

  ‘Here, Neddy,’ he said. The words came before he thought about them. Daft. The donkey glanced up at him, then stumbled a step away.

  What had he expected? That the beast would trot up to him, all friendly-like, hoping for a carrot? He gazed at the animal as it bent its head again. The lad on his back was quiet now, limp. Probably fainted, and a good thing too. Less pain. Easier to lug a dead weight than a man who flinched at every extra agony.

  It wasn’t much of a donkey. Big head, small body, like the ones he’d seen in Egypt, half starved all its life most likely. Its coat was dark brown, and it had a strangely pale muzzle. There was a scar on its hind quarters, probably from a beating. It had the biggest ears he’d ever seen, half flopped down like a rabbit’s. Suddenly the ears pricked up, and twitched towards him. The donkey took another step away.

  Where had it come from? Wild? But it had looked up when he called. No, this one had known men before. It was choosing to stay away, donkey-like. And why should it come to him? It had its grass. What did it need from him?

  And then he had it.

  Water…there wasn’t any water here, not unless you were a fish. No water for a donkey.

  ‘Hey, Neddy. Come with me and I’ll give thee the biggest drink tha’s ever seen.’

  The donkey trotted even further up the gully.

  What was he doing, standing here talking to a donkey like a loony with a wounded man on his back? No point chasing it. What would he do if he caught it, anyway?

  A donkey. A bleeding donkey here in Shrapnel Gully.

  Jack began his rough stumble down the gully once again.

  CHAPTER 9

  The Donkey

  Gallipoli, 26 April 1915

  The noise had terrified the donkey at first. But you could get used to noise, especially when it didn’t hurt you. The smells frightened him more, smells of pain and blood. But anything was better than the horror of the sea.

  His legs had steadied. To begin with they hadn’t seemed to belong to him at all. Now he nosed for food among the stones, looking for the greenest, softest grass—something to soothe his thirst and the roughness in his throat from salt and braying. Every now and then he lifted his nose and sniffed the air, but there was no smell of fresh water, except from very far away.

  He’d have to go there, some time. But between him and that tantalising scent were men, more men than he’d ever known before, and louder noises, the whirs and bangs and thuds he’d been hearing for the past two days, as well as human shouts and screams.

  Desperation would drive him through that wall of sound.

  But not quite yet.

  CHAPTER 10

  Jack

  Gallipoli, 26 April 1915

  Jack knelt on the sand and loosened his grip on the boy’s wrists, slowly, so the body didn’t drop too suddenly to the ground. The lad was still unconscious. Best thing for him, most like. There’d be time enough to feel the pain before he was loaded onto a barge and taken back out to the big ships. Plenty of time after that
, too, if he were lucky.

  Jack stood and stretched, feeling the ache in his back and his knees. It was easier hefting a sugar sack than a man down the rough stones of the gully. Now if he’d had donkey legs…

  The donkey.

  An Indian orderly knelt by the boy he’d brought in. Jack touched his shoulder and the man looked up. ‘Do tha know anything about a donkey, up in the gully?’

  The man looked at him as though he was crazy. Well, perhaps he was. Maybe the whole lot of them were barking mad.

  Jack raised his voice. ‘Any of youse know anything about a donkey? There’s one up in Shrapnel Gully.’

  No one answered. Suddenly another of the Indians beckoned. Jack stepped between the bodies—living, dead, waiting or unconscious—then knelt by the man the Indian orderly was tending—big chap, ginger hair, lying on his stomach with shrapnel wounds in his back. Red blood, not black. Most likely he’d live…Jack bent his head closer to catch the whisper.

  ‘Brought them over from Lemnos, down in the hold when I came over. Meant to carry water, but there’s no flaming water to carry, is there? No barges either, not for donkeys, so they chucked the donkeys over the side. Poor blighters drowned.’

  ‘One didn’t. Thanks, mate.’ Jack stood up.

  Not a wild donkey then. He’d been right. And if the army brought the donkeys over—well, the army were daft, but not that daft. They’d have found themselves donkeys that were trained to carry, that’d take orders like the rest of them.

  There was a bucket filled with soiled dressings. Jack emptied them onto the ground, then carried the bucket over to the water tin and half filled it.

  ‘What in hell’s name are you doing?’ The orderly sounded curious rather than condemning. Probably wonders if I’ve gone barmy, too, thought Jack.

  He grinned. ‘Baiting me line to catch a donkey. Any of you blighters know where I can find meself some hay?’

  CHAPTER 11

  The Donkey

  Gallipoli, 26 April 1915

  Humans passed. The donkey ignored them. The noise grew worse: so loud at times that the rocks under his hooves seemed to shudder. But the donkey had learnt already that the noise didn’t hurt him. There was something more important to think of now.

  Water.

  Thirst ate at him. His throat was almost too sore to swallow. He had to leave the safety of the gully or else he’d die.

  He put one hoof forwards, and then another. He hesitated. Perhaps if he waited till it was nearly dark. Somehow he knew there was safety in darkness, though last night had been even noisier than the day.

  ‘Eh, Neddy?’

  The voice was close behind him—so close the donkey shied, his hooves slipping on the rough ground. He hadn’t heard the man in all the noise.

  ‘Hey, steady, Neddy.’ The voice was calm, with a curious gentleness too. No one had spoken to the donkey in a gentle voice before. He twitched his ears, curious despite his thirst. He lifted his nose to catch more of the man’s scent.

  And then he smelt something else, as well. Water. Good fresh water.

  The man held it out, his hands around the middle of the bucket. The donkey waited for him to put it on the ground, but he didn’t.

  There was no choice. He had to drink, even though it brought him closer to the man. He lowered his head into the bucket and began to gulp.

  ‘Ah, that were what thou needed, eh?’ The voice was soft and low, a very different sound from the high-pitched whines and sharp explosions. The man wrapped one arm around the bucket and stroked the donkey’s neck with the other hand. The donkey twitched his tail, alarmed, but he kept drinking.

  ‘Now, lad, I’m going to put the bucket down, see? And then I’ll tether thee with these.’

  The donkey glanced up at the strips of white.

  ‘They’re only bandages, but they’ll do for a halter and lead rope, I reckon. What say tha? Ah, that’s the way then. Thou keep drinking while I tether tha…’

  The feel of a soft rope around his neck and then about his face. The donkey twitched again but, after all, it was familiar. And while humans had meant work and sometimes pain, they had meant food and water too.

  So the donkey didn’t pull away, even when he had drunk enough, but stood there. The man adjusted his makeshift halter then led him a few steps down to a biscuit of hay.

  The donkey smelt it. There was a scent of mule, and human too. But it smelt good. The donkey took a mouthful and chewed, while the man stroked his neck and back, ran his hands along his ears and talked.

  It was strange to be talked to so gently. No one had ever stroked him like this before, either.

  But this man did.

  And so, when the man tugged him up the gully the donkey followed.

  Step, step, step with a man pulling the rope in front of him…he could almost have been back home on the island, except for the noise about him and the lack of a load. He plodded on, almost unthinking now, letting the man decide. Then suddenly he realised.

  They were heading out beyond the gully.

  Out into the noise, into that strange mad world of men. No! The donkey planted his hooves among the pebbles and pulled back.

  The man turned round. The donkey cringed and waited for the beating. But instead the rough hand stroked his nose again. ‘Come on, Neddy. Thou can do it. Do thy best. Just a little way and we’ll turn back.’

  The donkey didn’t understand the words. But the tone was soothing, confident. If the man wasn’t afraid then perhaps it was all safe. The donkey stepped forwards, cautiously at first, then more confidently as the man in front of him didn’t falter.

  It was strangely good to be led again. And this man was different from Dimitri. His hands were kind.

  CHAPTER 12

  Jack

  Gallipoli, 26 April 1915

  He hadn’t thought the blinking donkey would really do it. Only men would be daft enough to walk through a world like this. Already the hills of Gallipoli looked liked they’d been hit by an army of badgers, or Aussie wombats: everywhere piles of sandy dirt from trenches; dirt-coloured sandbags already rising into walls to give some shelter from the bullets; and more dirt skidded up by rifle fire along the ground.

  It was like the time he’d gone gold-mining in earth churned up by decades of diggers. That was them now, he reckoned. They’d been turned back into diggers again, digging trenches to save their lives instead of for the gold.

  His ears buzzed with the noise. At times the world shivered before his eyes and, though he knew that it was his vision that had been rocked by a larger-than-usual burst of shell fire, it seemed like the earth itself had shuddered with the impact.

  The donkey still trotted beside him.

  Again he was struck by the dumb faith animals had in humans. He stroked the beast’s side. ‘Aye, Neddy, we hit you and we starve you, and still you follow us.’

  The donkey glanced up at him with his big brown eyes, then looked back down to where he was placing his feet.

  Suddenly the girl’s face on the beach so long ago came back to Jack. ‘Nay, I can’t call thee Neddy. Tha deserves a proper name. How about Duffy, then? Someone told me once it were the best name in the world for a donkey. What say thou to that, lad?’

  The donkey blew through his nostrils at him, almost as though he understood. A shell exploded nearby. The donkey started, but he didn’t try to pull away.

  Jack grinned. ‘I name thee Duffy then. Of course tha might be Turkish, and then Duffy wouldn’t suit tha at all. Are tha an Abdul mebbe?’

  The donkey said nothing.

  Ah, the sweet familiar animal smell. Well, all right, the donkey ponged something dreadful. But it were a good pong. Not like the stench of blood that seeped across the hills. The donkey’s scent reminded Jack of all the animals he’d cared for. It reminded him of home and of Ma complaining about the muck on his boots.

  How had Ma stood it? he wondered suddenly. Cleaning up after us. Caring for Dad all through his pain, wiping up blood year af
ter year, singing as she carried the bedpan to the outhouse in the yard. Sometimes when Ma sang it was like their home was filled with the roses and pretty girls of her songs, not with pain.

  Singing…

  Jack glanced at the donkey. The small beast still followed him obediently, hardly needing the lead rope.

  ‘I know a song about an Abdul,’ he informed the donkey. The donkey didn’t even look up. Jack grinned at himself. What had he expected? That the creature would start chattering back to him? I am going barmy, he thought. Nutty as a hedge of hazelnuts. He started to hum, partly just for the sheer hell of it, to tell the world that he was still alive and kicking. But suddenly it felt good…

  ‘The sons of the Prophet are brave men and bold’ he sang softly.

  ‘And quite unaccustomed to fear

  But the bravest by far in the ranks of the Shah Was Abdul Abulbul Amir.

  ‘If you wanted a man to encourage the van Or harass the foe from the rear Storm fort or redoubt, you had only to shout for Abdul Abulbul Amir.’

  Is this why Ma sings? he thought. Life might throw muck at you, but you needn’t let it stick. ‘While I live, I’ll sing.’

  Jack grinned at the donkey again. ‘What am I whispering for, eh? Not as though anyone can hear me in all this!’ He raised his voice defiantly. If he was going to die tomorrow he was damned if he’d whisper now.

  ‘Now the heroes were plenty and well known to fame In the troops that were led by the Czar And the bravest of these was a man by the name of Ivan Skavinsky Skavar.’

  A shell exploded. Jack looked around, irritated. ‘Keep time, tha bastards!’ he yelled. ‘How’s a man to sing if tha keep interrupting?!’

  He bellowed the song out now, as though his singing could drown out the war. And if Johnny Turk heard him, what did it matter? He’d shoot him whether he sang or not.