A taste of the reading experience to come:

The Queeen’s Irishman: In the night, someone placed an inverted cross against the gatepost, then a dead cat. And on the few occasions Harriett accompanied Jack to the village people crossed the street or averted their eyes and hurried past to avoid her. One shopkeeper refused them service and ordered them from his premises.

One afternoon, Jack looked out towards the road to see a priest standing there at the gate, crossing himself. He walked down the track to see what he wanted. The priest was praying in Latin, and Jack could not understand him. Then he looked up at Jack. He appeared frightened and his eyes kept looking over Jack’s shoulder at the cottage, as if he dreaded the appearance of the devil in person. ‘Father,’ said Jack, ‘Can I be of help?’ The priest hesitated, cleared his throat, and began to speak quickly, as if he had memorised his words.

‘Someone has informed me that here in this cottage lives one devoted to devil worship, a witch, in fact. The people believe her evil influence is the cause of so much death and disease in Ballinrobe. I wish to exorcise the evil spirit from her body. Only then will the terrible conditions lift from this parish.’

Jack laughed in his face. ‘Father,’ he said, ‘I would have imagined you to have more brains than to believe such foolishness. We are just a family trying to live in peace. Now, go away and leave us to our lives.’

The man of the cloth drew himself up to his full height. Tall, emaciated, with a prominent Adam’s apple, he looked ludicrous, but the words he spoke were far from it. ‘Very well, then I must act to drive you out of my parish.’ He held up a crucifix and brandished it in Jack’s face. ‘Get thee hence, Satan,’ he cried, ‘leave this body and descend into hell, in the name of God!’

When there was no discernible evidence of the devil’s flight, he spoke again, directly to Jack. ‘If you will not leave of your own free will, I will have the Earl of Lucan evict you. This is his property and you have no right to be here.’ He turned and strode away towards the village.

 
Sawdust & Prickly Pear: Jack drank his tea and talked with his hosts. They wanted to know about South Africa, and Jack wanted to know all about the Federation. They enjoyed the conversation. He finished his tea and rode down to the stockyards, where George was busy with a young horse. Jack watched him as he worked. He seemed to have infinite patience with the fractious animal, gently stroking him and blowing across his nostrils, all the time talking to him gently. Jack saw the horse calm, then reach out his nose to George, sniffing him. George never stopped talking to the horse. Jack watched for more than an hour. When George looked up, it was obvious the horse was now his friend. It moved forward and rubbed his forehead against George’s shoulder.

George had not realised Jack was even there, so engrossed was he in his work. ‘Jack,’ he said, ‘What do you think of the old place?’

‘Well, there are no bullets flying, and no lions wanting to eat me; I think it is good. I have just been up to see Basil Davis about the bullock team. He wants me to look them over tomorrow. Can you give me some more information?’

The young horse had walked up behind George and playfully rubbed his head across his back. George almost absentmindedly turned to ruffle his mane and rub his ears. ‘How long have you been breaking him in?’ asked Jack.

‘Since yesterday.’

‘Not bloody likely George; nobody can break in a horse in two days!’

‘Sometimes I take less,’ said George. ‘The trick is to make him my friend, and never, never, be cruel. Look!’ He turned to the horse and stroked his nose, murmuring something in his ear, and then he bent down and crabbed his way right under the animal’s belly. The horse gave a gentle snort and turned his head around to push at George’s shoulder again. Jack was speechless. His brother had a gift, as few people did.

Into the Dark Night, Falling: After their three days, they sailed for the port of Halifax in Nova Scotia. Here they joined a large convoy to cross the Atlantic to England. They watched their escorts gathering. There were a couple of old four stack destroyers and half a dozen tubby little Flower class corvettes. The escorts chivvied the ships into formation. It was a large convoy, some sixty ships. One sailor noticed that there was a tanker in the column to starboard. ‘Bastard,’ he said, ‘one tin fish in her and we’ll go up as well. What a bloody war!’

The crossing was short for this convoy, designated a fast convoy, was able to travel at a good ten knots. There were no slow ships or laggards; however, the escort commander had constant trouble with a tramp steamer flying the Norwegian flag. She was always straying out of position and subjected to long strings of invective from the destroyer’s loud hailer. The Norwegian skipper ignored most of that and struggled on. In the night, there were several alarms, but no sightings or attacks. But when daylight broke, the Norwegian was not there. Sometime in the night she had slipped from this mortal coil. The convoy sailed on. There were hundreds of ships at the bottom of the sea. Another would make little difference. The focus must remain on the living if the war was to be won.

While most of the convoy made the long journey to the north of Ireland into the Irish Sea and the safety of Liverpool, Columbine and two others, escorted by a battered little corvette, sailed ESE about for the port of Southampton. An elderly warrant officer wearing medal ribbons from the Great War, probably dragged out of retirement for this important job met them there. They were glad to feel solid ground beneath their feet at last. The WO gave them meal and travel warrants. They looked about them. Everywhere there were signs of the war. Even civilians carried gas masks, and there were few vehicles, because of severely rationed petrol. In the tearooms at the railway station, the choice was paltry. There were some small buns, stewed tea, and little else. Jack would have liked a large steak.

They entrained for Bournemouth; a sooty, dirty train packed with servicemen. Jack looked around him. There were many sailors, no doubt heading for Plymouth or Dartmouth, airmen from Coastal Command, and soldiers from everywhere. There were a couple of pretty WRNS as well. They eyed the Australians, recognising their shoulder flashes. They smiled lovely smiles at Jack. What an opportunity, he thought, and what a pity I can’t use it.

Now they sat in their cold rooms in Bournemouth, waiting for whatever fate had decreed for them. They did not know it, but six of the eight would never see Australia again

Drowning in Her Eyes: The recruit course went on. Every morning, they paraded, and then the men and their huts subjected to thorough inspection. Petty offences became capital crimes. Every afternoon, men marched off to Defaulters’ Parade. In the second week, the firearms lessons and the shooting ranges were of much more interest to Jack. They fired their rifles in a full range shoot at man-sized targets. Mostly, they missed. To be accurate, its owner must zero a rifle and none of these rifles was since they were not on a permanent issue as a personal weapon. It disappointed Jack, this result. The range officer said, ‘Private Riordan, have you even hit the bloody thing?’ There was a mess of torn target in the bottom right. The range officer threw it away in disgust. Jack said, ‘Hold on a minute sir, let me have a look.’

There in the corner were six holes, so close together it looked as if it was a single large hole punched through the target. Jack took it to the range officer. ‘Look, sir, I hit it with every shot. The rifle is off. It’s shooting low and to the right.’ The officer looked at the target, then at Jack, and repeated his father’s words of long ago. ‘Bugger me. How did you do that?’ he said. ‘You’ve shot a perfect group!’

 The House that Jack Built: His two companions swiftly pulled one sailor out into the open. The man was a Lascar, a sailor of Indian origin. Disoriented, blinded by the bright sun after so many days in the cave's gloom, it terrified him. They dragged him into the field of view of the camera. Two of the visitors appeared, faces hidden by black balaclavas, heads wearing black turbans. One turned to face the camera, while the other bound the seaman’s hands behind his back and tied his ankles, forcing him into a kneeling position in front of the camera. The first man produced a scroll and made an announcement in Arabic. The second man opened the other bundle and withdrew a long, shining sword.

As the first man began his speech, those prisoners who could understand began a low murmur, gradually rising to collective cries of terror. The lascar must have understood some of it, because he began shaking and his face showed utter terror. He pleaded for mercy, calling on his gods to save him. He voided his bladder and bowels in fear just before the sword completed its shining arc. His cleanly severed head rolled a few feet away from his body, now pumping its lifeblood from its ruptured arteries.

The swordsman walked over to the cave. The occupants, thinking he had come to select another victim, clambered over each other to reach the back. He smiled. ‘God is not pleased.’ He said. ‘Your company is delaying its payment to us. In one more week, there will be another display of our determination. There will be two of you then, including your captain. Allah Akbar.’

Whither Blows the Wind: He waited in the park until after midnight, for he knew nobody would threaten him, and then he went to the Rue St. Denis. There was still a little activity on the streets there. Some of the older and less-marketable ladies of the night remained, leaning on lampposts, but they did not interest Horst; he was after something else.

A bar à vin stood open, and a few seedy characters sat at tables, drinking rough red wine. Horst walked to the bar and asked for a beer. When it came, he said to the barman, ‘Any chance of a score?’

The man looked around nervously, before nodding toward a man standing in the shadows near the back door of the bar. Horst said, ‘Ok, are there any Flics about tonight?’

‘Some, M’sieur. They do not trouble us; we are too good a source of money and free women.’

Horst drank his beer and walked to the back door, ignoring the man there. ‘Je vais pisser,’ he said, as he walked past. The man shrugged his shoulders. Horst went to the end of a short corridor and opened the door to the back of the establishment, checking over the rear yard. Gut, he said to himself, before returning to the front where he finished his beer and left the bar. He walked to the far end of the block, found the service lane running behind the bar, where he waited in the shadows.

It was about three in the morning before he saw activity. Then a black Citroen drove down the lane and stopped across from the bar. The driver got out and went to walk to the gate in the wall leading to rear of the bar. Horst leapt out of the blackness and smashed his fist into the back of the man’s neck. He collapsed without a sound. Horst dragged him into the dark and removed his jacket and the baseball cap he wore, put them on, and then jumped into the driver’s seat.

A couple of minutes later, two men emerged, moving towards the car, one of them slim and carrying a duffel bag, the other the big man from the back of the bar. As Horst had hoped, the big man opened the back door, then waited deferentially for his boss to enter. As soon as the man was in the car, the big man moved to the front. Horst sped away, leaving him grasping at the door handle. Simultaneously, he pressed a button, locking all the doors.

The man in the back seat remained calm. Horst thought he might have to deal with a weapon, but this criminal was too smart to carry - he did not want any nosy cop to find anything on him. That was the big man’s job. He said to Horst, ‘You know you are a dead man. Unless you stop now, then you might end up with just a kneecap missing.’ Horst remained silent. Instead, he slammed on the brakes, and, as the man in the back seat lurched forward, he smashed his enormous fist onto the top of his head.

Horst pulled into a vacant taxi space near the nearest Metro, took the duffel bag, and calmly walked down the steps to the ticket office. Later, in a cheap hotel far from the Rue St. Denis, he counted the money. It had been a quiet night, but he still had more than ₣8,000, enough to last him a while, enough to find the Field Marshall and kill him, enough to get back into the former East Germany where he had friends who would set him up with work, his kind of work

 Invisible: For a moment, Michael didn’t recognise the two young women who just then entered the bar. Both wore expensive designer dresses, high heels, and stockings. For the first time, he saw Elsbeth with her hair down, a torrent of gold flowing to her shoulders. She was stunning. He moved to her and took her hand; the familiar charge was there. ‘You are so beautiful,’ he said. ‘I think I am in love.’

She gave him a breath-taking smile as she had done in the minibus the day they had first met; it would become her signature expression, meant for him, only for him. Suddenly, he knew this girl would be a part of him forever. ‘You boys better get into the bathrooms,’ said Mektilde, ‘and don’t make a mess.’

Flesh: Aleksandar was reluctant, but he eventually went to the far corner, to a solid wooden box, and prised up the lid. ‘Here,’ he said, ‘Will this suffice?’ They craned forward to see what was in the box. Jack smiled.

The GPMG M60 (General Purpose Machine Gun) was developed with technology used by Germany in its MG42, perhaps the best MG of World War Two. The M60 was standard issue in many armies in the west, and they trained Jack in its use. As an infantry section weapon, it gave sterling service in many conflicts, particularly Vietnam, although it was necessary to keep it scrupulously clean in that environment. While used universally as an infantry weapon, it was heavy and not well-balanced. Used as a defensive weapon, fired from a steady aiming position, or using the foldable bipod for stability, it was superb. Jack reached out and stroked the familiar weapon. ‘That’ll do the job,’ he said.

Aleksandar looked as though they had asked him to sell his only child. ‘It’s very expensive,’ he said, ‘you may not be able to pay me for it.’ However, he knew his obligation to his former company commander, and he knew he would part with it, whatever deal he offered.

‘How much?’ asked Jack.

‘Five thousand,’ he said, ‘US dollars.’

Horses: The first man he had discovered was ‘Whisper’ Smith. One evening, as he camped by the river near Roma, a ragged and unshaven man, down on his luck, approached George. The man had a queer, soft, but rasping voice. As was the custom, George had invited him to the fire and shared his meagre rations with him. The poor bugger’s half starved, thought George, as he watched Whisper down his food in great gulps. ‘Steady on, mate,’ he said. ‘there’s plenty more. Take it easy.’

‘I’m sorry, cobber. I’m bloody hungry.’

The voice had a queer timbre to it, not quite a quaver, but a sort of hissing and gasping, like a man with a severe case of the ‘flu. He explained. ‘I buggered me lungs. Copped a gut full of gas in France. I’m not going to die yet, but I can’t talk too good. It’s a long time since I had a good feed.’

In the long, tortured conversation that followed, George found out Whisper had been in the Light Horse in Egypt and, eager to see action, had transferred to the infantry; he had seen more than half his mates die on a single day at Fromelles. He can ride a horse then, thought George. Poor bastard. On impulse, he asked him to tag along with him; there might be some work somewhere, he said.

 The Golden Eagle: When Obersturmbannführer Rolo Giessner, now known as Gefrieter Heinrich Arner, waded across the small creek and surrendered to the Americans, he was bleeding badly from his self-inflicted wounds. After a cursory interrogation by the battalion intelligence officer, they transferred him to a field hospital and eventually to a military hospital in Hanover. They did not question his identity. The Allies had millions of German prisoners and displaced persons to process, and many SS and Gestapo slipped through the net. With the help of Nazi sympathisers in the Vatican, Geissner reached Rome, and sailed from Genoa to Paraguay.

They provided him with seed capital and over the years he built a small import business, bringing in machinery and parts from the USA for Paraguay’s farmers. He never forgot his days in the SS and remained a fervent Nazi. But he was practical enough to know that the resurrection of the Reich was nothing but a pipe dream. He missed his homeland, of course, and he thought many times of the ‘sacred’ mission Himmler had given him to retrieve the golden eagle.

Now that he had capital enough, he waited until he adjudged it safe to return to Germany and he did so in 1980.

Lonely Road: The two Mounties looked at each other and they saw that there was no way to escape the situation. They took out their weapons and laid them on the ground. Minutes later, they were in the back seat of the Yukon, secured to the steel mesh cargo barrier behind them with their own handcuffs. Leo and his companion got in the front and they set off up the hill, towards an upmarket housing estate.

‘What are you doing, you idiot,’ protested Crewe. ‘I can be invaluable to you. You need an inside man like me.’

‘You have bungled too many tasks, Inspector, and you have drawn unnecessary attention to our operation. Besides, you know too much.’ There was silence until they drew to a stop in front of Crewe’s own house. There, realisation finally set in.

‘No,’ he said, ‘Not Leila, she has done nothing wrong, please not her!’ Given the man’s callousness, it surprised Leo to hear genuine concern for her in Crewe’s voice.

He left them all in the Yukon and knocked on the door. An attractive, dark-haired woman opened it. Her eyes widened with surprise when she saw him. And, perhaps, he thought, with a tinge of fear as well.

‘Dear Leila,’ he said. ‘It is time.’

Her hand flew to her face. ‘No, Leo, no! I have done all that you asked of me. I have been true to our cause and to Allah. Surely you mean me no harm?’

Leo smiled sadly. ‘You know too much, my dear. I’m afraid it is all over.’

She quailed before him. ‘No,’ she said, ‘Please, I will do anything, anything.’ She unbuttoned her blouse, exposing most of her breasts. ‘I will do anything you ask. You found me attractive once. I could be yours again. Please, please!’

He took out his pistol. ‘I am sorry, Leila, you will receive your reward in Paradise.’ He screwed on the silencer and shot her between the eyes. Later, as they drove towards the lake, he could hear Crewe quietly sobbing in the back seat. How about that, he thought. He really loved her!

The Yukon is a heavy vehicle. With its windows open, this one sank rapidly into the depths of Waneta Lake, down, down, over one hundred and fifty feet. There, it came to rest not all that far away from a dirty brown Chevrolet and a near-new Harley-Davidson motorcycle.

But by then, all those inside it were dead.

Other People’s Lives: After half an hour, the inspector came back to him. I am afraid that this building will not pass inspection, he said, there are many infringements of the Act. There are no safety signs, there is no first aid kit, none of the lifting devices have marks showing the safe working load, and that’s just the beginning. Max looked at the gantry with its endless chain. He and the boys built it themselves to accept a load far more than anything they would ever lift. What did this shiny-arsed prick think - that they would put their own lives in danger? There is a first aid kit, he said, pointing to a large white box marked with a green cross.

Ah, yes, Mr Brown, but it does not carry an inspection sticker. In law that is the same as if it did not exist. The fire extinguisher is the same. It works, said Max. He went to the offending appliance and lifted it down from the wall. Look! He released a gout of foam that shot across the workshop floor and deluged the inspector’s shiny new shoes and his lower legs, saturating the expensive trousers. The man jumped back. Look out, you idiot, you’ve ruined my shoes. You’ll have to replace them! You’ll be lucky, thought Max, and then he said, where to now?

  Valedictory: ‘Hey, who are you?’ said Peter. Andy didn’t answer, for he had no idea that he was the subject of the enquiry. Peter pushed his shoulder, none too gently. ‘Who are you? Answer me or I’ll give yer a kick up the arse!’

Andy looked at him. ‘I’m Andy Merton,’ he said. ‘I come from a farm north of here. This is my first day.’

‘Well, yer better smarten yerself up around me, mate, or I’ll give yer a hidin’, see?’

Andy was not quite sure what a hidin’ was, but he could see that it wouldn’t be anything good. ‘Why?’ he said. ‘What have I done?’

‘Don’t be a smartarse,’ said Peter, ‘What grade’re yer in?’

‘Grade five.’

‘Good, that’s my grade. I’ll be watchin’ yer. Yer got any lollies on yer?’

‘No.’ 

‘Well, yer better ‘ave some termorrer, or I’ll give yer that hidin’ I promised yer. …’

… He didn’t tell his grandmother that night about his new acquaintance, Peter. Nor did he ask for lollies to take to school. Instead, he took a small brown paper bag from the kitchen and went outside. Grandma’s house was an old one and, like many of the old houses in the town, it had a resident family of possums in the roof space. You could hear them hissing and fighting in the night. They used to chew up Grandma’s garden relentlessly and left a generous deposit of their small, hard, pellet-shaped droppings behind. Andy half-filled the bag with them. In the morning, he poured a spoonful of Grandma’s icing sugar into the bag and gave it a shake. 

Peter was waiting for him at the top of the concrete steps when he arrived at the school in the morning. ‘Where’s me lollies?’ he said.

‘Up here,’ said Andy, and walked past him to the top of the stairs and onto the patch of grass that passed for lawn. Peter walked behind him. Andy turned and handed him the bag. ‘This is all my grandma had,’ he said. Peter grabbed the bag, took out a handful of its contents, and stuffed them hungrily into his mouth. At first, he only tasted the sugar, but when he chewed into the pellets, his face changed into an expression of sheer horror, and he spat them onto the ground. 

One of the other children looked down and screamed. ‘They’re not lollies,’ she shrilled, ‘Peter’s eating possum poo!’ All around, the children began to laugh. ‘Possum shit, possum shit,’ they chorused.