The colonel’s orders were that each man could take one kitbag or suitcase. The ground crews were also allowed to carry their rifles. “If you have bayonets, fix them,” he said. “You’ll need them to keep these animals at bay.” He took Wragge aside. “I’ll get your men ferried out to one of our big ships as soon as I can. Might take time. You’re not the only British personnel in this chaos.”
“We have a squadron doctor, sir. Female but very experienced. If she can help you in any way…”
The colonel shuddered. “Look around you. A battalion of doctors wouldn’t make a dent in this catastrophe. For Christ’s sake don’t let her out of your sight. You must hold your ground here.” He left with his escort.
The C.O. told the adjutant to carry out a roll-call, just to make sure everyone was present. The check was made, was repeated, and Brazier reported one man missing.
“Aircraftman Simm,” he said. “Not on the train, not off it. One man says he saw Simm go behind those trucks.” A row of empty cattle-trucks stood nearby. “Thought he’d gone to relieve himself.”
“What a damn nuisance. Well, we can’t leave him here. Take six men with rifles, Uncle, and find the silly bastard.”
Brazier’s men rapidly searched the area and found Simm with a tubby middle-aged man in an astrakhan overcoat. The man held an expensive leather suitcase and his other hand kept a firm grip of Simm’s arm. A young woman, clearly frightened, clung to his shoulder. Brazier seized all three and marched them back to the C.O.
“He’s Russian, and so is she, and they’re up to no good,” he said. “Exactly what, I don’t know.”
“Explain yourself,” Wragge told Simm.
“Well, sir, this Russki feller comes up to me, wants me to take all his money. In that suitcase, sir. Got a fortune in there, sir.”
Brazier prised the man’s fingers from the handle and opened the suitcase. It was packed with bundles of hundred-rouble notes, all new.
“Wouldn’t let me go, sir.” Simm said. “Kept gabbling at me. I tried to get away, sir, but he wouldn’t let me.”
“And it’s a lot of money,” Wragge said.
“I think he wanted me to sign a receipt or something, sir. Kept pushing a pen into my hand, sir. Fountain pen, sir. I didn’t want to break it, sir.”
“And it’s still a lot of money,” Wragge said. “Search the Russian.”
The search produced a printed document, stamped and sealed and signed. “Could be a diploma for tap-dancing.” Wragge beckoned to Borodin. “Translate, please.”
A quick glance was enough. “It’s a marriage certificate,” Borodin said. “That’s the mayor’s signature. He performed the marriage. This is the lady’s name. The bridegroom’s name is left blank. My guess is the girl is his daughter.”
“He was selling you his daughter,” Wragge told Simm. “If you signed this paper, you got the girl and the money.”
“Crikey,” Simm said. His eyes flickered from the open suitcase to the daughter and back. It was a colossal amount of money, and she was young and not unpretty, if tear-stained and dishevelled. “I mean to say, sir. Bloody hell.”
“He was selling his daughter in order to get her out of the country. To escape.”
Aircraftman Simm was still looking at the money. “Never saw that much before, sir.” He took a packet of notes from the top. “Is it real, sir?”
Borodin turned to Wragge. “With your permission.”
“Do, do,” Wragge said. “Whatever it is.”
“Please bring everyone with me,” Borodin said to the adjutant. “The father, the daughter, the money, Aircraftman Simm.” He led them to the dockside. Wragge followed. “Throw that money in the sea,” Borodin told Simm.
Simm had a tight hold of the packet, and he hesitated.
“Do as you’re bloody well ordered,” Brazier said in his ear, “or I’ll throw you in with it, you tiny streak of shit.” The notes vanished over the edge.
“Now throw the rest in.” Borodin gave Simm the suitcase. “Just the money. Not the case.”
Simm got to work. Packets of hundred-rouble notes went flying into the Black Sea. Everyone watched. It was rare that Simm was the focus of anyone’s attention. He worked hard, and he was gasping for breath when he straightened up.
Borodin closed the suitcase and gave it to the father. “They were worthless,” he told Simm. “Denikin roubles. He’s been printing money at top speed but his roubles collapsed even faster. Now they’re worth nothing. Waste paper.” He looked at Wragge. “You can let the Russians go.”
“Go,” Wragge said. They left. The girl was in tears, and so was the father.
“Let me speak to the squadron,” the adjutant said. Wragge nodded. They walked back. Brazier assembled everyone in a half-circle.
“This man…” Brazier held Simm by the ear. “He disobeyed an order while on Active Service. Told to remain here, he absented himself without permission. That is conduct prejudicial to good order and discipline. The maximum punishment is two years’ imprisonment.”
Simm wriggled. His ear hurt. Brazier tightened his grip. Now the ear hurt even more. Simm stopped wriggling and shut his eyes to the pain, but his ear was still on fire.
“Furthermore,” the adjutant said, “this man was apprehended in the act of taking a large bribe in exchange for going through a form of marriage to a young Russian woman with the purpose of getting her out of the country.”
That information impressed the squadron, but not by its criminal nature. Fancy old Simmy, trying to pull off a trick like that. Old Simmy, ugly as sin, thick as two short planks, gets a headache just tying his shoelaces. Old Simmy wanders off to have a slash and someone tries to give him a place to dip his wick twice nightly plus a load of loot! God looks after fools and idiots, that’s all you can say.
“The marriage would not have been legal,” Brazier said. “An act of fraud. The maximum punishment for fraud is penal servitude. The money was in worthless roubles. They have now been dumped in the sea. The girl was almost certainly riddled with disease. If he married her, this man would have been infected with incurable types of pox that would rapidly deprive him of what little manhood he has.”
He let that sink in. Old Simmy didn’t look so clever now.
“Think of this. Our sole task is to get this squadron off these docks and onto a British warship. Ignore the civilians. They are not your concern. Irrelevant. Only the squadron matters. Nothing else. Dismissed.”
“Well said, Uncle,” Wragge murmured. He took Oliphant’s arm and said, “Come with me, Tusker. I have a great wish to rise to great heights and get above this squalor.”
They climbed the ladder on a boxcar and sat on the roof.
“Did you ever see such a miserable crew?” Wragge said. “Dregs of a nation. Not their fault, I suppose. No food, no shelter, winter coming on, and they’re trapped in this godawful dead-end.” From time to time the warships boomed out another heavy echoing salvo but nobody paid them any attention. “Is it my imagination,” Wragge said, “or is there a strange smell in the air?”
Oliphant sniffed. “Five thousand armpits.”
“More like ten thousand. Could be twenty.”
“You can’t count the blighters. They keep moving.”
“Going everywhere and nowhere. I’m as humane as the next man, Tusker, but I can’t feel sorry for them. I can feel a sort of pity for one man, or his family, maybe his village. But this lot are just an enormous nuisance.”