Banks’ mouth went dry as he lowered his weapon and shakily lit a fresh smoke.
They’ve got us surrounded. We’re under siege.
— 12 —
Kim started talking around noon. At first, it was only to ask for water, then, as if a tap had been turned on in her throat, a torrent of words, about the dig, the mosaic, fragments of history about the city, worries about her parents and home and complaints of hunger. It came out as a long mixed-up stream.
“Are there any sandwiches? The Persians didn’t have sandwiches. Oh, they had bread and they might have put meat or cheeses in it but it wasn’t a sandwich. They broke the Roman’s siege easily enough, I wonder where they got the stone to make the mosaic? Maybe they dug it out the ground and that’s why there are so many tunnels. My mum will be worried sick.”
There most obviously wasn’t any mention of what had happened to Reynolds.
Maggie didn’t push it and let her ramble. But something Kim said about the siege of the town when under Roman occupation got her thinking.
“Tunnels, you said?”
Kim perked up, as if eager to answer something that meant she didn’t have to remember anything problematic.
“Yes. It’s a warren under the town. And there is a multitude of storerooms and mine workings. The underpinnings of this place are supposedly riddled with them. It’s how Shapur the First and the Persian army got in and ended the Roman era here. We haven’t seen them yet. We can’t leave without seeing them.”
It wasn’t archaeology that concerned Maggie; it was the thought of dark places, deep places, spaces where a horde of spiders might spin and sleep, contented for decades, centuries, until disturbed.
“Do you know how to access these tunnels and workings?” she asked.
“Nobody has been in them for more than a hundred years,” Kim replied. “But on the last major expedition, there was an entrance discovered via the synagogue on the west-hand side of the main square. That’s how the Victorian explorers got in and… ”
Kim kept rambling, off in details of finds that now resided in museums across Europe, down to who had collected them, who had catalogued them, and where each piece could now be seen on display. It was an impressive feat of mental agility and one Maggie didn’t know the woman had possessed until now.
But she’s not talking about Reynolds.
Maggie knew that a voluble rush like this one would probably lead to a hard crash and sooner rather than later. She resolved that she would be close by when it happened. Kim was going to need a friend to get her up again.
When Kim finally stopped talking it came suddenly, mid-sentence, and Maggie was surprised to see that the other woman had fallen asleep sitting upright against the wall.
Wiggins had come off watch and was preparing a fresh pot of coffee. He looked over and smiled.
“Let her sleep,” he said quietly. “It’ll keep her from fretting.”
Maggie pried herself carefully away from Kim and went over to where Wiggins sat, taking a smoke when he offered.
“How’s things outside?” she asked.
“Much the same. They’ve let us know they’re there, on the roofs. We watch them and they watch us and as long as neither of us makes a move, we’re all happy that it stays that way.”
“And what about when we need to make a move?”
“That’s hours away yet. The captain will have a plan by then.”
She heard the confidence in the statement.
“What’s it like, to have that much faith in someone who holds your life in his hands?”
Wiggins laughed.
“We don’t think about it like that. He’s in charge, we do what he says, and we trust him to be right, more often than not. It’s how the system works.”
“It’s not that I don’t trust you,” she replied. “But I’ve always taken care of myself and now I’ve got you lot looking out for me, I feel like a spare wheel around here. It’s got me all itchy and worried and I’m not usually like this.”
“Don’t worry, lass. The cap’s definitely right more often than not. He has got us out of some tight spots before. This might seem like a nightmare to you but I could tell you stories that would turn your hair white. It’s who we are. It’s what we do.”
“But it’s not all smooth talk and plain sailing, is it? You lose people too, right? Not everybody always makes it?” Now it was her turn to see that she’d struck a nerve as Wiggins’ smile vanished and a heavy sadness showed in his eyes. “Sorry, I didn’t mean that to sound harsh.”
“No, you’re okay, you weren’t to know,” Wiggins replied. “I lost a pal on the last mission. The wound’s raw. But I meant what I said. The captain will die first rather than let harm come to you. So would I for that matter. As I said, it’s what we do and why we do it.”
When Wiggins left to ferry coffee to the others on watch, Maggie sat thinking about what he’d said. Davies was standing in the doorway, watching the hole in the high corner.
“Did you hear any of that?”
“Aye. And he’s right. I’m new to the squad but I see the strength in the older lags. They signed up to serve. It was different for me. I just wanted to get out of Easterhouse.”
“I don’t blame you there,” Maggie said, remembering the seedy, tired tower blocks she’d seen on a brief visit with an old boyfriend some years before.
She got a laugh in reply.
“God’s own country, so they say. Skinny lads like me can get into all sorts of bother on a big estate like that, especially when they’re seen as different, not really Scottish. I was constantly getting told to ‘go back home’ and I’m sure you know all the names I used to get. Being called Joshua didn’t help much either, not in Glasgow. I don’t have much of a family, there’s only my old ma and me. So I became a Joe and found myself a home, made myself one. These lads here are my family. Trust the corporal. Trust the captain. Trust the squad. We’ll get you back to your home.”
Maggie took a long drag at her cigarette and waved it at the private.
“If the cancer sticks don’t get me first. Getting me smoking again isn’t doing much to keep me alive.”
“I wouldn’t be too sure,” Davies replied, smiling. “It’s giving you something to do, something else to think about. That’s kind of the point and why so many of us do it.”
After she finished the smoke and reminded herself not to take another one from any of the men for a while, she wanted some fresher air in her lungs so headed back out to the main doorway. The younger men, Brock and Wilkins, were watching the two rooms in the corridor, with the three officers, all of them smoking, standing at the main doorway at the entrance. She told Captain Banks what Kim had said about the tunnels.
He listened intently.
“So there might be a way out without going through the streets?”
“That wasn’t what I was thinking,” Maggie replied. “I was thinking more in the sense that there might be a spider lair down there.”
“Aye, there’s that too,” Banks replied. “But an underground escape route might be exactly what we need later. Do either of you know how to get down there?”
“I think Kim does,” she replied. “But whether she’ll talk about it again is fifty-fifty at best. She’s a bit shook up.”