Boy Soldier (2 page)

2005, Army RCB Centre, Wiltshire, England

Danny was running. His pace was as steady and constant as his breathing; he moved with a natural rhythm. This was what he'd been waiting for – at last he was really showing what he could do.

Sometimes when Danny ran, when he was training, he would wear a Walkman and sing to himself under his breath, fitting the tempo of the song to his strides. It helped maintain the pace and stopped him from getting bored on a long run. But not today. Today he was focused. He wanted to win, even though they'd been told it wasn't a race. But Danny still wanted to win. He always did.

He was way ahead of the others as he approached the stream. The muddy stretch of water was too wide to clear without the aid of the strong rope dangling invitingly from the thick branch of a tree. Danny's eyes narrowed as he neared the edge and without breaking his stride he leaped into the air, grabbed the rope with both hands and swung effortlessly across to the other side.

The watching NCO smiled his approval and checked the list of names on his clipboard. 'Good effort, Mr Watts, keep it going,' he boomed as Danny ran on towards the high wall.

Danny grinned.
Mister
Watts. Him? He couldn't remember anyone calling him Mister Watts before. A few other things maybe, but never Mister. But it was all so different here.

When they'd assembled on Day One, nervous and self-conscious, a sergeant had told them they would all be referred to as Mister. 'That's because officers are gentlemen,' he said. 'And that includes potential officers like yourselves.'

Danny wasn't bothered what they called him – General Watts, for all he cared – just as long as he got one of the Regular Commissions Board bursaries at the end of the three-day selection course. He had to get a bursary; it was the only way he could possibly afford to take up a university place and then go on to Sandhurst Military Academy.

And the weeks of preparation were paying off. Danny had sailed through the medical and fitness tests, handed in a decent current affairs essay, and if the rest of his written work wasn't exactly
University Challenge
standard, he was pretty sure he'd done well enough. In the briefings and interviews he had been confident but not cocky. He'd even laughed at the officers' bad jokes.

He knew they were being assessed at every moment, and that included their relaxation time. So when a few of the others got stuck into pints of bitter in the mess, Danny stuck to Diet Coke. It was no big sacrifice – he couldn't stand the taste of beer anyway.

One 'real ale man' ended up making a total prat of himself, downing four pints in less than an hour. It was three and a half pints too many: he threw up on the floor before being dragged off to bed. The duty officer wasn't impressed and neither was the steward who had to mop up the vomit.

Four Pints, as the others named him, woke up the next morning to a king-sized bollocking that did nothing to make his hangover feel better.

But it was a useful reminder to Danny to get everything right. This was his one chance, he had to take it, and with the assault course run being the final event it was all working out perfectly.

He clambered over the two-metre-high wall and sprinted the final hundred metres to the finish line, where a waiting sergeant clicked a stopwatch and made a note of his time. 'Very good, Mr Watts, very good indeed. Says on your application that you've run for your county.'

'Middle distance and cross country.'

'And is that something you'd wish to continue in the army?'

Danny paused before answering, reminding himself to say the right thing. 'As long as it didn't get in the way of my other duties.'

The sergeant laughed. 'I shouldn't worry about that, Mr Watts, the army always wants to sponsor top quality athletes. Look at Kelly Holmes – she did ten years in the army and look at her now: double Olympic gold medallist. Take my advice, you stay in training.'

'I will, sir. Thanks.'

'Sir? I'm no Sir. I work for a living.' The NCO pointed at the three small green stripes sewn onto his combat jacket. 'It's Sergeant. Now get yourself off to the showers while I wait for the also rans.'

As Danny jogged away towards the changing rooms he could see
the next few years panning out exactly the way he'd planned. University, then
Sandhurst and then a commission as an officer in the infantry. And on top
of that, they might even pay him to run. It couldn't get any better.

The selection course ended with an after-lunch debriefing from the colonel in charge. He was a red-faced, cheerful old boy who told them exactly what they expected to hear: they'd all done very well and it had been one of the best RCBs he could remember.

'Bet he says that every time,' whispered someone sitting behind Danny.

The stifled laughter died away as the colonel reminded them that with only a certain number of bursaries available, some of them were going to be disappointed.

Thirty minutes later they were in the reception area waiting for the coach that would take them to the train station. They were a mixed bunch: a few, like Danny, comprehensive kids, but the majority public school, Officer Training Corps and Army Cadet Corps.

Some were from old military families. Four Pints had boasted he could trace his family all the way back to Wellington and the Battle of Waterloo. That was just before he was sick.

As far as Danny was concerned Waterloo was the place where he changed trains on his way back to Camberwell. Military history could wait until Sandhurst. Firm footsteps sounded from along the corridor and the sergeant from the assault course approached. 'Mr Watts?'

'Sergeant?'

'Good lad, got it right that time. With me, please, Colonel's office. Leave your bag there.'

The sergeant turned away and retraced his steps down the corridor and Danny felt the eyes of the other candidates on him.

'Looks like you're in,' said Four Pints, with a wink. 'Must have been your run that did it.'

Danny hurried after the sergeant, his thoughts racing. Was that it? Was he in? The colonel had said letters to the successful candidates would go out the following day.

They reached the colonel's office at the end of the corridor and an abrupt, 'Come,' was called in response to the sergeant's firm knock. He opened the door, nodded for Danny to go through and then pulled the door shut. His combat boots echoed away down the corridor.

The man seated on the far side of the dark wooden desk was not the colonel. He was blond-haired, mid forties, and in his slick, dark blue suit and custard-yellow and red striped tie, looked every inch a top civil servant. Danny recognized the tie – he'd once been on a school trip to a Test Match at Lord's and had seen dozens of them worn by the MCC members in the pavilion.

A half-full cup of coffee stood on the desk. The man was studying a buff-coloured army RCB file with Danny's photograph stapled to the front of the cover. He spoke without looking up. 'Sit.'

Danny obediently sat in the chair on the near side of the desk but felt his face flush. He wanted to say, 'Look, mate, I'm not a dog, and what happened to
Mister
Watts?' But he didn't.

A clock on the wall ticked loudly. Danny realized he was counting the passing seconds until, at last, the man looked up. 'The Regular Commissions Board will be turning down your application for a bursary, Watts.'

The words stunned Danny like a surge of electricity. 'But . . . but why? I did well on everything. I passed the medical, my written tests were good. Good enough.'

The man shrugged. 'Hardly Einstein.'

'And I won the assault course race.'

'Yes, you can run, Watts, you can certainly run. And while your predicted A-level grades are adequate for a place at one of the modern so-called universities, we all know that education standards are slipping. But the army is looking for better than average, Watts. We want the cream.'

He seemed to be enjoying it, taunting Danny, deliberately winding him up. 'On the other hand, if you made your own way through university and, by some miracle, exceeded expectations, you could apply for a commission. But . . .'

The thin smile was more like a sneer, and the way he left the 'but' dangling in mid air made it perfectly clear to Danny that he had virtually no hope of ever becoming an army officer.

'I don't have family to pay for university.'

Another thin smile. 'I am aware of that.'

Danny was fighting to hold back his anger. 'You knew my predicted grades. What's the point of getting me down here and putting me through all this if it's just to turn me down?'

'We believe in equal opportunities for all.'

Danny snapped. He stood up and banged a fist on the desktop. 'That's bollocks.' The man raised an eyebrow but said nothing and Danny had no alternative but to bluster on. 'It's because I'm not from the right background. I don't speak with a posh accent like you and I didn't go to the right school. I thought all that family crap was a thing of the past in the army.'

The reply was totally calm and measured. 'The working-class chip on the shoulder doesn't help either, Watts.' He let the application form drop onto the desk and raised his voice slightly. 'Now sit down.'

Danny sank back onto the chair, and the thought that perhaps all this was deliberate flashed through his mind. Another test. Of his ability to withstand pressure and provocation. If it was, he'd failed it. Big time.

'You need to learn to control your temper, Watts. And contrary to what you believe, family connections still play a very important part in the army. Your own, for example.'

'Mine?' Danny looked as bewildered as he felt. 'I don't know what you're talking about.'

This time there was no smile. The man got up from his chair, walked round to Danny, and sat back against the desk. 'When did you last see your grandfather?'

'My—'

'Fergus Watts?'

'I . . . I've never seen him. Ever.'

'Are you certain about that?' The laid-back, laconic style had gone; Danny's interrogator was now firing in questions like rounds from an AK-47. 'Has he tried to make contact?'

'Not with me, no. And what's he got to do with this?'

'Not with you? What do you mean by that?' He leaned closer. 'Answer me, Watts.'

Danny could smell the coffee on the man's breath. His own mouth went dry. It wasn't meant to be like this. 'Someone contacted social services and asked about me, when I was sixteen. I don't know who it was. If it was my granddad he never got in touch.'

The man stared into Danny's eyes. His look was almost hypnotic, probing. Finally he seemed satisfied. He moved away and went back to his chair. 'Fergus Watts betrayed his country and his regiment. You knew he was SAS?'

Danny shook his head. 'I knew he was in the army, that's all.'

'There are certain matters we need to clear up with your grandfather, and if you could help us in any way . . .' He picked up the application form again. 'Well . . . there will be other RCBs.'

The black-and-white photograph was yellowed and faded. Three young men in army uniforms, their arms around each other's shoulders. They were smiling, happy. Young comrades.

The photograph was the only link Danny had ever had to his grandfather. He looked at it again and then tore it down the centre and threw the two halves towards the already full wastepaper basket on the far side of the room. They missed and landed on the carpet.

Elena was standing in the doorway of Danny's bedroom. 'You might regret that.'

Danny sat on his bed, his face dark and sullen. 'Why? The only thing he's ever done for me is stop me getting into the army.'

'Don't sulk, Danny, it doesn't suit you.'

'Tough.' The journey back from Wiltshire hadn't improved his temper. He was seething, as well as sulking. 'The guy kept asking questions. Did I know where my granddad was? Was I certain he'd never been here?'

Elena glanced at the two halves of the torn photograph lying on the carpet. She could still make out the smiling faces. 'But what do they want him for? After all this time?'

'He wouldn't tell me. Just said they needed to talk to him.'

'Well, don't
you
want to know?'

'I don't want to know anything about him. I hate his guts.'

The sound of voices drifted up from the floor below and Elena shifted uneasily in the doorway. 'I'd better go down. Dave the Rave's gonna go ballistic if he catches me up here.'

Danny got up from the bed. 'I might as well look in the evening paper, see if there are any jobs going for army rejects. Part time at Tesco won't do any more, will it?'

'But what about your A levels?'

'What's the point now?' said Danny, brushing past and going
towards the staircase at the end of the landing. Elena grabbed the two halves
of the photograph from the floor, slipped them into the back pocket of her
jeans and followed him.

They lived at Foxcroft, a privately run hostel for teenagers in Camberwell, south-east London. Danny had been there for five years. It was home, or the closest anywhere had been to home for as long as he could remember.

His parents had both been killed in a car crash when he was six. Danny was in the car too, but he had no memory of the crash. Not even in his dreams. With no relatives around to look after him, he'd become a 'kid in care', a social services statistic. He'd been farmed out to four sets of foster parents over the years, but none had worked out.

It wasn't that Danny was a troublemaker. He was independent, he liked his own space, and fitting into other people's idea of family life wasn't for him. He'd lost his own family and he didn't want to be part of someone else's. So when he got the chance of a place at Foxcroft he'd jumped at it. It suited him.

Elena had been there for eighteen months, moving in soon after her mum died. There was no one else for her either; her dad had gone back to Nigeria years before, telling Elena and her mum he was going to make his fortune. He'd always been full of big ideas. Big ideas, but no result.

Danny and Elena had hit it off straight away; they just clicked, even though Elena was a year younger. And at first Danny thought they might be more than mates but Elena soon put him right on that score. 'I want a friend, Danny.' she told him when he made a clumsy attempt at kissing her. 'I'm not interested in going out with anyone. Not yet, anyway.'

So Danny settled for friendship, even though he still really fancied Elena. And sometimes he thought she fancied him too. But maybe that was just what he wanted to think.

Elena was confident, clever and sharp. No one intimidated her, and she knew how to handle people. And that included Danny, who was looking guilty as she joined him at the top of the stairs.

'I didn't even ask about your GCSE results.'

'You're right, you didn't.'

'Look, I'm sorry. So tell me then.'

Elena smiled. 'You want me to be modest or just go for it?'

Danny laughed. Elena always did have a way of making him laugh. 'When were you ever modest?'

'In that case, I did brilliant. Six A stars and four As brilliant. Boff or what? Now, let's go down.'

Elena was a genius, her school's star pupil, but definitely
no boff. She didn't spend hours and hours with her face buried in textbooks
or bore you with endless streams of useless information. But she didn't mind
letting her friends know how brilliant she was. In the nicest possible way,
of course.

Foxcroft was an old building. Victorian, with three main floors and an attic where the below stairs maids would once have had their poky little bedrooms. At some time between the First and Second World Wars it had been the home of a government minister.

You wouldn't have thought so now. It was faded. Sad. The paintwork was flaking, the boiler down in the cellar wheezed and spluttered like an old man after a lifetime of too many unripped fags, the sash windows jammed in their runners, and when the wind blew the whole place seemed to groan and shiver. But there was something about Foxcroft that almost everyone who lived there liked. It was reassuring. Something to do with old glory that refused to lie down and die.

Danny and Elena made their way down the stairs to the first floor. The staircase was broad and grand, with a dark oak banister and a threadbare carpet that might once have been red. Boys' bedrooms were on the second floor, girls' were on the first. Telly room and living rooms were on the ground floor.

Dave the Rave appeared on the first-floor landing just as Danny and Elena arrived. There was no chance of slipping quietly by. Dave was a huge bloke. He'd been a rugby player with Saracens in his younger days and might have made it into the England team had it not been for a back injury.

But he was all right; you knew where you stood with Dave the Rave, and right now they knew they were in trouble. Dave was scowling. 'Elena, you know you're not meant to be on the boys' landing.'

'Sorry, Dave, I was giving Danny the good news about my GCSEs.'

'You can do that downstairs. You two are supposed to set an example here.'

Danny and Elena didn't usually step out of line at Foxcroft. They respected Dave Brooker and his wife Jane. They were fair, they didn't try to be like parents, or teachers, or even mates. They were just Dave and Jane: they owned the place and they made the rules.

Dave's brilliant blue eyes softened – he never stayed angry for long. And he was almost as delighted at Elena's exam success as she was. 'I think she's the first genius we've ever had at Foxcroft,' he said to Danny, who didn't reply.

'Look, Danny,' said Dave gently, 'I'm really sorry about the army. I know how much it meant to you.'

Danny shrugged as though it didn't matter. 'I'm fine, Dave. I'll find something else.'

'Yes, but . . .'

It was as far as he got. Danny had already started down the lower staircase. Elena looked at Dave, raised her eyebrows and hurried after Danny.

On the ground floor the theme tune from
EastEnders
was pumping out from the television room so they went into the room reserved for peace and quiet. Television, Game Boys and even mobile phones were banned. As usual, it was empty.

Elena threw herself onto the huge old sofa that stretched along one wall. 'You really giving up your A levels?'

Danny sat in one of the armchairs. It didn't match the sofa – none of the furniture in the room matched. 'I don't have a choice. I can't afford university and I can't stay here. I'll have to get a job and somewhere to live.'

'But Dave would let you stay.'

'He can't. I'm seventeen, over age for this place if I give up school.'

He got up from the chair and moved over to the tall sash window that looked directly out onto the street. One of the panes had a crack in one corner; it had been there ever since Danny moved in. He traced a finger over the crack and gazed out through the window. 'He's out there somewhere, Elena, and he's got no idea what he's done to me.'

The evening sun dipped behind the houses on the opposite side of the road and the room was instantly filled with shadows. Danny turned back to face Elena. 'I'm gonna find him.'

Elena had been picking at a loose thread on one arm of the sofa. She stopped and stared at Danny. 'Your granddad? But you said—'

'I know what I said, but you're right, I
do
want to know about him. I'm gonna find him and make him see how he's ruined my life.'

'Yeah, like how, Danny?'

Danny thought for a moment and then shrugged. 'You're the genius. You tell me.'