Chapter 6
The First Battalion of the East Surrey Regiment had been in France for almost a year by the time Ashley and Tom joined their number. The other pair of runners, like most of the brigade, were tired and hardened and a little bit skeptical of newcomers.
“Good timing you two have,” grumbled a boy with reddish hair called Robin Blake.
“We’ve only just come out of the trenches.
This here’s the longest rest we’ve seen in months.
” Blake had a pointed chin and a pinched expression that perpetually looked as if he were sucking on a lemon, his face wrinkled up as though the sour taste were burning his beady eyes.
“And don’t get used to the tents either.
” He gesticulated wildly as he spoke, motioning towards the canvas tents where they’d all been sleeping.
“Aye, we’re living like kings at the moment,” another runner, Cooper, confirmed before spitting a sunflower seed shell on the ground.
One of the few Black soldiers in their unit, Cooper had played football for The Arsenal in North London before his number came up, and he was always keen to race, though Blake would claim his running was too elegant.
“Like some kind of lady,” Blake relentlessly teased.
“To impress the ladies, more like,” Cooper countered.
Ash laughed along with the rest of them, but a slight sheen of panic broke out on her brow. She’d never been accused of being too ladylike, but would something in her run give her away?
“What’s it like? The trenches?” TomTom asked them, raking a hand nervously through his hair so it stood up in the front.
Blake and Cooper shared a look, and then Blake shrugged one shoulder, seeming torn between wanting to scare them and wanting to look brave and unbothered.
Ash felt sick to her stomach.
“Mostly it’s boring as hell,” Cooper finally said.
“Till it’s not,” Blake added, and Cooper nodded in sober agreement.
Tom’s face had gone very pale, making his freckles stand out all the more.
Grinning, Cooper slapped him on the back. “Don’t worry about it, mate! It’s good for you—gets the blood pumping, hey?”
“Not worried,” Tom assured him, causing Blake to roll his eyes in Cooper’s direction.
“Course you’re not,” Cooper agreed. “If anything, be worried about the Brigade Sports. It’s us against the Queens, the Buffs, and the Kents.”
“Those are other regiments?” Ash asked, and Blake scoffed at her obvious ignorance.
“You know it, Ash,” Cooper confirmed. “We’ll take first and second of course,” he said gesturing to himself and then to Blake. “But there’s no reason you two can’t take third and fourth.”
“I’ll be first. You’ll be second,” Blake argued, and Cooper just laughed at him.
“Is it only a few races?” Ashley asked.
“It’s all the races,” Cooper explained, ticking them off on his fingers. “Hundred yard, three hundred yard, quarter mile, half mile, whole mile. Three legged. One with a sack.”
“There’s shooting competitions as well. You’ll be sure to take first in those,” Blake sneered at her.
Ash resisted the urge to stick out her tongue at him and glanced at TomTom. He was smiling now, no trace of his anxiety about the trenches. “Not a bad way to spend the war,” he laughed.
The morning of the Brigade Sports Day, the camp was a flurry of activity as additional regiments arrived and tents were packed away to make more room.
The captain’s right-hand man, Private Grey, who’d introduced himself to Ash and Tom as Dusty when he brought them to the barn a few days prior, found them after breakfast with another soldier in tow.
“New runner,” Dusty said. “This here’s Stewart.”
“What, another one?” Blake asked.
“Another two,” the tall, lanky, dark-haired Stewart rumbled in a deep Scottish burr, gesturing down to a blue-eyed border collie at his side.
“A dog?” Blake demanded. “Well that’s it then, Coop, I reckon we can just go home. They’ve a Scotsman and a dog to run their dispatches now.”
Stewart cocked his head at the dog who mirrored him, cocking hers right back. “Don’t worry, lass. You’ll soon win ’em over,” Stewart told the dog. To the rest of them he added, “Her name’s Maxine.”
They were saved further argument from Blake by whistles and shouts to assemble for the sports to begin.
Cooper proved correct in his assessment about the shorter races. Out of all four regiments, he took first and Blake took second, with Ash and TomTom alternating for third and fourth.
“Well done,” their own Lieutenant Napier told them, smirking at the officers of the other units who began to grumble that perhaps the four fastest runners should be more evenly distributed between regiments.
“Or perhaps you should feed yours better,” Napier suggested.
“We give ours filet mignon on alternating Tuesdays and Veuve Clicquot when we tuck them into bed.”
“Gonna hold you to that, gov,” Cooper laughed, though he received no response from the lieutenant but a long, cold stare, which made him settle down.
The next race was the mile, and Ash was all warmed up and ready. As they assembled at the starting line, someone shoved her from behind, and she tripped forward. “Careful there, Surrey. Don’t want to be disqualified for an early start,” growled a straw-haired private from the Buffs.
“Piss off, Simmons,” Blake told him. “If you don’t want to lose to the new kid, run faster.”
Ash nodded her thanks, but Blake rolled his eyes and took up his own position to her left.
The second the starting whistle blew she was off—not first off the mark and not the fastest, but she settled into her pace, keeping up and eventually edging past each one of the boys.
By the time she reached the finish line, there was no doubt she had won it, and she was met with a roar of screaming Surreys and one yipping fluffy-tailed dog.
Blake crossed the finish line about half a second behind her, and Cooper maybe a second after that.
Coop lifted Ash in his arms, jumping and cheering, and she held her breath, waiting to see if he would notice the bandages hiding beneath her shirt, but when he set her down, he threw one damp arm around her neck and with his other hand, raised hers in the air, celebrating her win.
“You’re a sly one, Ash the Flash,” he teased.
“That was very well done, Private Ashley,” Captain Davies commended, while Lieutenant Napier gave her a single, solemn nod of approval.
“Knew you had it in you,” the lieutenant said.
“Suppose you’ll amount to something after all,” Sergeant Major Chapman joined in. “Do that while hitting a bloody target, and I’ll really be impressed.”
Ash turned, wide-eyed, to Tom, who shook his head.
“Absolutely do not do that while shooting,” he gasped, still catching his breath from the run.
After a water break and a few more events, they were ordered to choose teams for the three-legged race. Cooper and Blake were already tying their legs together when Tom looked from Ash to Stew. She’d assumed they would be an obvious pair, she and Tom, but he seemed torn.
When he caught her noticing, TomTom reddened and took off his glasses to polish them on his shirttail. “It’s just… the height difference…” he explained. He and Stewart were both quite a bit taller than Ashley, which would make running with her very awkward. Together they were a more natural fit.
“My gran always called me Long-Leg Logan,” Stewart said with an apologetic shrug.
“Go on, then,” Ash waved them towards the starting block. “See if you can outrun Blake and Coop.”
She watched them all line up feeling slightly let down, an outsider once more despite her disguise, just a spectator on the sidelines as she’d always been watching the boys play football back at home.
“Sitting this one out?” a familiar voice asked as Rook’s shadow fell across her, sending chills on a race down her spine.
“Well, our sixth man is a dog. She’s automatically disqualified.”
He snorted and she studied him out of the corner of her eye.
Rook cast a long shadow. Everything about him seemed too much for her to take in. But he stood closer to Charles’s medium height—closer to her own height—as she’d noticed before.
“No,” he said, somehow reading her mind.
“If I said please?”
He shook his head. “Absolutely not. I don’t participate.”
Just as well, she supposed. Being that close to him, joined at hip and ankle, would probably make her trip over her own bootlaces and break both their necks.
There was a great deal of yelling at the starting block, and Ash turned to see the others waving for her attention.
“Come on, Ash,” TomTom yelled. “Surreys are disqualified if we can’t field three teams!”
Ash saw the moment Rook was ripe for surrender. His eyes closed and his jaw popped like he wanted to plot her murder.
“Come on, Private,” she begged. “You wouldn’t let the whole regiment down, would you?”
He sighed. “There are a hundred other men here who could partner with you.”
“No time!” she called, jogging backward towards the starting line, somehow confident he would follow.
The others let out a cheer the moment he finally did, and he sighed again, a bottomless, gravelly growl.
“Which leg do you like?” she asked when she was given a bandanna to bind them.
He shrugged. “You’re the runner. You choose.”
“My left, your right then.”
There was something very intimate about kneeling down to tie their ankles together, and when she stood back up, he had a funny look on his face she couldn’t quite parse.
“Any tips?” he grunted.
She felt almost hysterical when she laughed and said, “No idea. I’ve never done this before either.”
He sighed again.
“Just… go slow and steady I suppose. When I say one, do your outside leg, and when I say two, your inside leg.”
Nodding at her strategy he said simply, “Fine,” and held out his right arm.
Hardly breathing, she tucked herself against his side, putting her own arm around his waist, every nerve ending lit on fire.
Someone blew a whistle, and they set off.
“Outside, inside, outside, inside,” Ash called, and together they made their way across the field, passing Tom and Stewart already tumbled in a heap with Maxine jumping about licking their faces while somebody bellowed to get the damn dog off the field!
“You drag your feet when you run, do you know that?” Tom complained.
“Outside, inside, outside, inside,” she kept chanting as she and Rook found their stride and picked up speed.
“Out, in, out, in!” They were catching up to Blake and Cooper, and then Blake tripped and the pair went down right in front of them.
“Jump!” Ash yelled, and they leaped over her friends and made it first to the finish line.
“We did it!” she exclaimed, as shocked as anyone.
Rook leaned over, hands on his knees, gasping for breath. “You said,” he panted, “one, two.”
“Sorry,” she laughed. “In the moment, I was afraid I’d get confused.”
He laughed too and collapsed onto the grass, dragging her down beside him.
The last event of the day was tug-of-war, the teams lined up on either side of a large muddy pit.
Ash had no interest in participating and no delusions of being strong enough to make a difference.
But the other boys’ excitement was contagious as they ran for places along the big, heavy rope, and so she dug in her heels behind TomTom.
This time, Rook watched from a safer distance and when they yelled for him to join them, he held up his hands and shook his head, entirely resolute.
After being bested by the young runners all day long, the Kents were out for blood and the Surreys never really stood a chance.
Splashing their way out of the mud, Tom said halfheartedly, “Race you to the river?” which elicited a groan of exhaustion from every other man.
“If we wash all this off in the river, it’ll run black for a year,” Ash moaned.
“Don’t be rude now, Ash,” Cooper said, rubbing his arm. “It don’t wash off.”
Ashley’s jaw dropped open but no words would come, she was so horrified that Cooper thought she was referring to his skin color rather than the muck covering them all from head to foot.
Then Cooper cracked a brilliant smile and Blake guffawed.
“Only joking, mate,” he said, shoving Ashley in the direction of the Somme.