The Painted Altar

Prologue

That late-summer night must have been a black one. Blacker than we can perhaps now imagine. Not even the nearby village of Northdyke would have cast that residual urban glow which we later generations are accustomed to. The year was 1943 and rural eastern England offered no guide, no ground-level points of reference, to the westbound drone of the Luftwaffe. A cloud-covered night meant, simply, no light.

As the North Sea breeze propelled those clouds further inland, an occasional gap may have permitted the rays of some distant star to briefly alight upon the corrugated iron roofs of the Nissen huts. To lick a faint line along the side of the camp water tower, pick out the sharp, twisted tangle of perimeter wire. But no, the night I picture was to all intents and purposes devoid of colour or contour. As black as the hearts of the men who lurked in the field beyond.

I don't know how many there were, or - bar possibly one name - exactly who they were. Nor in my mind's eye can I quite distinguish their night-cloaked figures pressed stomach-down in the dirt. More I hear the dismal scene which would follow. Can almost smell the Saturday night booze on their breaths - the best bitters and milds and thirsty swigs of gin...

Yes, their impatient whispers are those of the decidely drunk. More than whispers - normal talking volume, hiss-softened a little at the edges.

Come on out then you greasy wop.

You sure it's tonight?

Dead sure. Wouldn't have dragged you out here otherwise.

But Lord, I mean, are we really going to do this?

Wops're no different to the jerries, ask me. Facist vermin, the lot of them.

But it just seems--

Ssshhh. Think I can hear something...

Indeed, a faint panting sound now emerges in the background.

Wait for it. Not yet.

A real whisper this time: tense, barely audible.

Then: Now!

At which point there are numerous sounds, a sudden muffled cacophany of them. Other pants. Mud-squelching feet. A chilling, strangulated cry.

The subsequent silence is stark, strangely prolonged.

Oh Christ, we really went and did it.

Told you there was nothing to it. Just like the straw man in bayonet training.

Think I've got his blood all over my shirt.

Best dump it in there with him.

We got the right one you think?

There's the flinty scratch then of a cigarette lighter, the flickering orb of illumination revealing a pair of faces. One, dirt-blackened and motionless, stares unflinchingly towards the heavens. The other - paler, sweat-beaded - squints in examination of the I.D tags around the first man's neck.

D'Ambra, Vincenzo.

Aye, that's the bastard.

The blackness once more falls. Veils the subsequent grunts of exertion, the repeated tinny jabs of the spade churning through the soil...

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