Figures in a Landscape

Barry England

Figures in a Landscape

CONTENTS

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Barry England (1932–2009) was an English novelist and playwright, chiefly known for Figures in a Landscape, shortlisted for the inaugural Booker Prize. In the early fifties he joined the British Army and served as an officer in the Far East, but he later studied at RADA. He worked as an actor before starting a successful career as a playwright. The first of England’s plays to be produced was End of Conflict, starring a young Ian McKellen. Figures in a Landscape was made into a film by Joseph Losey in 1970.

ALSO BY BARRY ENGLAND

No Man’s Land

With their hands tied as usual behind their backs, they had just been paraded through the streets of a small village for the edification of the local population. While they were being formed up for the march to that night’s camp, MacConnachie had come suddenly close and whispered harshly:

‘If I go left, will you come?’

Ansell, remembering a hundred humiliations at MacConnachie’s hands, had stared at him in astonishment.

‘What?’

‘Will you come?’

‘Yes.’

‘When I move – follow!’

That was the extent of their planning. They had been beaten for talking.

Stumbling along in the fierce heat, Ansell struggled to make his brain think clearly: what have I committed myself to? what have I done? His bound arms ached at his back, his anguish of mind feeding on his torment of body. Through glazed eyes he saw MacConnachie look back towards him, and his stomach contracted with fear at the thought of what lay ahead. Not an hour before he had committed himself to a man he feared because that man despised him.

Now one of the Goons screamed at MacConnachie to face his front and MacConnachie swore back. The other prisoners murmured in anger and fear, terrified that MacConnachie would make trouble. MacConnachie spat on them with contempt.

They hate him, Ansell thought. They’ve all given up, you can see it in the way they shuffle along, heads bent in submission. MacConnachie alone remains stubborn, and they hate him for it. They’d kill him if they could – anything to be rid of that unbending reminder that they were themselves once men.

He is right. We must get away now or we never shall. But how can we hope to survive? And why pick me?

It was late afternoon. The prisoners moved raggedly in column of threes along a narrow mountain track, choking on the thick dust that their feet threw up; the weight of the sun pressed constantly over them. The air was suffocating and still, the Goons no less tired or dirty than the men they guarded.

To their right, the massive shoulder of the mountain soared up to a hidden peak; on their left was a sheer drop. Ansell had no idea how deep it was or what lay at the bottom. MacConnachie, he knew, was no better informed than himself since, from the right-hand column, he would have had even less opportunity than Ansell to peer over the edge, and Ansell had had none. He was racked by a terrible sense of having committed himself beyond his capacity; as though, by surrendering to MacConnachie’s will, he had made a promise he would be unable to keep. He felt sick with the fear of letting MacConnachie down. Try as he might, he could not feel that he yearned for freedom as MacConnachie did, with his entire body. To him it was an idea, however desirable; to MacConnachie, a palpable animal need.