Greeenmantle (Kara Gubek)

 

    Kara Gubek was the point of interest.  It stood on a rib ofland between two peaks, which from the contour lines rose verysteep.   So long as it was held it was clear that no invader couldmove down the Euphrates glen.  Stumm had appended a note to the peaks—“not fortified”; and about two miles tothe north-east there was a red cross and the name “Prjevalsky.”  I assumed that to be thefarthest point yet reached by the right wing of the Russian attack.

     Then I turned to the paper from which Stumm had copied the jottings onto his map.  It was typewritten, and consisted of notes on differentpoints.  One was headed “Kara Gubek” and read: “No time to fortify adjacent peaks.  Difficult for enemy toget batteries there, but not impossible. This is the real point of danger, forif Prjevalsky wins the peaks Kara Gubek and Tafta must fall, and enemy will beon the left rear of Deve Boyun main position.”

 

     I was soldier enough to seethe tremendous importance of this note.  On Kara Gubek depended thedefence of Erzerum, and it was a broken reed if one knew where the weaknesslay.  Yet, searching the map again, I could not believe that any mortal commanderwould see any chance in the adjacent peaks, even if he thought themunfortified.  That was information confined to the Turkish and Germanstaffs.

NOTE:  


I haven't read Greenmantle in a long time, but I remember first turning its pages under LosCabos, Baja Sur, sun with hawks wheeling overhead and whales breaking the Seaof Cortez surface and spouting very close offshore.


The paragraphs quoted above are atmospheric, but don’t convey thebreadth, sweep, and moral depth and focus of John Buchan's trans-Caucasian WorldWar I espionage-adventure novel.


I'm not the world's biggest Steven Spielberg fan, but I can'tunderstand why he hasn't yet attacked Greenmantle.  It is tailor-made for him. I think hecould make a commanding and moving success of it and The Three Hostages also (since sequel-itis seems to be a disease with no knowncure).  He could transfer Mr Standfast to the care of PeterJackson.

 

 John Buchan(1875-1940)

The Summons Comes For Mr Standfast

       

    

     They took Peter from the wreckagewith scarcely a scar except his twisted leg. Death had smoothed out some of the age in him, and had left his face muchas I remembered it long ago in the Mashonaland hills.  In his pocket was his old battered Pilgrim’s Progress.  It lies before me as I write, as beside it,for I was his only legatee – the little case which came to him weeks later,containing the highest honour that can be bestowed upon a soldier of Britain.

 

  

        It was fromthe Pilgrim’s Progress that I readnext morning, when in the lee of an apple orchard Mary and Blenkiron and Istood in the soft spring rain beside his grave. And what I read was the tale of the end, not of Mr Standfast who he hadsingled out for his counterpart, but of Mr Valiant-for-Truth whom he had nothoped to emulate.  I set down the wordsas a salute and a farewell:

 

         “Then said he, ‘I am going to my Father’s;and though with great difficulty I am got hither, yet now I do not repent me ofall the trouble I have been at to arrive where I am. My sword I give to himthat shall succeed me in my pilgrimage, and my courage and skill to him thatcan get it.  My marks and scars I carrywith me, to be a witness for me that I have fought His battles who will now bemy rewarder.’

 

        “So he passed over, and all thetrumpets sounded for him on the other side.” 

John Buchan, Mr Standfast (Chapter 54).  London, Hodder & Stoughton (1919) 

Mr Standfast (John Buchan, 1919)

I took the train three days later from King’s Cross toEdinburgh. I went to the Pentland Hotel in Princes Street and left there asuit-case containing some clean linen and a change of clothes.  I had been thinking the thing out, and hadcome to the conclusion that I must have a base somewhere and a fresh outfit.  Then, in well-worn tweeds and with no moreluggage than a small trench kit-bag, I descended upon the city of Glasgow.

 

        I walked tothe station which Blenkiron had given me. It was a hot summer evening, and the streets were filled with bareheadedwomen and weary-looking artisans.  As Imade my way down the Dumbarton Road I was amazed at the number of able-bodiedfellows about, considering that you couldn’t stir a mile on any British frontwithout bumping up against a Glasgow battalion. Then I realized that there were such things as munitions and ships, andI wondered no more.

John Buchan:  Chapter 36 ("Andrew Amos").  
Excerpt from Mr Standfast.  London, Hodder & Stoughton, 1919