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You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms +of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online +at <a href="https://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a>. If you +are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the +country where you are located before using this eBook. +</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Title: Traffics and Discoveries</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Author: Rudyard Kipling</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Release Date: October 17, 2003 [eBook #9790]<br /> +[Most recently updated: January 15, 2022]</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Language: English</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Character set encoding: UTF-8</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Produced by: Juliet Sutherland, Keith M. Eckrich and PG Distributed Proofreaders</div> +<div style='margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:4em'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TRAFFICS AND DISCOVERIES ***</div> + +<h1>TRAFFICS AND DISCOVERIES</h1> + +<h2 class="no-break">by Rudyard Kipling</h2> + +<hr /> + +<h2>Contents</h2> + +<table summary="" style=""> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap01"><i>from the Masjid-al-Aqsa of Sayyid Ahmed (Wahabi)</i></a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap02">THE CAPTIVE</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap03"><i>Poseidon’s Law</i></a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap04">THE BONDS OF DISCIPLINE</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap05"><i>The Runners</i></a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap06">A SAHIBS’ WAR</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap07"><i>The Wet Litany</i></a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap08">“THEIR LAWFUL OCCASIONS”—PART I.</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap09">“THEIR LAWFUL OCCASIONS”—PART II.</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap10"><i>The King’s Task</i></a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap11">THE COMPREHENSION OF PRIVATE COPPER</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap12"><i>The Necessitarian</i></a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap13">STEAM TACTICS</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap14"><i>Kaspar’s Song in “Varda”</i></a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap15">“WIRELESS”</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap16"><i>Song of the Old Guard</i></a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap17">THE ARMY OF A DREAM—PART I.</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap18">THE ARMY OF A DREAM—PART II.</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap19"><i>The Return of the Children</i></a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap20">“THEY”</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap21"><i>From Lyden’s “Irenius</i>”</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap22">MRS. BATHURST</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap23">“<i>Our Fathers Also</i>”</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap24">BELOW THE MILL DAM</a></td> +</tr> + +</table> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap02"></a>THE CAPTIVE</h2> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap01"></a> +FROM THE MASJID-AL-AQSA OF SAYYID AHMED (WAHABI)</h2> + +<p class="poem"> +Not with an outcry to Allah nor any complaining<br/> +He answered his name at the muster and stood to the chaining.<br/> +When the twin anklets were nipped on the leg-bars that held them,<br/> +He brotherly greeted the armourers stooping to weld them.<br/> +Ere the sad dust of the marshalled feet of the chain-gang swallowed him,<br/> +Observing him nobly at ease, I alighted and followed him.<br/> +Thus we had speech by the way, but not touching his sorrow<br/> +Rather his red Yesterday and his regal To-morrow,<br/> +Wherein he statelily moved to the clink of his chains unregarded,<br/> +Nowise abashed but contented to drink of the potion awarded.<br/> +Saluting aloofly his Fate, he made swift with his story;<br/> +And the words of his mouth were as slaves spreading carpets of glory<br/> +Embroidered with names of the Djinns—a miraculous weaving—<br/> +But the cool and perspicuous eye overbore unbelieving.<br/> +So I submitted myself to the limits of rapture—<br/> +Bound by this man we had bound, amid captives his capture—<br/> +Till he returned me to earth and the visions departed;<br/> +But on him be the Peace and the Blessing: for he was great-hearted! +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2>THE CAPTIVE</h2> + +<p class="poem"> +“He that believeth shall not make haste.”—<i>Isaiah</i>. +</p> + +<p> +The guard-boat lay across the mouth of the bathing-pool, her crew idly spanking +the water with the flat of their oars. A red-coated militia-man, rifle in hand, +sat at the bows, and a petty officer at the stern. Between the snow-white +cutter and the flat-topped, honey-coloured rocks on the beach the green water +was troubled with shrimp-pink prisoners-of-war bathing. Behind their orderly +tin camp and the electric-light poles rose those stone-dotted spurs that throw +heat on Simonstown. Beneath them the little <i>Barracouta</i> nodded to the big +<i>Gibraltar</i>, and the old <i>Penelope</i>, that in ten years has been +bachelors’ club, natural history museum, kindergarten, and prison, rooted +and dug at her fixed moorings. Far out, a three-funnelled Atlantic transport +with turtle bow and stern waddled in from the deep sea. +</p> + +<p> +Said the sentry, assured of the visitor’s good faith, “Talk to +’em? You can, to any that speak English. You’ll find a lot that +do.” +</p> + +<p> +Here and there earnest groups gathered round ministers of the Dutch Reformed +Church, who doubtless preached conciliation, but the majority preferred their +bath. The God who Looks after Small Things had caused the visitor that day to +receive two weeks’ delayed mails in one from a casual postman, and the +whole heavy bundle of newspapers, tied with a strap, he dangled as bait. At the +edge of the beach, cross-legged, undressed to his sky-blue army shirt, sat a +lean, ginger-haired man, on guard over a dozen heaps of clothing. His eyes +followed the incoming Atlantic boat. +</p> + +<p> +“Excuse me, Mister,” he said, without turning (and the speech +betrayed his nationality), “would you mind keeping away from these +garments? I’ve been elected janitor—on the Dutch vote.” +</p> + +<p> +The visitor moved over against the barbed-wire fence and sat down to his mail. +At the rustle of the newspaper-wrappers the ginger-coloured man turned quickly, +the hunger of a press-ridden people in his close-set iron-grey eyes. +</p> + +<p> +“Have you any use for papers?” said the visitor. +</p> + +<p> +“Have I any use?” A quick, curved forefinger was already snicking +off the outer covers. “Why, that’s the New York postmark! Give me +the ads. at the back of <i>Harper’s</i> and <i>M’Clure’s</i> +and I’m in touch with God’s Country again! Did you know how I was +aching for papers?” +</p> + +<p> +The visitor told the tale of the casual postman. +</p> + +<p> +“Providential!” said the ginger-coloured man, keen as a terrier on +his task; “both in time and matter. Yes! … The <i>Scientific American</i> +yet once more! Oh, it’s good! it’s good!” His voice broke as +he pressed his hawk-like nose against the heavily-inked patent-specifications +at the end. “Can I keep it? I thank you—I thank you! +Why—why—well—well! The <i>American Tyler</i> of all things +created! Do you subscribe to that?” +</p> + +<p> +“I’m on the free list,” said the visitor, nodding. +</p> + +<p> +He extended his blue-tanned hand with that air of Oriental spaciousness which +distinguishes the native-born American, and met the visitor’s grasp +expertly. “I can only say that you have treated me like a Brother (yes, +I’ll take every last one you can spare), and if ever—” He +plucked at the bosom of his shirt. “Psha! I forgot I’d no card on +me; but my name’s Zigler—Laughton G. Zigler. An American? If +Ohio’s still in the Union, I am, Sir. But I’m no extreme +States’-rights man. I’ve used all of my native country and a few +others as I have found occasion, and now I am the captive of your bow and +spear. I’m not kicking at that. I am not a coerced alien, nor a +naturalised Texas mule-tender, nor an adventurer on the instalment plan. +<i>I</i> don’t tag after our consul when he comes around, expecting the +American Eagle to lift me out o’ this by the slack of my pants. No, sir! +If a Britisher went into Indian Territory and shot up his surroundings with a +Colt automatic (not that <i>she’s</i> any sort of weapon, but I take her +for an illustration), he’d be strung up quicker’n a snowflake +’ud melt in hell. No ambassador of yours ’ud save him. I’m my +neck ahead on this game, anyway. That’s how I regard the proposition. +</p> + +<p> +“Have I gone gunning against the British? To a certain extent, I presume +you never heard tell of the Laughton-Zigler automatic two-inch field-gun, with +self-feeding hopper, single oil-cylinder recoil, and ballbearing gear +throughout? Or Laughtite, the new explosive? Absolutely uniform in effect, and +one-ninth the bulk of any present effete charge—flake, cannonite, +cordite, troisdorf, cellulose, cocoa, cord, or prism—I don’t care +what it is. Laughtite’s immense; so’s the Zigler automatic. +It’s me. It’s fifteen years of me. You are not a gun-sharp? I am +sorry. I could have surprised you. Apart from my gun, my tale don’t +amount to much of anything. I thank you, but I don’t use any tobacco +you’d be likely to carry… Bull Durham? <i>Bull Durham!</i> I take it all +back—every last word. Bull Durham—here! If ever you strike Akron, +Ohio, when this fool-war’s over, remember you’ve Laughton O. Zigler +in your vest pocket. Including the city of Akron. We’ve a little club +there…. Hell! What’s the sense of talking Akron with no pants? +</p> + +<p> +“My gun? … For two cents I’d have shipped her to our Filipeens. +‘Came mighty near it too; but from what I’d read in the papers, you +can’t trust Aguinaldo’s crowd on scientific matters. Why +don’t I offer it to our army? Well, you’ve an effete aristocracy +running yours, and we’ve a crowd of politicians. The results are +practically identical. I am not taking any U.S. Army in mine. +</p> + +<p> +“I went to Amsterdam with her—to this Dutch junta that supposes +it’s bossing the war. I wasn’t brought up to love the British for +one thing, and for another I knew that if she got in her fine work (my gun) +I’d stand more chance of receiving an unbiassed report from a crowd of +dam-fool British officers than from a hatful of politicians’ nephews +doing duty as commissaries and ordnance sharps. As I said, I put the brown man +out of the question. That’s the way <i>I</i> regarded the proposition. +</p> + +<p> +“The Dutch in Holland don’t amount to a row of pins. Maybe I +misjudge ’em. Maybe they’ve been swindled too often by self-seeking +adventurers to know a enthusiast when they see him. Anyway, they’re +slower than the Wrath o’ God. But on delusions—as to their winning +out next Thursday week at 9 <small>A.M</small>.—they are—if I may +say so—quite British. +</p> + +<p> +“I’ll tell you a curious thing, too. I fought ’em for ten +days before I could get the financial side of my game fixed to my liking. I +knew they didn’t believe in the Zigler, but they’d no call to be +crazy-mean. I fixed it—free passage and freight for me and the gun to +Delagoa Bay, and beyond by steam and rail. Then I went aboard to see her +crated, and there I struck my fellow-passengers—all deadheads, same as +me. Well, Sir, I turned in my tracks where I stood and besieged the +ticket-office, and I said, ‘Look at here, Van Dunk. I’m paying for +my passage and her room in the hold—every square and cubic foot.’ +‘Guess he knocked down the fare to himself; but I paid. I paid. I +wasn’t going to deadhead along o’ <i>that</i> crowd of Pentecostal +sweepings. ’Twould have hoodooed my gun for all time. That was the way I +regarded the proposition. No, Sir, they were not pretty company. +</p> + +<p> +“When we struck Pretoria I had a hell-and-a-half of a time trying to +interest the Dutch vote in my gun an’ her potentialities. The bottom was +out of things rather much just about that time. Kruger was praying some and +stealing some, and the Hollander lot was singing, ‘If you haven’t +any money you needn’t come round,’ Nobody was spending his dough on +anything except tickets to Europe. We were both grossly neglected. When I think +how I used to give performances in the public streets with dummy cartridges, +filling the hopper and turning the handle till the sweat dropped off me, I +blush, Sir. I’ve made her to do her stunts before Kaffirs—naked +sons of Ham—in Commissioner Street, trying to get a holt somewhere. +</p> + +<p> +“Did I talk? I despise exaggeration—’tain’t American or +scientific—but as true as I’m sitting here like a blue-ended baboon +in a kloof, Teddy Roosevelt’s Western tour was a maiden’s sigh +compared to my advertising work. +</p> + +<p> +“’Long in the spring I was rescued by a commandant called Van +Zyl—a big, fleshy man with a lame leg. Take away his hair and his gun and +he’d make a first-class Schenectady bar-keep. He found me and the Zigler +on the veldt (Pretoria wasn’t wholesome at that time), and he annexed me +in a somnambulistic sort o’ way. He was dead against the war from the +start, but, being a Dutchman, he fought a sight better than the rest of that +‘God and the Mauser’ outfit. Adrian Van Zyl. Slept a heap in the +daytime—and didn’t love niggers. I liked him. I was the only +foreigner in his commando. The rest was Georgia Crackers and Pennsylvania +Dutch—with a dash o’ Philadelphia lawyer. I could tell you things +about them would surprise you. Religion for one thing; women for another; but I +don’t know as their notions o’ geography weren’t the +craziest. ‘Guess that must be some sort of automatic compensation. There +wasn’t one blamed ant-hill in their district they didn’t know +<i>and</i> use; but the world was flat, they said, and England was a +day’s trek from Cape Town. +</p> + +<p> +“They could fight in their own way, and don’t you forget it. But I +guess you will not. They fought to kill, and, by what I could make out, the +British fought to be killed. So both parties were accommodated. +</p> + +<p> +“I am the captive of your bow and spear, Sir. The position has its +obligations—on both sides. You could not be offensive or partisan to me. +I cannot, for the same reason, be offensive to you. Therefore I will not give +you my opinions on the conduct of your war. +</p> + +<p> +“Anyway, I didn’t take the field as an offensive partisan, but as +an inventor. It was a condition and not a theory that confronted me. (Yes, Sir, +I’m a Democrat by conviction, and that was one of the best things Grover +Cleveland ever got off.) +</p> + +<p> +“After three months’ trek, old man Van Zyl had his commando in good +shape and refitted off the British, and he reckoned he’d wait on a +British General of his acquaintance that did business on a circuit between +Stompiesneuk, Jackhalputs, Vrelegen, and Odendaalstroom, year in and year out. +He was a fixture in that section. +</p> + +<p> +“‘He’s a dam’ good man,’ says Van Zyl. +‘He’s a friend of mine. He sent in a fine doctor when I was wounded +and our Hollander doc. wanted to cut my leg off. Ya, I’ll guess +we’ll stay with him.’ Up to date, me and my Zigler had lived in +innocuous desuetude owing to little odds and ends riding out of gear. How in +thunder was I to know there wasn’t the ghost of any road in the country? +But raw hide’s cheap and lastin’. I guess I’ll make my next +gun a thousand pounds heavier, though. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, Sir, we struck the General on his beat—Vrelegen it +was—and our crowd opened with the usual compliments at two thousand +yards. Van Zyl shook himself into his greasy old saddle and says, ‘Now we +shall be quite happy, Mr. Zigler. No more trekking. Joost twelve miles a day +till the apricots are ripe.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Then we hitched on to his outposts, and vedettes, and cossack-picquets, +or whatever they was called, and we wandered around the veldt arm in arm like +brothers. +</p> + +<p> +“The way we worked lodge was this way. The General, he had his breakfast +at 8:45 <small>A.M</small>. to the tick. He might have been a Long Island +commuter. At 8:42 <small>A.M</small>. I’d go down to the Thirty-fourth +Street ferry to meet him—I mean I’d see the Zigler into position at +two thousand (I began at three thousand, but that was cold and +distant)—and blow him off to two full hoppers—eighteen +rounds—just as they were bringing in his coffee. If his crowd was busy +celebrating the anniversary of Waterloo or the last royal kid’s birthday, +they’d open on me with two guns (I’ll tell you about them later +on), but if they were disengaged they’d all stand to their horses and +pile on the ironmongery, and washers, and typewriters, and five weeks’ +grub, and in half an hour they’d sail out after me and the rest of Van +Zyl’s boys; lying down and firing till 11:45 <small>A.M</small>. or maybe +high noon. Then we’d go from labour to refreshment, resooming at 2 +<small>P.M</small>. and battling till tea-time. Tuesday and Friday was the +General’s moving days. He’d trek ahead ten or twelve miles, and +we’d loaf around his flankers and exercise the ponies a piece. Sometimes +he’d get hung up in a drift—stalled crossin’ a +crick—and we’d make playful snatches at his wagons. First time that +happened I turned the Zigler loose with high hopes, Sir; but the old man was +well posted on rearguards with a gun to ’em, and I had to haul her out +with three mules instead of six. I was pretty mad. I wasn’t looking for +any experts back of the Royal British Artillery. Otherwise, the game was mostly +even. He’d lay out three or four of our commando, and we’d gather +in four or five of his once a week or thereon. One time, I remember, long +towards dusk we saw ’em burying five of their boys. They stood pretty +thick around the graves. We wasn’t more than fifteen hundred yards off, +but old Van Zyl wouldn’t fire. He just took off his hat at the proper +time. He said if you stretched a man at his prayers you’d have to hump +his bad luck before the Throne as well as your own. I am inclined to agree with +him. So we browsed along week in and week out. A war-sharp might have judged it +sort of docile, but for an inventor needing practice one day and peace the next +for checking his theories, it suited Laughton O. Zigler. +</p> + +<p> +“And friendly? Friendly was no word for it. We was brothers in arms. +</p> + +<p> +“Why, I knew those two guns of the Royal British Artillery as well as I +used to know the old Fifth Avenoo stages. <i>They</i> might have been brothers +too. +</p> + +<p> +“They’d jolt into action, and wiggle around and skid and spit and +cough and prize ’emselves back again during our hours of bloody battle +till I could have wept, Sir, at the spectacle of modern white men chained up to +these old hand-power, back-number, flint-and-steel reaping machines. One of +’em—I called her Baldy—she’d a long white scar all +along her barrel—I’d made sure of twenty times. I knew her crew by +sight, but she’d come switching and teturing out of the dust of my shells +like—like a hen from under a buggy—and she’d dip into a +gully, and next thing I’d know ’ud be her old nose peeking over the +ridge sniffin’ for us. Her runnin’ mate had two grey mules in the +lead, and a natural wood wheel repainted, and a whole raft of rope-ends +trailin’ around. ‘Jever see Tom Reed with his vest off, +steerin’ Congress through a heat-wave? I’ve been to Washington +often—too often—filin’ my patents. I called her Tom Reed. We +three ’ud play pussy-wants-a-corner all round the outposts on +off-days—cross-lots through the sage and along the mezas till we was +short-circuited by canons. O, it was great for me and Baldy and Tom Reed! I +don’t know as we didn’t neglect the legitimate interests of our +respective commanders sometimes for this ball-play. I know <i>I</i> did. +</p> + +<p> +“’Long towards the fall the Royal British Artillery grew +shy—hung back in their breeching sort of—and their shooting was +way—way off. I observed they wasn’t taking any chances, not though +I acted kitten almost underneath ’em. +</p> + +<p> +“I mentioned it to Van Zyl, because it struck me I had about knocked +their Royal British moral endways. +</p> + +<p> +“‘No,’ says he, rocking as usual on his pony. ‘My +Captain Mankeltow he is sick. That is all.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘So’s your Captain Mankeltow’s guns,’ I said. +‘But I’m going to make ’em a heap sicker before he gets +well.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘No,’ says Van Zyl. ‘He has had the enteric a little. +Now he is better, and he was let out from hospital at Jackhalputs. Ah, that +Mankeltow! He always makes me laugh so. I told him—long back—at +Colesberg, I had a little home for him at Nooitgedacht. But he would not +come—no! He has been sick, and I am sorry.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘How d’you know that?’ I says. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Why, only to-day he sends back his love by Johanna Van der Merwe, +that goes to their doctor for her sick baby’s eyes. He sends his love, +that Mankeltow, and he tells her tell me he has a little garden of roses all +ready for me in the Dutch Indies—Umballa. He is very funny, my Captain +Mankeltow.’ +</p> + +<p> +“The Dutch and the English ought to fraternise, Sir. They’ve the +same notions of humour, to my thinking.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘When he gets well,’ says Van Zyl, ‘you look out, Mr. +Americaan. He comes back to his guns next Tuesday. Then they shoot +better.’ +</p> + +<p> +“I wasn’t so well acquainted with the Royal British Artillery as +old man Van Zyl. I knew this Captain Mankeltow by sight, of course, and, +considering what sort of a man with the hoe he was, I thought he’d done +right well against my Zigler. But nothing epoch-making. +</p> + +<p> +“Next morning at the usual hour I waited on the General, and old Van Zyl +come along with some of the boys. Van Zyl didn’t hang round the Zigler +much as a rule, but this was his luck that day. +</p> + +<p> +“He was peeking through his glasses at the camp, and I was helping +pepper, the General’s sow-belly—just as usual—when he turns +to me quick and says, ‘Almighty! How all these Englishmen are liars! You +cannot trust one,’ he says. ‘Captain Mankeltow tells our Johanna he +comes not back till Tuesday, and to-day is Friday, and there he is! Almighty! +The English are all Chamberlains!’ +</p> + +<p> +“If the old man hadn’t stopped to make political speeches +he’d have had his supper in laager that night, I guess. I was busy +attending to Tom Reed at two thousand when Baldy got in her fine work on me. I +saw one sheet of white flame wrapped round the hopper, and in the middle of it +there was one o’ my mules straight on end. Nothing out of the way in a +mule on end, but this mule hadn’t any head. I remember it struck me as +incongruous at the time, and when I’d ciphered it out I was doing the +Santos-Dumont act without any balloon and my motor out of gear. Then I got to +thinking about Santos-Dumont and how much better my new way was. Then I thought +about Professor Langley and the Smithsonian, and wishing I hadn’t lied so +extravagantly in some of my specifications at Washington. Then I quit thinking +for quite a while, and when I resumed my train of thought I was nude, Sir, in a +very stale stretcher, and my mouth was full of fine dirt all flavoured with +Laughtite. +</p> + +<p> +“I coughed up that dirt. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Hullo!’ says a man walking beside me. ‘You’ve +spoke almost in time. Have a drink?’ +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t use rum as a rule, but I did then, because I needed it. +</p> + +<p> +“‘What hit us?’ I said. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Me,’ he said. ‘I got you fair on the hopper as you +pulled out of that donga; but I’m sorry to say every last round in the +hopper’s exploded and your gun’s in a shocking state. I’m +real sorry,’ he says. ‘I admire your gun, Sir.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Are you Captain Mankeltow?’ I says. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Yes,’ he says. ‘I presoom you’re Mister Zigler. +Your commanding officer told me about you.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Have you gathered in old man Van Zyl?’ I said. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Commandant Van Zyl,’ he says very stiff, ‘was most +unfortunately wounded, but I am glad to say it’s not serious. We hope +he’ll be able to dine with us to-night; and I feel sure,’ he says, +‘the General would be delighted to see you too, though he didn’t +expect,’ he says, ‘and no one else either, by Jove!’ he says, +and blushed like the British do when they’re embarrassed. +</p> + +<p> +“I saw him slide an Episcopalian Prayer-book up his sleeve, and when I +looked over the edge of the stretcher there was half-a-dozen enlisted +men—privates—had just quit digging and was standing to attention by +their spades. I guess he was right on the General not expecting me to dinner; +but it was all of a piece with their sloppy British way of doing business. Any +God’s quantity of fuss and flubdub to bury a man, and not an ounce of +forehandedness in the whole outfit to find out whether he was rightly dead. And +I am a Congregationalist anyway! +</p> + +<p> +“Well, Sir, that was my introduction to the British Army. I’d write +a book about it if anyone would believe me. This Captain Mankeltow, Royal +British Artillery, turned the doctor on me (I could write another book about +<i>him</i>) and fixed me up with a suit of his own clothes, and fed me canned +beef and biscuits, and give me a cigar—a Henry Clay and a +whisky-and-sparklet. He was a white man. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Ye-es, by Jove,’ he said, dragging out his words like a +twist of molasses, ‘we’ve all admired your gun and the way +you’ve worked it. Some of us betted you was a British deserter. I won a +sovereign on that from a yeoman. And, by the way,’ he says, +‘you’ve disappointed me groom pretty bad.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Where does your groom come in?’ I said. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Oh, he was the yeoman. He’s a dam poor groom,’ says +my captain, ‘but he’s a way-up barrister when he’s at home. +He’s been running around the camp with his tongue out, waiting for the +chance of defending you at the court-martial.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘What court-martial?’ I says. +</p> + +<p> +“‘On you as a deserter from the Artillery. You’d have had a +good run for your money. Anyway, you’d never have been hung after the way +you worked your gun. Deserter ten times over,’ he says, ‘I’d +have stuck out for shooting you like a gentleman.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Well, Sir, right there it struck me at the pit of my stomach—sort +of sickish, sweetish feeling—that my position needed regularising pretty +bad. I ought to have been a naturalised burgher of a year’s standing; but +Ohio’s my State, and I wouldn’t have gone back on her for a +desertful of Dutchmen. That and my enthoosiasm as an inventor had led me to the +existing crisis; but I couldn’t expect this Captain Mankeltow to regard +the proposition that way. There I sat, the rankest breed of unreconstructed +American citizen, caught red-handed squirting hell at the British Army for +months on end. I tell <i>you</i>, Sir, I wished I was in Cincinnatah that +summer evening. I’d have compromised on Brooklyn. +</p> + +<p> +“‘What d’you do about aliens?’ I said, and the dirt +I’d coughed up seemed all back of my tongue again. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Oh,’ says he, ‘we don’t do much of anything. +They’re about all the society we get. I’m a bit of a pro-Boer +myself,’ he says, ‘but between you and me the average Boer +ain’t over and above intellectual. You’re the first American +we’ve met up with, but of course you’re a burgher.’ +</p> + +<p> +“It was what I ought to have been if I’d had the sense of a common +tick, but the way he drawled it out made me mad. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Of course I am not,’ I says. ‘Would <i>you</i> be a +naturalised Boer?’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘I’m fighting against ’em,’ he says, lighting a +cigarette, ‘but it’s all a matter of opinion.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Well,’ I says, ‘you can hold any blame opinion you +choose, but I’m a white man, and my present intention is to die in that +colour.’ +</p> + +<p> +“He laughed one of those big, thick-ended, British laughs that +don’t lead anywhere, and whacked up some sort of compliment about America +that made me mad all through. +</p> + +<p> +“I am the captive of your bow and spear, Sir, but I do not understand the +alleged British joke. It is depressing. +</p> + +<p> +“I was introdooced to five or six officers that evening, and every blame +one of ’em grinned and asked me why I wasn’t in the Filipeens +suppressing our war! And that was British humour! They all had to get it off +their chests before they’d talk sense. But they was sound on the Zigler. +They had all admired her. I made out a fairy-story of me being wearied of the +war, and having pushed the gun at them these last three months in the hope +they’d capture it and let me go home. That tickled ’em to death. +They made me say it three times over, and laughed like kids each time. But half +the British <i>are</i> kids; specially the older men. My Captain Mankeltow was +less of it than the others. He talked about the Zigler like a lover, Sir, and I +drew him diagrams of the hopper-feed and recoil-cylinder in his note-book. He +asked the one British question I was waiting for, ‘Hadn’t I made my +working-parts too light?’ The British think weight’s strength. +</p> + +<p> +“At last—I’d been shy of opening the subject before—at +last I said, ‘Gentlemen, you are the unprejudiced tribunal I’ve +been hunting after. I guess you ain’t interested in any other +gun-factory, and politics don’t weigh with you. How did it feel your end +of the game? What’s my gun done, anyway?’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘I hate to disappoint you,’ says Captain Mankeltow, +‘because I know you feel as an inventor.’ I wasn’t feeling +like an inventor just then. I felt friendly, but the British haven’t more +tact than you can pick up with a knife out of a plate of soup. +</p> + +<p> +“‘The honest truth,’ he says, ‘is that you’ve +wounded about ten of us one way and another, killed two battery horses and four +mules, and—oh, yes,’ he said, ‘you’ve bagged five +Kaffirs. But, buck up,’ he said, ‘we’ve all had mighty close +calls’—shaves, he called ’em, I remember. ‘Look at my +pants.’ +</p> + +<p> +“They was repaired right across the seat with Minneapolis flour-bagging. +I could see the stencil. +</p> + +<p> +“‘I ain’t bluffing,’ he says. ‘Get the hospital +returns, Doc.’ +</p> + +<p> +“The doctor gets ’em and reads ’em out under the proper +dates. That doctor alone was worth the price of admission. +</p> + +<p> +“I was right pleased right through that I hadn’t killed any of +these cheerful kids; but none the less I couldn’t help thinking that a +few more Kaffirs would have served me just as well for advertising purposes as +white men. No, sir. Anywhichway you regard the proposition, twenty-one +casualties after months of close friendship like ours was—paltry. +</p> + +<p> +“They gave me taffy about the gun—the British use taffy where we +use sugar. It’s cheaper, and gets there just the same. They sat around +and proved to me that my gun was too good, too uniform—shot as close as a +Mannlicher rifle. +</p> + +<p> +“Says one kid chewing a bit of grass: ‘I counted eight of your +shells, Sir, burst in a radius of ten feet. All of ’em would have gone +through one waggon-tilt. It was beautiful,’ he says. ‘It was too +good.’ +</p> + +<p> +“I shouldn’t wonder if the boys were right. My Laughtite is too +mathematically uniform in propelling power. Yes; she was too good for this +refractory fool of a country. The training gear was broke, too, and we had to +swivel her around by the trail. But I’ll build my next Zigler fifteen +hundred pounds heavier. Might work in a gasoline motor under the axles. I must +think that up. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Well, gentlemen,’ I said, ‘I’d hate to have +been the death of any of you; and if a prisoner can deed away his property, +I’d love to present the Captain here with what he’s seen fit to +leave of my Zigler.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Thanks awf’ly,’ says my Captain. ‘I’d +like her very much. She’d look fine in the mess at Woolwich. That is, if +you don’t mind, Mr. Zigler.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Go right ahead,’ I says. ‘I’ve come out of all +the mess I’ve any use for; but she’ll do to spread the light among +the Royal British Artillery.’ +</p> + +<p> +“I tell you, Sir, there’s not much of anything the matter with the +Royal British Artillery. They’re brainy men languishing under an effete +system which, when you take good holt of it, is England—just all England. +‘Times I’d feel I was talking with real live citizens, and times +I’d feel I’d struck the Beef Eaters in the Tower. +</p> + +<p> +“How? Well, this way. I was telling my Captain Mankeltow what Van Zyl had +said about the British being all Chamberlains when the old man saw him back +from hospital four days ahead of time. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Oh, damn it all!’ he says, as serious as the Supreme Court. +‘It’s too bad,’ he says. ‘Johanna must have +misunderstood me, or else I’ve got the wrong Dutch word for these +blarsted days of the week. I told Johanna I’d be out on Friday. The +woman’s a fool. Oah, da-am it all!’ he says. ‘I +wouldn’t have sold old Van Zyl a pup like that,’ he says. +‘I’ll hunt him up and apologise.’ +</p> + +<p> +“He must have fixed it all right, for when we sailed over to the +General’s dinner my Captain had Van Zyl about half-full of sherry and +bitters, as happy as a clam. The boys all called him Adrian, and treated him +like their prodigal father. He’d been hit on the collarbone by a wad of +shrapnel, and his arm was tied up. +</p> + +<p> +“But the General was the peach. I presume you’re acquainted with +the average run of British generals, but this was my first. I sat on his left +hand, and he talked like—like the <i>Ladies’ Home Journal</i>. +J’ever read that paper? It’s refined, Sir—and innocuous, and +full of nickel-plated sentiments guaranteed to improve the mind. He was it. He +began by a Lydia Pinkham heart-to-heart talk about my health, and hoped the +boys had done me well, and that I was enjoying my stay in their midst. Then he +thanked me for the interesting and valuable lessons that I’d given his +crowd—specially in the matter of placing artillery and rearguard attacks. +He’d wipe his long thin moustache between drinks—lime-juice and +water he used—and blat off into a long ‘a-aah,’ and ladle +out more taffy for me or old man Van Zyl on his right. I told him how I’d +had my first Pisgah-sight of the principles of the Zigler when I was a +fourth-class postmaster on a star-route in Arkansas. I told him how I’d +worked it up by instalments when I was machinist in Waterbury, where the +dollar-watches come from. He had one on his wrist then. I told him how +I’d met Zalinski (he’d never heard of Zalinski!) when I was an +extra clerk in the Naval Construction Bureau at Washington. I told him how my +uncle, who was a truck-farmer in Noo Jersey (he loaned money on mortgage too, +for ten acres ain’t enough now in Noo Jersey), how he’d willed me a +quarter of a million dollars, because I was the only one of our kin that called +him down when he used to come home with a hard-cider jag on him and heave +ox-bows at his nieces. I told him how I’d turned in every red cent on the +Zigler, and I told him the whole circus of my coming out with her, and so on, +and so following; and every forty seconds he’d wipe his moustache and +blat, ‘How interesting. Really, now? How interesting.’ +</p> + +<p> +“It was like being in an old English book, Sir. Like <i>Bracebridge +Hall</i>. But an American wrote <i>that!</i> I kept peeking around for the +Boar’s Head and the Rosemary and Magna Charta and the Cricket on the +Hearth, and the rest of the outfit. Then Van Zyl whirled in. He was no ways +jagged, but thawed—thawed, Sir, and among friends. They began discussing +previous scraps all along the old man’s beat—about sixty of +’em—as well as side-shows with other generals and columns. Van Zyl +told ’im of a big beat he’d worked on a column a week or so before +I’d joined him. He demonstrated his strategy with forks on the table. +</p> + +<p> +“‘There!’ said the General, when he’d finished. +‘That proves my contention to the hilt. Maybe I’m a bit of a +pro-Boer, but I stick to it,’ he says, ‘that under proper officers, +with due regard to his race prejudices, the Boer’ud make the finest +mounted infantry in the Empire. Adrian,’ he says, ‘you’re +simply squandered on a cattle-run. You ought to be at the Staff College with De +Wet.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘You catch De Wet and I come to your Staff +College—eh,’ says Adrian, laughing. ‘But you are so slow, +Generaal. Why are you so slow? For a month,’ he says, ‘you do so +well and strong that we say we shall hands-up and come back to our farms. Then +you send to England and make us a present of two—three—six hundred +young men, with rifles and wagons and rum and tobacco, and such a great lot of +cartridges, that our young men put up their tails and start all over again. If +you hold an ox by the horn and hit him by the bottom he runs round and round. +He never goes anywhere. So, too, this war goes round and round. You know that, +Generaal!’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Quite right, Adrian,’ says the General; ‘but you must +believe your Bible.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Hooh!’ says Adrian, and reaches for the whisky. +‘I’ve never known a Dutchman a professing Atheist, but some few +have been rather active Agnostics since the British sat down in Pretoria. Old +man Van Zyl—he told me—had soured on religion after Bloemfontein +surrendered. He was a Free Stater for one thing.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘He that believeth,’ says the General, ‘shall not make +haste. That’s in Isaiah. We believe we’re going to win, and so we +don’t make haste. As far as I’m concerned I’d like this war +to last another five years. We’d have an army then. It’s just this +way, Mr. Zigler,’ he says, ‘our people are brimfull of patriotism, +but they’ve been born and brought up between houses, and England +ain’t big enough to train ’em—not if you expect to +preserve.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Preserve what?’ I says. ‘England?’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘No. The game,’ he says; ‘and that reminds me, +gentlemen, we haven’t drunk the King and Fox-hunting.’ +</p> + +<p> +“So they drank the King and Fox-hunting. I drank the King because +there’s something about Edward that tickles me (he’s so blame +British); but I rather stood out on the Fox-hunting. I’ve ridden wolves +in the cattle-country, and needed a drink pretty bad afterwards, but it never +struck me as I ought to drink about it—he-red-it-arily. +</p> + +<p> +“‘No, as I was saying, Mr. Zigler,’ he goes on, ‘we +have to train our men in the field to shoot and ride. I allow six months for +it; but many column-commanders—not that I ought to say a word against +’em, for they’re the best fellows that ever stepped, and most of +’em are my dearest friends—seem to think that if they have men and +horses and guns they can take tea with the Boers. It’s generally the +other way about, ain’t it, Mr. Zigler?’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘To some extent, Sir,’ I said. +</p> + +<p> +“‘I’m <i>so</i> glad you agree with me,’ he says. +‘My command here I regard as a training depot, and you, if I may say so, +have been one of my most efficient instructors. I mature my men slowly but +thoroughly. First I put ’em in a town which is liable to be attacked by +night, where they can attend riding-school in the day. Then I use ’em +with a convoy, and last I put ’em into a column. It takes time,’ he +says, ‘but I flatter myself that any men who have worked under me are at +least grounded in the rudiments of their profession. Adrian,’ he says, +‘was there anything wrong with the men who upset Van Bester’s +applecart last month when he was trying to cross the line to join Piper with +those horses he’d stole from Gabbitas?’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘No, Generaal,’ says Van Zyl. ‘Your men got the horses +back and eleven dead; and Van Besters, he ran to Delarey in his shirt. They was +very good, those men. They shoot hard.’ +</p> + +<p> +“<i>‘So</i> pleased to hear you say so. I laid ’em down at +the beginning of this century—a 1900 vintage. <i>You</i> remember +’em, Mankeltow?’ he says. ‘The Central Middlesex Buncho +Busters—clerks and floorwalkers mostly,’ and he wiped his +moustache. ‘It was just the same with the Liverpool Buckjumpers, but they +were stevedores. Let’s see—they were a last-century draft, +weren’t they? They did well after nine months. <i>You</i> know ’em, +Van Zyl? You didn’t get much change out of ’em at +Pootfontein?’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘No,’ says Van Zyl. ‘At Pootfontein I lost my son +Andries.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘I beg your pardon, Commandant,’ says the General; and the +rest of the crowd sort of cooed over Adrian. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Excoose,’ says Adrian. ‘It was all right. They were +good men those, but it is just what I say. Some are so dam good we want to +hands-up, and some are so dam bad, we say, “Take the Vierkleur into Cape +Town.” It is not upright of you, Generaal. It is not upright of you at +all. I do not think you ever wish this war to finish.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘It’s a first-class dress-parade for Armageddon,’ says +the General. ‘With luck, we ought to run half a million men through the +mill. Why, we might even be able to give our Native Army a look in. Oh, not +here, of course, Adrian, but down in the Colony—say a camp-of-exercise at +Worcester. You mustn’t be prejudiced, Adrian. I’ve commanded a +district in India, and I give you my word the native troops are splendid +men.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Oh, I should not mind them at Worcester,’ says Adrian. +‘I would sell you forage for them at Worcester—yes, and Paarl and +Stellenbosch; but Almighty!’ he says, ‘must I stay with Cronje till +you have taught half a million of these stupid boys to ride? I shall be an old +man.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Well, Sir, then and there they began arguing whether St. Helena would +suit Adrian’s health as well as some other places they knew about, and +fixing up letters of introduction to Dukes and Lords of their acquaintance, +so’s Van Zyl should be well looked after. We own a fair-sized block of +real estate—America does—but it made me sickish to hear this crowd +fluttering round the Atlas (oh yes, they had an Atlas), and choosing stray +continents for Adrian to drink his coffee in. The old man allowed he +didn’t want to roost with Cronje, because one of Cronje’s kin had +jumped one of his farms after Paardeberg. I forget the rights of the case, but +it was interesting. They decided on a place called Umballa in India, because +there was a first-class doctor there. +</p> + +<p> +“So Adrian was fixed to drink the King and Foxhunting, and study up the +Native Army in India (I’d like to see ’em myself), till the British +General had taught the male white citizens of Great Britain how to ride. +Don’t misunderstand me, Sir. I loved that General. After ten minutes I +loved him, and I wanted to laugh at him; but at the same time, sitting there +and hearing him talk about the centuries, I tell you, Sir, it scared me. It +scared me cold! He admitted everything—he acknowledged the corn before +you spoke—he was more pleased to hear that his men had been used to wipe +the geldt with than I was when I knocked out Tom Reed’s two +lead-horses—and he sat back and blew smoke through his nose and matured +his men like cigars and—he talked of the everlastin’ centuries! +</p> + +<p> +“I went to bed nearer nervous prostration than I’d come in a long +time. Next morning me and Captain Mankeltow fixed up what his shrapnel had left +of my Zigler for transport to the railroad. She went in on her own wheels, and +I stencilled her ‘Royal Artillery Mess, Woolwich,’ on the muzzle, +and he said he’d be grateful if I’d take charge of her to Cape +Town, and hand her over to a man in the Ordnance there. ‘How are you +fixed financially? You’ll need some money on the way home,’ he says +at last. +</p> + +<p> +“‘For one thing, Cap,’ I said, ‘I’m not a poor +man, and for another I’m not going home. I am the captive of your bow and +spear. I decline to resign office.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Skittles!’ he says (that was a great word of his), +‘you’ll take parole, and go back to America and invent another +Zigler, a trifle heavier in the working parts—I would. We’ve got +more prisoners than we know what to do with as it is,’ he says. +‘You’ll only be an additional expense to me as a taxpayer. Think of +Schedule D,’ he says, ‘and take parole.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘I don’t know anything about your tariffs,’ I said, +‘but when I get to Cape Town I write home for money, and I turn in every +cent my board’ll cost your country to any ten-century-old department +that’s been ordained to take it since William the Conqueror came +along.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘But, confound you for a thick-headed mule,’ he says, +‘this war ain’t any more than just started! Do you mean to tell me +you’re going to play prisoner till it’s over?’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘That’s about the size of it,’ I says, ‘if an +Englishman and an American could ever understand each other.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘But, in Heaven’s Holy Name, why?’ he says, sitting +down of a heap on an anthill. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Well, Cap,’ I says, ‘I don’t pretend to follow +your ways of thought, and I can’t see why you abuse your position to +persecute a poor prisoner o’ war on <i>his!</i>’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘My dear fellow,’ he began, throwing up his hands and +blushing, ‘I’ll apologise.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘But if you insist,’ I says, ‘there are just one and a +half things in this world I can’t do. The odd half don’t matter +here; but taking parole, and going home, and being interviewed by the boys, and +giving lectures on my single-handed campaign against the hereditary enemies of +my beloved country happens to be the one. We’ll let it go at that, +Cap.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘But it’ll bore you to death,’ he says. The British +are a heap more afraid of what they call being bored than of dying, I’ve +noticed. +</p> + +<p> +“‘I’ll survive,’ I says, ‘I ain’t British. +I can think,’ I says. +</p> + +<p> +“‘By God,’ he says, coming up to me, and extending the right +hand of fellowship, ‘you ought to be English, Zigler!’ +</p> + +<p> +“It’s no good getting mad at a compliment like that. The English +all do it. They’re a crazy breed. When they don’t know you they +freeze up tighter’n the St. Lawrence. When they <i>do</i>, they go out +like an ice-jam in April. Up till we prisoners left—four days—my +Captain Mankeltow told me pretty much all about himself there was; his mother +and sisters, and his bad brother that was a trooper in some Colonial corps, and +how his father didn’t get on with him, and—well, everything, as +I’ve said. They’re undomesticated, the British, compared with us. +They talk about their own family affairs as if they belonged to someone else. +’Taint as if they hadn’t any shame, but it sounds like it. I guess +they talk out loud what we think, and we talk out loud what they think. +</p> + +<p> +“I liked my Captain Mankeltow. I liked him as well as any man I’d +ever struck. He was white. He gave me his silver drinking-flask, and I gave him +the formula of my Laughtite. That’s a hundred and fifty thousand dollars +in his vest-pocket, on the lowest count, if he has the knowledge to use it. No, +I didn’t tell him the money-value. He was English. He’d send his +valet to find out. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, me and Adrian and a crowd of dam Dutchmen was sent down the road +to Cape Town in first-class carriages under escort. (What did I think of your +enlisted men? They are largely different from ours, Sir: very largely.) As I +was saying, we slid down south, with Adrian looking out of the car-window and +crying. Dutchmen cry mighty easy for a breed that fights as they do; but I +never understood how a Dutchman could curse till we crossed into the Orange +Free State Colony, and he lifted up his hand and cursed Steyn for a solid ten +minutes. Then we got into the Colony, and the rebs—ministers mostly and +schoolmasters—came round the cars with fruit and sympathy and texts. Van +Zyl talked to ’em in Dutch, and one man, a big red-bearded minister, at +Beaufort West, I remember, he jest wilted on the platform. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Keep your prayers for yourself,’ says Van Zyl, throwing +back a bunch of grapes. ‘You’ll need ’em, and you’ll +need the fruit too, when the war comes down here. <i>You</i> done it,’ he +says. ‘You and your picayune Church that’s deader than +Cronje’s dead horses! What sort of a God have you been unloading on us, +you black <i>aas vogels</i>? The British came, and we beat ’em,’ he +says, ‘and you sat still and prayed. The British beat us, and you sat +still,’ he says. ‘You told us to hang on, and we hung on, and our +farms was burned, and you sat still—you and your God. See here,’ he +says, ‘I shot my Bible full of bullets after Bloemfontein went, and you +and God didn’t say anything. Take it and pray over it before we Federals +help the British to knock hell out of you rebels.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Then I hauled him back into the car. I judged he’d had a fit. But +life’s curious—and sudden—and mixed. I hadn’t any more +use for a reb than Van Zyl, and I knew something of the lies they’d fed +us up with from the Colony for a year and more. I told the minister to pull his +freight out of that, and went on with my lunch, when another man come along and +shook hands with Van Zyl. He’d known him at close range in the Kimberley +seige and before. Van Zyl was well seen by his neighbours, I judge. As soon as +this other man opened his mouth I said, ‘You’re Kentucky, +ain’t you?’ ‘I am,’ he says; ‘and what may you +be?’ I told him right off, for I was pleased to hear good United States +in any man’s mouth; but he whipped his hands behind him and said, +‘I’m not knowing any man that fights for a Tammany Dutchman. But I +presoom you’ve been well paid, you dam gun-runnin’ Yank.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Well, Sir, I wasn’t looking for that, and it near knocked me over, +while old man Van Zyl started in to explain. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Don’t you waste your breath, Mister Van Zyl,’ the man +says. ‘I know this breed. The South’s full of ’em.’ +Then he whirls round on me and says, ‘Look at here, you Yank. A little +thing like a King’s neither here nor there, but what <i>you’ve</i> +done,’ he says, ‘is to go back on the White Man in six places at +once—two hemispheres and four continents—America, England, Canada, +Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa. Don’t open your head,’ he +says. ‘You know well if you’d been caught at this game in our +country you’d have been jiggling in the bight of a lariat before you +could reach for your naturalisation papers. Go on and prosper,’ he says, +‘and you’ll fetch up by fighting for niggers, as the North +did.’ And he threw me half-a-crown—English money. +</p> + +<p> +“Sir, I do not regard the proposition in that light, but I guess I must +have been somewhat shook by the explosion. They told me at Cape Town one rib +was driven in on to my lungs. I am not adducing this as an excuse, but the cold +God’s truth of the matter is—the money on the floor did it…. I give +up and cried. Put my head down and cried. +</p> + +<p> +“I dream about this still sometimes. He didn’t know the +circumstances, but I dream about it. And it’s Hell! +</p> + +<p> +“How do you regard the proposition—as a Brother? If you’d +invented your own gun, and spent fifty-seven thousand dollars on her—and +had paid your own expenses from the word ‘go’? An American citizen +has a right to choose his own side in an unpleasantness, and Van Zyl +wasn’t any Krugerite … and I’d risked my hide at my own expense. I +got that man’s address from Van Zyl; he was a mining man at Kimberley, +and I wrote him the facts. But he never answered. Guess he thought I lied…. +Damned Southern rebel! +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, say. Did I tell you my Captain gave me a letter to an English Lord +in Cape Town, and he fixed things so’s I could lie up a piece in his +house? I was pretty sick, and threw up some blood from where the rib had gouged +into the lung—here. This Lord was a crank on guns, and he took charge of +the Zigler. He had his knife into the British system as much as any American. +He said he wanted revolution, and not reform, in your army. He said the British +soldier had failed in every point except courage. He said England needed a +Monroe Doctrine worse than America—a new doctrine, barring out all the +Continent, and strictly devoting herself to developing her own Colonies. He +said he’d abolish half the Foreign Office, and take all the old +hereditary families clean out of it, because, he said, they was expressly +trained to fool around with continental diplomats, and to despise the Colonies. +His own family wasn’t more than six hundred years old. He was a very +brainy man, and a good citizen. We talked politics and inventions together when +my lung let up on me. +</p> + +<p> +“Did he know my General? Yes. He knew ’em all. Called ’em +Teddie and Gussie and Willie. They was all of the very best, and all his +dearest friends; but he told me confidentially they was none of ’em fit +to command a column in the field. He said they were too fond of advertising. +Generals don’t seem very different from actors or doctors or—yes, +Sir—inventors. +</p> + +<p> +“He fixed things for me lovelily at Simons-Town. Had the biggest sort of +pull—even for a Lord. At first they treated me as a harmless lunatic; but +after a while I got ’em to let me keep some of their books. If I was left +alone in the world with the British system of bookkeeping, I’d +reconstruct the whole British Empire—beginning with the Army. Yes, +I’m one of their most trusted accountants, and I’m paid for it. As +much as a dollar a day. I keep that. I’ve earned it, and I deduct it from +the cost of my board. When the war’s over I’m going to pay up the +balance to the British Government. Yes, Sir, that’s how I regard the +proposition. +</p> + +<p> +“Adrian? Oh, he left for Umballa four months back. He told me he was +going to apply to join the National Scouts if the war didn’t end in a +year. ’Tisn’t in nature for one Dutchman to shoot another, but if +Adrian ever meets up with Steyn there’ll be an exception to the rule. +Ye—es, when the war’s over it’ll take some of the British +Army to protect Steyn from his fellow-patriots. But the war won’t be over +yet awhile. He that believeth don’t hurry, as Isaiah says. The ministers +and the school-teachers and the rebs’ll have a war all to themselves long +after the north is quiet. +</p> + +<p> +“I’m pleased with this country—it’s big. Not so many +folk on the ground as in America. There’s a boom coming sure. I’ve +talked it over with Adrian, and I guess I shall buy a farm somewhere near +Bloemfontein and start in cattle-raising. It’s big and peaceful—a +ten-thousand-acre farm. I could go on inventing there, too. I’ll sell my +Zigler, I guess. I’ll offer the patent rights to the British Government; +and if they do the ‘reelly-now-how-interesting’ act over her, +I’ll turn her over to Captain Mankeltow and his friend the Lord. +They’ll pretty quick find some Gussie, or Teddie, or Algie who can get +her accepted in the proper quarters. I’m beginning to know my English. +</p> + +<p> +“And now I’ll go in swimming, and read the papers after lunch. I +haven’t had such a good time since Willie died.” He pulled the blue +shirt over his head as the bathers returned to their piles of clothing, and, +speaking through the folds, added: +</p> + +<p> +“But if you want to realise your assets, you should lease the whole +proposition to America for ninety-nine years.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap04"></a>THE BONDS OF DISCIPLINE</h2> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap03"></a>POSEIDON’S LAW</h2> + +<p class="poem"> +When the robust and brass-bound man commissioned first for sea<br/> +His fragile raft, Poseidon laughed, and, “Mariner,” said he,<br/> +“Behold, a Law immutable I lay on thee and thine,<br/> +That never shall ye act or tell a falsehood at my shrine.<br/> +<br/> +“Let Zeus adjudge your landward kin, whose votive meal and salt<br/> +At easy-cheated altars win oblivion for the fault,<br/> +But ye the unhoodwinked waves shall test—the immediate gulfs condemn—<br/> +Unless ye owe the Fates a jest, be slow to jest with them.<br/> +<br/> +“Ye shall not clear by Greekly speech, nor cozen from your path<br/> +The twinkling shoal, the leeward beach, and Hadria’s white-lipped wrath;<br/> +Nor tempt with painted cloth for wood my fraud-avenging hosts;<br/> +Nor make at all or all make good your bulwarks and your boasts.<br/> +<br/> +“Now and henceforward serve unshod through wet and wakeful shifts,<br/> +A present and oppressive God, but take, to aid, my gifts—<br/> +The wide and windward-opened eye, the large and lavish hand,<br/> +The soul that cannot tell a lie—except upon the land!”<br/> +<br/> +In dromond and in catafract—wet, wakeful, windward-eyed—<br/> +He kept Poseidon’s Law intact (his ship and freight beside),<br/> +But, once discharged the dromond’s hold, the bireme beached once more,<br/> +Splendaciously mendacious rolled the brass-bound man ashore. +</p> + +<hr /> + +<p class="poem"> +The thranite now and thalamite are pressures low and high,<br/> +And where three hundred blades bit white the twin-propellers ply:<br/> +The God that hailed, the keel that sailed, are changed beyond recall,<br/> +But the robust and brass-bound man he is not changed at all!<br/> +<br/> +From Punt returned, from Phormio’s Fleet, from Javan and Gadire,<br/> +He strongly occupies the seat about the tavern fire,<br/> +And, moist with much Falernian or smoked Massilian juice,<br/> +Revenges there the brass-bound man his long-enforced truce! +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2>THE BONDS OF DISCIPLINE</h2> + +<p> +As literature, it is beneath contempt. It concerns the endurance, armament, +turning-circle, and inner gear of every ship in the British Navy—the +whole embellished with profile plates. The Teuton approaches the matter with +pagan thoroughness; the Muscovite runs him close; but the Gaul, ever an artist, +breaks enclosure to study the morale, at the present day, of the British +sailorman. +</p> + +<p> +In this, I conceive, he is from time to time aided by the zealous amateur, +though I find very little in his dispositions to show that he relies on that +amateur’s hard-won information. There exists—unlike some other +publication, it is not bound in lead boards—a work by one “M. de +C.,” based on the absolutely unadorned performances of one of our +well-known <i>Acolyte</i> type of cruisers. It contains nothing that did not +happen. It covers a period of two days; runs to twenty-seven pages of large +type exclusive of appendices; and carries as many exclamation points as the +average Dumas novel. +</p> + +<p> +I read it with care, from the adorably finished prologue—it is the +disgrace of our Navy that we cannot produce a commissioned officer capable of +writing one page of lyric prose—to the eloquent, the joyful, the +impassioned end; and my first notion was that I had been cheated. In this sort +of book-collecting you will see how entirely the bibliophile lies at the mercy +of his agent. +</p> + +<p> +“M. de C.,” I read, opened his campaign by stowing away in one of +her boats what time H.M.S. <i>Archimandrite</i> lay off Funchal. “M. de +C.” was, always on behalf of his country, a Madeira Portuguese fleeing +from the conscription. They discovered him eighty miles at sea and bade him +assist the cook. So far this seemed fairly reasonable. Next day, thanks to his +histrionic powers and his ingratiating address, he was promoted to the rank of +“supernumerary captain’s servant”—a “post +which,” I give his words, “I flatter myself, was created for me +alone, and furnished me with opportunities unequalled for a task in which one +word malapropos would have been my destruction.” +</p> + +<p> +From this point onward, earth and water between them held no marvels like to +those “M. de C.” had “envisaged”—if I translate +him correctly. It became clear to me that “M. de C.” was either a +pyramidal liar, or… +</p> + +<p> +I was not acquainted with any officer, seaman, or marine in the +<i>Archimandrite</i>; but instinct told me I could not go far wrong if I took a +third-class ticket to Plymouth. +</p> + +<p> +I gathered information on the way from a leading stoker, two seaman-gunners, +and an odd hand in a torpedo factory. They courteously set my feet on the right +path, and that led me through the alleys of Devonport to a public-house not +fifty yards from the water. We drank with the proprietor, a huge, yellowish man +called Tom Wessels; and when my guides had departed, I asked if he could +produce any warrant or petty officer of the <i>Archimandrite</i>. +</p> + +<p> +“The <i>Bedlamite</i>, d’you mean—’er last commission, +when they all went crazy?” +</p> + +<p> +“Shouldn’t wonder,” I replied. “Fetch me a sample and +I’ll see.” +</p> + +<p> +“You’ll excuse me, o’ course, but—what d’you want +’im <i>for?</i>” +</p> + +<p> +“I want to make him drunk. I want to make you drunk—if you like. I +want to make him drunk here.” +</p> + +<p> +“Spoke very ’andsome. I’ll do what I can.” He went out +towards the water that lapped at the foot of the street. I gathered from the +pot-boy that he was a person of influence beyond Admirals. +</p> + +<p> +In a few minutes I heard the noise of an advancing crowd, and the voice of Mr. +Wessels. +</p> + +<p> +“’E only wants to make you drunk at ’is expense. Dessay +’e’ll stand you all a drink. Come up an’ look at ’im. +’E don’t bite.” +</p> + +<p> +A square man, with remarkable eyes, entered at the head of six large +bluejackets. Behind them gathered a contingent of hopeful free-drinkers. +</p> + +<p> +“’E’s the only one I could get. Transferred to the +<i>Postulant</i> six months back. I found ’im quite accidental.” +Mr. Wessels beamed. +</p> + +<p> +“I’m in charge o’ the cutter. Our wardroom is dinin’ on +the beach <i>en masse</i>. They won’t be home till mornin’,” +said the square man with the remarkable eyes. “Are you an +<i>Archimandrite?</i>” I demanded. +</p> + +<p> +“That’s me. I was, as you might say.” +</p> + +<p> +“Hold on. I’m a <i>Archimandrite.</i>” A Red Marine with +moist eyes tried to climb on the table. “Was you lookin’ for a +<i>Bedlamite?</i> I’ve—I’ve been invalided, an’ what +with that, an’ visitin’ my family ’ome at Lewes, +per’aps I’ve come late. ’Ave I?” +</p> + +<p> +“You’ve ’ad all that’s good for you,” said Tom +Wessels, as the Red Marine sat cross-legged on the floor. +</p> + +<p> +“There are those ’oo haven’t ’ad a thing yet!” +cried a voice by the door. +</p> + +<p> +“I will take this <i>Archimandrite</i>,” I said, “and this +Marine. Will you please give the boat’s crew a drink now, and another in +half an hour if—if Mr.——” +</p> + +<p> +“Pyecroft,” said the square man. “Emanuel Pyecroft, +second-class petty-officer.” +</p> + +<p> +“—Mr. Pyecroft doesn’t object?” +</p> + +<p> +“He don’t. Clear out. Goldin’, you picket the hill by +yourself, throwin’ out a skirmishin’-line in ample time to let me +know when Number One’s comin’ down from his vittles.” +</p> + +<p> +The crowd dissolved. We passed into the quiet of the inner bar, the Red Marine +zealously leading the way. +</p> + +<p> +“And what do you drink, Mr. Pyecroft?” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“Only water. Warm water, with a little whisky an’ sugar an’ +per’aps a lemon.” +</p> + +<p> +“Mine’s beer,” said the Marine. “It always was.” +</p> + +<p> +“Look ’ere, Glass. You take an’ go to sleep. The +picket’ll be comin’ for you in a little time, an’ +per’aps you’ll ’ave slep’ it off by then. What’s +your ship, now?” said Mr. Wessels. +</p> + +<p> +“The Ship o’ State—most important?” said the Red Marine +magnificently, and shut his eyes. +</p> + +<p> +“That’s right,” said Mr. Pyecroft. “He’s safest +where he is. An’ now—here’s santy to us all!—what +d’you want o’ me?” +</p> + +<p> +“I want to read you something.” +</p> + +<p> +“Tracts, again!” said the Marine, never opening his eyes. +“Well. I’m game…. A little more ’ead to it, miss, +please.” +</p> + +<p> +“He thinks ’e’s drinkin’—lucky beggar!” +said Mr. Pyecroft. “I’m agreeable to be read to. +’Twon’t alter my convictions. I may as well tell you beforehand +I’m a Plymouth Brother.” +</p> + +<p> +He composed his face with the air of one in the dentist’s chair, and I +began at the third page of “M. de C.” +</p> + +<p> +“‘<i>At the moment of asphyxiation, for I had hidden myself under +the boat’s cover, I heard footsteps upon the superstructure and coughed +with empress</i>’—coughed loudly, Mr. Pyecroft. ‘<i>By this +time I judged the vessel to be sufficiently far from land. A number of sailors +extricated me amid language appropriate to their national brutality. I +responded that I named myself Antonio, and that I sought to save myself from +the Portuguese conscription</i>.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Ho!” said Mr. Pyecroft, and the fashion of his countenance +changed. Then pensively: “Ther beggar! What might you have in your hand +there?” +</p> + +<p> +“It’s the story of Antonio—a stowaway in the +<i>Archimandrite’s</i> cutter. A French spy when he’s at home, I +fancy. What do <i>you</i> know about it?” +</p> + +<p> +“An’ I thought it was tracts! An’ yet some’ow I +didn’t.” Mr. Pyecroft nodded his head wonderingly. “Our old +man was quite right—so was ’Op—so was I. ’Ere, +Glass!” He kicked the Marine. “Here’s our Antonio ’as +written a impromptu book! He <i>was</i> a spy all right.” +</p> + +<p> +The Red Marine turned slightly, speaking with the awful precision of the +half-drunk. “’As ’e got any-thin’ in about my +’orrible death an’ execution? Ex<i>cuse</i> me, but if I open my +eyes, I shan’t be well. That’s where I’m different from +<i>all</i> other men. Ahem!” +</p> + +<p> +“What about Glass’s execution?” demanded Pyecroft. +</p> + +<p> +“The book’s in French,” I replied. +</p> + +<p> +“Then it’s no good to me.” +</p> + +<p> +“Precisely. Now I want you to tell your story just as it happened. +I’ll check it by this book. Take a cigar. I know about his being dragged +out of the cutter. What I want to know is what was the meaning of all the other +things, because they’re unusual.” +</p> + +<p> +“They were,” said Mr. Pyecroft with emphasis. “Lookin’ +back on it as I set here more an’ more I see what an ’ighly unusual +affair it was. But it happened. It transpired in the +<i>Archimandrite</i>—the ship you can trust… Antonio! Ther beggar!” +</p> + +<p> +“Take your time, Mr. Pyecroft.” +</p> + +<p> +In a few moments we came to it thus— +</p> + +<p> +“The old man was displeased. I don’t deny he was quite a little +displeased. With the mail-boats trottin’ into Madeira every twenty +minutes, he didn’t see why a lop-eared Portugee had to take liberties +with a man-o’-war’s first cutter. Any’ow, we couldn’t +turn ship round for him. We drew him out and took him out to Number One. +‘Drown ’im,’ ’e says. ‘Drown ’im before +’e dirties my fine new decks.’ But our owner was tenderhearted. +‘Take him to the galley,’ ’e says. ‘Boil ’im! +Skin ’im! Cook ’im! Cut ’is bloomin’ hair? Take +’is bloomin’ number! We’ll have him executed at +Ascension.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Retallick, our chief cook, an’ a Carth’lic, was the +on’y one any way near grateful; bein’ short-’anded in the +galley. He annexes the blighter by the left ear an’ right foot an’ +sets him to work peelin’ potatoes. So then, this Antonio that was +avoidin’ the conscription—” +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Sub</i>scription, you pink-eyed matlow!” said the Marine, with +the face of a stone Buddha, and whimpered sadly: “Pye don’t see any +fun in it at all.” +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Con</i>scription—come to his illegitimate sphere in Her +Majesty’s Navy, an’ it was just then that Old ’Op, our Yeoman +of Signals, an’ a fastidious joker, made remarks to me about ’is +hands. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Those ’ands,’ says ’Op, ‘properly +considered, never done a day’s honest labour in their life. Tell me those +hands belong to a blighted Portugee manual labourist and I won’t call you +a liar, but I’ll say you an’ the Admiralty are pretty much unique +in your statements.’ ’Op was always a fastidious joker—in his +language as much as anything else. He pursued ’is investigations with the +eye of an ’awk outside the galley. He knew better than to advance +line-head against Retallick, so he attacked <i>ong eshlong</i>, speakin’ +his remarks as much as possible into the breech of the starboard four point +seven, an’ ’ummin’ to ’imself. Our chief cook +’ated ’ummin’. ‘What’s the matter of your +bowels?’ he says at last, fistin’ out the mess-pork agitated like. +“‘Don’t mind me,’ says ’Op. ‘I’m only +a mildewed buntin’-tosser,’ ’e says: ‘but +speakin’ for my mess, I do hope,’ ’e says, ‘you +ain’t goin’ to boil your Portugee friend’s boots along +o’ that pork you’re smellin’ so gay!’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Boots! Boots! Boots!’ says Retallick, an’ he run +round like a earwig in a alder-stalk. ‘Boots in the galley,’ +’e says. ‘Cook’s mate, cast out an’ abolish this +cutter-cuddlin’ abori<i>gine’s</i> boots!’” +</p> + +<p> +“They was hove overboard in quick time, an’ that was what ’Op +was lyin’ to for. As subsequently transpired. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Fine Arab arch to that cutter-cuddler’s hinstep,’ he +says to me. ‘Run your eye over it, Pye,’ ’e says. +‘Nails all present an’ correct,’ ’e says. ‘Bunion +on the little toe, too,’ ’e says; ‘which comes from +wearin’ a tight boot. What do <i>you</i> think?’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Dook in trouble, per’aps,’ I says. ‘He +ain’t got the hang of spud-skinnin’.’ No more he ’ad. +’E was simply cannibalisin’ ’em. +</p> + +<p> +“‘I want to know what ’e ’as got the ’ang +of,’ says ’Op, obstructed-like. ‘Watch ’im,’ +’e says. ‘These shoulders were foreign-drilled somewhere.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘“When it comes to “Down ’ammicks!” which is our +naval way o’ goin’ to bye-bye, I took particular trouble over +Antonio, ’oo had ’is ’ammick ’ove at ’im with +general instructions to sling it an’ be sugared. In the ensuin’ +melly I pioneered him to the after-’atch, which is a orifice +communicatin’ with the after-flat an’ similar suites of apartments. +He havin’ navigated at three fifths power immejit ahead o’ me, +<i>I</i> wasn’t goin’ to volunteer any assistance, nor he +didn’t need it.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Mong Jew!’ says ’e, sniffin’ round. An’ +twice more ‘Mong Jew!’—which is pure French. Then he slings +’is ’ammick, nips in, an’ coils down. ‘Not bad for a +Portugee conscript,’ I says to myself, casts off the tow, abandons him, +and reports to ’Op. +</p> + +<p> +“About three minutes later I’m over’auled by our +sub-lootenant, navigatin’ under forced draught, with his bearin’s +’eated. ’E had the temerity to say I’d instructed our Antonio +to sling his carcass in the alleyway, an’ ’e was peevish about it. +O’ course, I prevaricated like ’ell. You get to do that in the +service. Nevertheless, to oblige Mr. Ducane, I went an’ readjusted +Antonio. You may not ’ave ascertained that there are two ways o’ +comin’ out of an ’ammick when it’s cut down. Antonio came out +t’other way—slidin’ ’andsome to his feet. That showed +me two things. First, ’e had been in an ’ammick before, an’ +next, he hadn’t been asleep. Then I reproached ’im for goin’ +to bed where ’e’d been told to go, instead o’ standin’ +by till some one gave him entirely contradictory orders. Which is the essence +o’ naval discipline. +</p> + +<p> +“In the middle o’ this argument the gunner protrudes his ram-bow +from ’is cabin, an’ brings it all to an ’urried conclusion +with some remarks suitable to ’is piebald warrant-rank. Navigatin’ +thence under easy steam, an’ leavin’ Antonio to re-sling his little +foreign self, my large flat foot comes in detonatin’ contact with a small +objec’ on the deck. Not ’altin’ for the obstacle, nor +changin’ step, I shuffles it along under the ball of the big toe to the +foot o’ the hatchway, when, lightly stoopin’, I catch it in my +right hand and continue my evolutions in rapid time till I eventuates under +’Op’s lee. +</p> + +<p> +“It was a small moroccer-bound pocket-book, full of indelible +pencil-writin’—in French, for I could plainly discern the +<i>doodeladays</i>, which is about as far as my education runs. +</p> + +<p> +“’Op fists it open and peruses. ’E’d known an +’arf-caste Frenchwoman pretty intricate before he was married; when he +was trained man in a stinkin’ gunboat up the Saigon River. He understood +a lot o’ French—domestic brands chiefly—the kind that +isn’t in print. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Pye,’ he says to me, ‘you’re a tattician +o’ no mean value. I am a trifle shady about the precise bearin’ +an’ import’ o’ this beggar’s private log here,’ +’e says, ‘but it’s evidently a case for the owner. +You’ll ’ave your share o’ the credit,’ ’e says. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Nay, nay, Pauline,’ I says, ‘You don’t catch +Emanuel Pyecroft mine-droppin’ under any post-captain’s +bows,’ I says, ‘in search of honour,’ I says. +‘I’ve been there oft.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Well, if you must, you must,’ ’e says, takin’ +me up quick. ‘But I’ll speak a good word for you, Pye.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘You’ll shut your mouth, ’Op,’ I says, ‘or +you an’ me’ll part brass-rags. The owner has his duties, an’ +I have mine. We will keep station,’ I says, ‘nor seek to +deviate.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Deviate to blazes!’ says ’Op. ‘I’m +goin’ to deviate to the owner’s comfortable cabin direct.’ So +he deviated.” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Pyecroft leaned forward and dealt the Marine a large pattern Navy kick. +“’Ere, Glass! You was sentry when ’Op went to the old +man—the first time, with Antonio’s washin’-book. Tell us what +transpired. You’re sober. You don’t know how sober you are!” +</p> + +<p> +The Marine cautiously raised his head a few inches. As Mr. Pyecroft said, he +was sober—after some R.M.L.I. fashion of his own devising. +“’Op bounds in like a startled anteloper, carryin’ ’is +signal-slate at the ready. The old man was settin’ down to ’is +bountiful platter—not like you an’ me, without anythin’ more +in sight for an ’ole night an’ ’arf a day. Talkin’ +about food—” +</p> + +<p> +“No! No! No!” cried Pyecroft, kicking again. “What about +’Op?” I thought the Marine’s ribs would have snapped, but he +merely hiccuped. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, ’im! ’E ’ad it written all down on ’is +little slate—I think—an’ ’e shoves it under the old +man’s nose. ‘Shut the door,’ says ’Op. ‘For +’Eavin’s sake shut the cabin door!’ Then the old man must +ha’ said somethin’ ’bout irons. ‘I’ll put +’em on, Sir, in your very presence,’ says ’Op, ‘only +’ear my prayer,’ or—words to that ’fect…. It was +jus’ the same with me when I called our Sergeant a bladder-bellied, +lard-’eaded, perspirin’ pension-cheater. They on’y put on the +charge-sheet ‘words to that effect.’ Spoiled the ’ole +’fect.” +</p> + +<p> +“’Op! ’Op! ’Op! What about ’Op?” thundered +Pyecroft. +</p> + +<p> +“’Op? Oh, shame thing. Words t’ that ’fect. Door shut. +Nushin’ more transphired till ’Op comes out—nose exshtreme +angle plungin’ fire or—or words ‘that effect. Proud’s +parrot. ‘Oh, you prou’ old parrot,’ I says.” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Glass seemed to slumber again. +</p> + +<p> +“Lord! How a little moisture disintegrates, don’t it? When we had +ship’s theatricals off Vigo, Glass ’ere played Dick Deadeye to the +moral, though of course the lower deck wasn’t pleased to see a +leatherneck interpretin’ a strictly maritime part, as you might say. +It’s only his repartees, which ’e can’t contain, that +conquers him. Shall I resume my narrative?” +</p> + +<p> +Another drink was brought on this hint, and Mr. Pyecroft resumed. +</p> + +<p> +“The essence o’ strategy bein’ forethought, the essence +o’ tattics is surprise. Per’aps you didn’t know that? My +forethought ’avin’ secured the initial advantage in attack, it +remained for the old man to ladle out the surprise-packets. ’Eavens! What +surprises! That night he dines with the wardroom, bein’ of the +kind—I’ve told you as we were a ’appy ship?—that likes +it, and the wardroom liked it too. This ain’t common in the service. They +had up the new Madeira—awful undisciplined stuff which gives you a +cordite mouth next morning. They told the mess-men to navigate towards the +extreme an’ remote ’orizon, an’ they abrogated the sentry +about fifteen paces out of earshot. Then they had in the Gunner, the +Bo’sun, an’ the Carpenter, an’ stood them large round drinks. +It all come out later—wardroom joints bein’ lower-deck hash, as the +sayin’ is—that our Number One stuck to it that ’e +couldn’t trust the ship for the job. The old man swore ’e could, +’avin’ commanded ’er over two years. He was right. There +wasn’t a ship, I don’t care in what fleet, could come near the +<i>Archimandrites</i> when we give our mind to a thing. We held the cruiser +big-gun records, the sailing-cutter (fancy-rig) championship, an’ the +challenge-cup row round the fleet. We ’ad the best nigger-minstrels, the +best football an’ cricket teams, an’ the best squee-jee band of +anything that ever pushed in front of a brace o’ screws. An’ +<i>yet</i> our Number One mistrusted us! ’E said we’d be a +floatin’ hell in a week, an’ it ’ud take the rest o’ +the commission to stop our way. They was arguin’ it in the wardroom when +the bridge reports a light three points off the port bow. We overtakes her, +switches on our search-light, an’ she discloses herself as a collier +o’ no mean reputation, makin’ about seven knots on ’er lawful +occasions—to the Cape most like. +</p> + +<p> +“Then the owner—so we ’eard in good time—broke the +boom, springin’ all mines together at close interval. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Look ’ere, my jokers,’ ’e says (I’m +givin’ the grist of ’is arguments, remember), ‘Number One +says we can’t enlighten this cutter-cuddlin’ Gaulish lootenant on +the manners an’ customs o’ the Navy without makin’ the ship a +market-garden. There’s a lot in that,’ ’e says, +‘specially if we kept it up lavish, till we reached Ascension. +But,’ ’e says, ‘the appearance o’ this strange sail has +put a totally new aspect on the game. We can run to just one day’s +amusement for our friend, or else what’s the good o’ discipline? +An’ then we can turn ’im over to our presumably short-’anded +fellow-subject in the small-coal line out yonder. He’ll be +pleased,’ says the old man, ‘an’ so will Antonio. +M’rover,’ he says to Number One, ‘I’ll lay you a dozen +o’ liquorice an’ ink’—it must ha’ been that new +tawny port—‘that I’ve got a ship I can trust—for one +day,’ ’e says. ‘Wherefore,’ he says, ‘will you +have the extreme goodness to reduce speed as requisite for keepin’ a +proper distance behind this providential tramp till further orders?’ Now, +that’s what I call tattics. +</p> + +<p> +“The other manœuvres developed next day, strictly in accordance with the +plans as laid down in the wardroom, where they sat long an’ steady. +’Op whispers to me that Antonio was a Number One spy when ’e was in +commission, and a French lootenant when ’e was paid off, so I navigated +at three ’undred and ninety six revolutions to the galley, never +’avin’ kicked a lootenant up to date. I may as well say that I did +not manœuvre against ’im as a Frenchman, because I like Frenchmen, but +stric’ly on ’is rank an’ ratin’ in ’is own navy. +I inquired after ’is health from Retallick. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Don’t ask me,’ ’e says, sneerin’ +be’ind his silver spectacles. ‘’E’s promoted to be +captain’s second supernumerary servant, to be dressed and addressed as +such. If ’e does ’is dooties same as he skinned the spuds, <i>I</i> +ain’t for changin’ with the old man.’ +</p> + +<p> +“In the balmy dawnin’ it was given out, all among the +’olystones, by our sub-lootenant, who was a three-way-discharge devil, +that all orders after eight bells was to be executed in inverse ration to the +cube o’ the velocity. ‘The reg’lar routine,’ he says, +‘was arrogated for reasons o’ state an’ policy, an’ any +flat-foot who presumed to exhibit surprise, annoyance, or amusement, would be +slightly but firmly reproached.’ Then the Gunner mops up a heathenish +large detail for some hanky-panky in the magazines, an’ led ’em off +along with our Gunnery Jack, which is to say, our Gunnery Lootenant. +</p> + +<p> +“That put us on the <i>viva voce</i>—particularly when we +understood how the owner was navigatin’ abroad in his sword-belt +trustin’ us like brothers. We shifts into the dress o’ the day, +an’ we musters <i>an’</i> we prays <i>ong reggle</i>, an’ we +carries on anticipatory to bafflin’ Antonio. +</p> + +<p> +“Then our Sergeant of Marines come to me wringin’ his ’ands +an’ weepin’. ’E’d been talkin’ to the +sub-lootenant, an’ it looked like as if his upper-works were +collapsin’. +</p> + +<p> +“‘I want a guarantee,’ ’e says, wringin’ +’is ’ands like this. ‘<i>I</i> ’aven’t ’ad +sunstroke slave-dhowin’ in Tajurrah Bay, an’ been compelled to live +on quinine an’ chlorodyne ever since. <i>I</i> don’t get the +horrors off glasses o’ brown sherry.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘What ’ave you got now?’ I says. +</p> + +<p> +“‘<i>I</i> ain’t an officer,’ ’e says. +‘<i>My</i> sword won’t be handed back to me at the end o’ the +court-martial on account o’ my little weaknesses, an’ no stain on +my character. I’m only a pore beggar of a Red Marine with eighteen +years’ service, an’ why for,’ says he, wringin’ +’is hands like this all the time, ‘must I chuck away my pension, +sub-lootenant or no sub-lootenant? Look at ’em,’ he says, +‘only look at ’em. Marines fallin’ in for small-arm +drill!’ +</p> + +<p> +“The leathernecks was layin’ aft at the double, an’ a more +insanitary set of accidents I never wish to behold. Most of ’em was in +their shirts. They had their trousers on, of course—rolled up nearly to +the knee, but what I mean is belts over shirts. Three or four ’ad +<i>our</i> caps, an’ them that had drawn helmets wore their chin-straps +like Portugee earrings. Oh, yes; an’ three of ’em ’ad only +one boot! I knew what our bafflin’ tattics was goin’ to be, but +even I was mildly surprised when this gay fantasia of Brazee drummers halted +under the poop, because of an ’ammick in charge of our Navigator, +an’ a small but ’ighly efficient landin’-party. +</p> + +<p> +“‘’Ard astern both screws!’ says the Navigator. +‘Room for the captain’s ’ammick!’ The captain’s +servant—Cockburn ’is name was—had one end, an’ our +newly promoted Antonio, in a blue slop rig, ’ad the other. They slung it +from the muzzle of the port poop quick-firer thort-ships to a stanchion. Then +the old man flickered up, smokin’ a cigarette, an’ brought +’is stern to an anchor slow an’ oriental. +</p> + +<p> +“‘What a blessin’ it is, Mr. Ducane,’ ’e says to +our sub-lootenant, ‘to be out o’ sight o’ the ’ole pack +o’ blighted admirals! What’s an admiral after all?’ ’e +says. ‘Why, ’e’s only a post-captain with the pip, Mr. +Ducane. The drill will now proceed. What O! Antonio, <i>descendez</i> an’ +get me a split.’ +</p> + +<p> +“When Antonio came back with the whisky-an’-soda, he was told off +to swing the ’ammick in slow time, an’ that massacritin’ +small-arm party went on with their oratorio. The Sergeant had been kindly +excused from participating an’ he was jumpin’ round on the +poop-ladder, stretchin’ ’is leather neck to see the +disgustin’ exhibition an’ cluckin’ like a ash-hoist. A lot of +us went on the fore an’ aft bridge an’ watched ’em like +‘Listen to the Band in the Park.’ All these evolutions, I may as +well tell you, are highly unusual in the Navy. After ten minutes o’ +muckin’ about, Glass ’ere—pity ’e’s so +drunk!—says that ’e’d had enough exercise for ’is +simple needs an’ he wants to go ’ome. Mr. Ducane catches him a +sanakatowzer of a smite over the ’ead with the flat of his sword. Down +comes Glass’s rifle with language to correspond, and he fiddles with the +bolt. Up jumps Maclean—’oo was a Gosport +’ighlander—an’ lands on Glass’s neck, thus +bringin’ him to the deck, fully extended. +</p> + +<p> +“The old man makes a great show o’ wakin’ up from sweet +slumbers. ‘Mistah Ducane,’ he says, ‘what is this painful +interregnum?’ or words to that effect. Ducane takes one step to the +front, an’ salutes: ‘Only ’nother case of attempted +assassination, Sir,’ he says. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Is that all?’ says the old man, while Maclean sits on +Glass’s collar button. ‘Take him away,’ ’e says, +‘he knows the penalty.’” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah! I suppose that is the ‘invincible <i>morgue</i> Britannic in +the presence of brutally provoked mutiny,’” I muttered, as I turned +over the pages of M. de C. +</p> + +<p> +“So, Glass, ’e was led off kickin’ an’ squealin’, +an’ hove down the ladder into ’is Sergeant’s volupshus arms. +’E run Glass forward, an’ was all for puttin’ ’im in +irons as a maniac. +</p> + +<p> +“‘You refill your waterjacket and cool off!’ says Glass, +sittin’ down rather winded. ‘The trouble with you is you +haven’t any imagination.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Haven’t I? I’ve got the remnants of a little poor +authority though,’ ’e says, lookin’ pretty vicious. +</p> + +<p> +“‘You ’ave?’ says Glass. ‘Then for pity’s +sake ’ave some proper feelin’ too. I’m goin’ to be shot +this evenin’. You’ll take charge o’ the +firin’-party.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Some’ow or other, that made the Sergeant froth at the mouth. +’E ’ad no more play to his intellects than a spit-kid. ’E +just took everything as it come. Well, that was about all, I think…. Unless +you’d care to have me resume my narrative.” +</p> + +<p> +We resumed on the old terms, but with rather less hot water. The marine on the +floor breathed evenly, and Mr. Pyecroft nodded. +</p> + +<p> +“I may have omitted to inform you that our Number One took a general row +round the situation while the small-arm party was at work, an’ o’ +course he supplied the outlines; but the details we coloured in by ourselves. +These were our tattics to baffle Antonio. It occurs to the Carpenter to +’ave the steam-cutter down for repairs. ’E gets ’is +cheero-party together, an’ down she comes. You’ve never seen a +steam-cutter let down on the deck, ’ave you? It’s not usual, +an’ she takes a lot o’ humourin’. Thus we ’ave the +starboard side completely blocked an’ the general traffic tricklin’ +over’ead along the fore-an’-aft bridge. Then Chips gets into her +an’ begins balin’ out a mess o’ small reckonin’s on the +deck. Simultaneous there come up three o’ those dirty engine-room objects +which we call ‘tiffies,’ an’ a stoker or two with orders to +repair her steamin’-gadgets. <i>They</i> get into her an’ bale out +another young Christmas-treeful of small reckonin’s—brass mostly. +Simultaneous it hits the Pusser that ’e’d better serve out mess +pork for the poor matlow. These things half shifted Retallick, our chief cook, +off ’is bed-plate. Yes, you might say they broke ’im wide open. +’E wasn’t at all used to ’em. +</p> + +<p> +“Number One tells off five or six prime, able-bodied seamen-gunners to +the pork barrels. You never see pork fisted out of its receptacle, ’ave +you? Simultaneous, it hits the Gunner that now’s the day an’ +now’s the hour for a non-continuous class in Maxim instruction. So they +all give way together, and the general effect was <i>non plus ultra</i>. There +was the cutter’s innards spread out like a Fratton pawnbroker’s +shop; there was the ‘tiffies’ hammerin’ in the stern of +’er, an’ <i>they</i> ain’t antiseptic; there was the Maxim +class in light skirmishin’ order among the pork, an’ forrard the +blacksmith had ’is forge in full blast, makin’ ’orse-shoes, I +suppose. Well, that accounts for the starboard side. The on’y warrant +officer ’oo hadn’t a look in so far was the Bosun. So ’e +stated, all out of ’is own ’ead, that Chips’s reserve +o’ wood an’ timber, which Chips ’ad stole at our last refit, +needed restowin’. It was on the port booms—a young an’ +healthy forest of it, for Charley Peace wasn’t to be named +’longside o’ Chips for burglary. +</p> + +<p> +“‘All right,’ says our Number One. ‘You can ’ave +the whole port watch if you like. Hell’s Hell,’ ’e says, +’an when there study to improve.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Jarvis was our Bosun’s name. He hunted up the ’ole of the +port watch by hand, as you might say, callin’ ’em by name loud +an’ lovin’, which is not precisely Navy makee-pigeon. They +‘ad that timber-loft off the booms, an’ they dragged it up and down +like so many sweatin’ little beavers. But Jarvis was jealous o’ +Chips an’ went round the starboard side to envy at him. +</p> + +<p> +“’Tain’t enough,’ ’e says, when he had climbed +back. ‘Chips ’as got his bazaar lookin’ like a coal-hulk in a +cyclone. We must adop’ more drastic measures.’ Off ’e goes to +Number One and communicates with ’im. Number One got the old man’s +leave, on account of our goin’ so slow (we were keepin’ +be’ind the tramp), to fit the ship with a full set of patent +supernumerary sails. Four trysails—yes, you might call ’em +trysails—was our Admiralty allowance in the un’eard of event of a +cruiser breakin’ down, but we had our awnin’s as well. They was all +extricated from the various flats an’ ’oles where they was stored, +an’ at the end o’ two hours’ hard work Number One ’e +made out eleven sails o’ different sorts and sizes. I don’t know +what exact nature of sail you’d call +’em—pyjama-stun’sles with a touch of Sarah’s shimmy, +per’aps—but the riggin’ of ’em an’ all the +supernumerary details, as you might say, bein’ carried on through +an’ over an’ between the cutter an’ the forge an’ the +pork an’ cleanin’ guns, an’ the Maxim class an’ the +Bosun’s calaboose <i>and</i> the paintwork, was sublime. There’s no +other word for it. Sub-lime! +</p> + +<p> +“The old man keeps swimmin’ up an’ down through it all with +the faithful Antonio at ’is side, fetchin’ him numerous splits. +’E had eight that mornin’, an’ when Antonio was detached to +get ’is spy-glass, or his gloves, or his lily-white ’andkerchief, +the old man would waste ’em down a ventilator. Antonio must ha’ +learned a lot about our Navy thirst.” +</p> + +<p> +“He did.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah! Would you kindly mind turnin’ to the precise page indicated +an’ givin’ me a <i>résumé</i> of ’is tattics?” said Mr. +Pyecroft, drinking deeply. “I’d like to know ’ow it looked +from ’is side o’ the deck.” +</p> + +<p> +“How will this do?” I said. “‘<i>Once clear of the +land, like Voltaire’s Habakkuk</i>———”’ +</p> + +<p> +“One o’ their new commerce-destroyers, I suppose,” Mr. +Pyecroft interjected. +</p> + +<p> +“‘—<i>each man seemed veritably capable of all—to do +according to his will. The boats, dismantled and forlorn, are lowered upon the +planking. One cries “Aid me!” flourishing at the same time the +weapons of his business. A dozen launch themselves upon him in the orgasm of +zeal misdirected. He beats them off with the howlings of dogs. He has lost a +hammer. This ferocious outcry signifies that only. Eight men seek the utensil, +colliding on the way with some many others which, seated in the stern of the +boat, tear up and scatter upon the planking the ironwork which impedes their +brutal efforts. Elsewhere, one detaches from on high wood, canvas, iron bolts, +coal-dust—what do I know</i>?’” +</p> + +<p> +“That’s where ’e’s comin’ the bloomin’ +<i>onjenew</i>. ’E knows a lot, reely.” +</p> + +<p> +“‘<i>They descend thundering upon the planking, and the spectacle +cannot reproduce itself. In my capacity of valet to the captain, whom I have +well and beautifully plied with drink since the rising of the sun (behold me +also, Ganymede!) I pass throughout observing, it may be not a little. They ask +orders. There is none to give them. One sits upon the edge of the vessel and +chants interminably the lugubrious “Roule Britannia”—to +endure how lomg</i>?’” +</p> + +<p> +“That was me! On’y ’twas ‘A Life on the Ocean +Wave’—which I hate more than any stinkin’ tune I know, +havin’ dragged too many nasty little guns to it. Yes, Number One told me +off to that for ten minutes; an’ I ain’t musical, you might +say.” +</p> + +<p> +“<i>‘Then come marines, half-dressed, seeking vainly through this +“tohu-bohu</i>”’ (that’s one of his names for the +<i>Archimandrite</i>, Mr. Pyecroft), ‘<i>for a place whence they shall +not be dislodged. The captain, heavy with drink, rolls himself from his +hammock. He would have his people fire the Maxims. They demand which Maxim. +That to him is equal. The breech-lock indispensable is not there. They demand +it of one who opens a barrel of pork, for this Navy feeds at all hours. He +refers them to the cook, yesterday my master</i>—’” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, an’ Retallick nearly had a fit. What a truthful an’ +observin’ little Antonio we ’ave!” +</p> + +<p> +“‘<i>It is discovered in the hands of a boy who says, and they do +not rebuke him, that he has found it by hazard</i>.’ I’m afraid I +haven’t translated quite correctly, Mr. Pyecroft, but I’ve done my +best.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why, it’s beautiful—you ought to be a Frenchman—you +ought. You don’t want anything o’ <i>me</i>. You’ve got it +all there.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, but I like your side of it. For instance. Here’s a little +thing I can’t quite see the end of. Listen! ‘<i>Of the domain which +Britannia rules by sufferance, my gross captain, knew nothing, and his +Navigator, if possible, less. From the bestial recriminations and the +indeterminate chaos of the grand deck, I ascended—always with a +whisky-and-soda in my hands—to a scene truly grotesque. Behold my captain +in plain sea, at issue with his Navigator! A crisis of nerves due to the +enormous quantity of alcohol which he had swallowed up to then, has filled for +him the ocean with dangers, imaginary and fantastic. Incapable of judgment, +menaced by the phantasms of his brain inflamed, he envisages islands perhaps of +the Hesperides beneath his keel—vigias innumerable.’</i> I +don’t know what a vigia is, Mr. Pyecroft. <i>‘He creates shoals sad +and far-reaching of the mid-Atlantic!’</i> What was that, now?” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, I see! That come after dinner, when our Navigator threw ’is +cap down an’ danced on it. Danby was quartermaster. They ’ad a +tea-party on the bridge. It was the old man’s contribution. Does he say +anything about the leadsmen?” +</p> + +<p> +“Is this it? <i>‘Overborne by his superior’s causeless +suspicion, the Navigator took off the badges of his rank and cast them at the +feet of my captain and sobbed. A disgusting and maudlin reconciliation +followed. The argument renewed itself, each grasping the wheel, +crapulous’</i> (that means drunk, I think, Mr. Pyecroft), +<i>‘shouting. It appeared that my captain would chenaler’</i> (I +don’t know what that means, Mr. Pyecroft) <i>‘to the Cape. At the +end, he placed a sailor with the sound’</i> (that’s the lead, I +think) <i>‘in his hand, garnished with suet.’</i> Was it garnished +with suet?” +</p> + +<p> +“He put two leadsmen in the chains, o’ course! He didn’t know +that there mightn’t be shoals there, ’e said. Morgan went an’ +armed his lead, to enter into the spirit o’ the thing. They ’eaved +it for twenty minutes, but there wasn’t any suet—only tallow, +o’ course.” +</p> + +<p> +“‘<i>Garnished with suet at two thousand metres of profundity. +Decidedly the Britannic Navy is well guarded</i>.’ Well, that’s all +right, Mr. Pyecroft. Would you mind telling me anything else of interest that +happened?” +</p> + +<p> +“There was a good deal, one way an’ another. I’d like to know +what this Antonio thought of our sails.” +</p> + +<p> +“He merely says that ‘<i>the engines having broken down, an officer +extemporised a mournful and useless parody of sails</i>.’ Oh, yes! he +says that some of them looked like ‘<i>bonnets in a +needlecase</i>,’ I think.” +</p> + +<p> +“Bonnets in a needlecase! They were stun’sles. That shows the +beggar’s no sailor. That trick was really the one thing we did. Pho! I +thought he was a sailorman, an’ ’e hasn’t sense enough to see +what extemporisin’ eleven good an’ drawin’ sails out o’ +four trys’les an’ a few awnin’s means. ’E must have +been drunk!” +</p> + +<p> +“Never mind, Mr. Pyecroft. I want to hear about your target-practice, and +the execution.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh! We had a special target-practice that afternoon all for Antonio. As +I told my crew—me bein’ captain of the port-bow quick-firer, though +I’m a torpedo man now—it just showed how you can work your gun +under any discomforts. A shell—twenty six-inch +shells—burstin’ inboard couldn’t ’ave begun to make the +varicose collection o’ tit-bits which we had spilled on our deck. It was +a lather—a rich, creamy lather! +</p> + +<p> +“We took it very easy—that gun-practice. We did it in a +complimentary ‘Jenny-’ave-another-cup-o’ tea’ style, +an’ the crew was strictly ordered not to rupture ’emselves with +unnecessary exertion. This isn’t our custom in the Navy when we’re +<i>in puris naturalibus</i>, as you might say. But we wasn’t so then. We +was impromptu. An’ Antonio was busy fetchin’ splits for the old +man, and the old man was wastin’ ’em down the ventilators. There +must ’ave been four inches in the bilges, I should think—wardroom +whisky-an’-soda. +</p> + +<p> +“Then I thought I might as well bear a hand as look pretty. So I let my +<i>bundoop</i> go at fifteen ’undred—sightin’ very +particular. There was a sort of ’appy little belch like—no more, I +give you my word—an’ the shell trundled out maybe fifty feet +an’ dropped into the deep Atlantic. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Government powder, Sir!’ sings out our Gunnery Jack to the +bridge, laughin’ horrid sarcastic; an’ then, of course, we all +laughs, which we are not encouraged to do <i>in puris naturalibus</i>. Then, of +course, I saw what our Gunnery Jack ’ad been after with his subcutaneous +details in the magazines all the mornin’ watch. He had redooced the +charges to a minimum, as you might say. But it made me feel a trifle faint +an’ sickish notwithstanding this spit-in-the-eye business. Every time +such transpired, our Gunnery Lootenant would say somethin’ sarcastic +about Government stores, an’ the old man fair howled. ’Op was on +the bridge with ’im, an’ ’e told me—’cause +’e’s a free-knowledgeist an’ reads character—that +Antonio’s face was sweatin’ with pure joy. ’Op wanted to kick +him. Does Antonio say anything about that?” +</p> + +<p> +“Not about the kicking, but he is great on the gun-practice, Mr. +Pyecroft. He has put all the results into a sort of appendix—a table of +shots. He says that the figures will speak more eloquently than words.” +</p> + +<p> +“What? Nothin’ about the way the crews flinched an’ hopped? +Nothin’ about the little shells rumblin’ out o’ the guns so +casual?” +</p> + +<p> +“There are a few pages of notes, but they only bear out what you say. He +says that these things always happen as soon as one of our ships is out of +sight of land. Oh, yes! I’ve forgotten. He says, <i>‘From the +conversation of my captain with his inferiors I gathered that no small +proportion of the expense of these nominally efficient cartridges finds itself +in his pockets. So much, indeed, was signified by an officer on the deck below, +who cried in a high voice: “I hope, Sir, you are making something out of +it. It is rather monotonous.” This insult, so flagrant, albeit +well-merited, was received with a smile of drunken +bonhommy’</i>—that’s cheerfulness, Mr. Pyecroft. Your glass +is empty.” +</p> + +<p> +“Resumin’ afresh,” said Mr. Pyecroft, after a well-watered +interval, “I may as well say that the target-practice occupied us two +hours, and then we had to dig out after the tramp. Then we half an’ +three-quarters cleaned up the decks an’ mucked about as requisite, +haulin’ down the patent awnin’ stun’sles which Number One +’ad made. The old man was a shade doubtful of his course, ’cause I +’eard him say to Number One, ‘You were right. A week o’ this +would turn the ship into a Hayti bean-feast. But,’ he says pathetic, +‘haven’t they backed the band noble?’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Oh! it’s a picnic for them,’ says Number One. +</p> + +<p> +“‘But when do we get rid o’ this whisky-peddlin’ +blighter o’ yours, Sir?’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘That’s a cheerful way to speak of a Viscount,’ says +the old man. “E’s the bluest blood o’ France when he’s +at home,’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Which is the precise landfall I wish ’im to make,’ +says Number One.’ It’ll take all ’ands and the Captain of the +Head to clean up after ’im.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘They won’t grudge it,’ says the old man. ‘Just +as soon as it’s dusk we’ll overhaul our tramp friend an’ waft +him over.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Then a sno—midshipman—Moorshed was is name—come up +an’ says somethin’ in a low voice. It fetches the old man. +</p> + +<p> +“‘You’ll oblige me,’ ’e says, ‘by +takin’ the wardroom poultry for <i>that</i>. I’ve ear-marked every +fowl we’ve shipped at Madeira, so there can’t be any possible +mistake. M’rover,’ ’e says, ‘tell ’em if they +spill one drop of blood on the deck,’ he says, ‘they’ll not +be extenuated, but hung.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Mr. Moorshed goes forward, lookin’ unusual ’appy, even for +him. The Marines was enjoyin’ a committee-meetin’ in their own +flat. +</p> + +<p> +“After that, it fell dark, with just a little streaky, oily light on the +sea—an’ anythin’ more chronic than the <i>Archimandrite</i> +I’d trouble you to behold. She looked like a fancy bazaar and a +auction-room—yes, she almost looked like a passenger-steamer. We’d +picked up our tramp, an’ was about four mile be’ind ’er. I +noticed the wardroom as a class, you might say, was manoeuvrin’ <i>en +masse</i>, an’ then come the order to cockbill the yards. We hadn’t +any yards except a couple o’ signallin’ sticks, but we cock-billed +’em. I hadn’t seen that sight, not since thirteen years in the West +Indies, when a post-captain died o’ yellow jack. It means a sign o’ +mourning the yards bein’ canted opposite ways, to look drunk an’ +disorderly. They do. +</p> + +<p> +“‘An’ what might our last giddy-go-round signify?’ I +asks of ’Op. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Good ’Evins!’ ’e says, ‘Are you in the +habit o’ permittin’ leathernecks to assassinate lootenants every +morning at drill without immejitly ’avin’ ’em shot on the +foc’sle in the horrid crawly-crawly twilight?’” +</p> + +<p> +“‘Yes,’ I murmured over my dear book, ‘<i>the +infinitely lugubrious crepuscule. A spectacle of barbarity +unparalleled—hideous—cold-blooded, and yet touched with appalling +grandeur</i>.’” +</p> + +<p> +“Ho! Was that the way Antonio looked at it? That shows he ’ad +feelin’s. To resoom. Without anyone givin’ us orders to that +effect, we began to creep about an’ whisper. Things got stiller and +stiller, till they was as still as—mushrooms! Then the bugler let off the +‘Dead March’ from the upper bridge. He done it to cover the remarks +of a cock-bird bein’ killed forrard, but it came out paralysin’ in +its <i>tout ensemble</i>. You never heard the ‘Dead March’ on a +bugle? Then the pipes went twitterin’ for both watches to attend public +execution, an’ we came up like so many ghosts, the ’ole +ship’s company. Why, Mucky ’Arcourt, one o’ our boys, was +that took in he give tongue like a beagle-pup, an’ was properly kicked +down the ladder for so doin’. Well, there we lay—engines stopped, +rollin’ to the swell, all dark, yards cock-billed, an’ that merry +tune yowlin’ from the upper bridge. We fell in on the foc’sle, +leavin’ a large open space by the capstan, where our sail-maker was +sittin’ sewin’ broken firebars into the foot of an old +’ammick. ’E looked like a corpse, an’ Mucky had another fit +o’ hysterics, an’ you could ’ear us breathin’ +’ard. It beat anythin’ in the theatrical line that even us +<i>Archimandrites</i> had done—an’ we was the ship you could trust. +Then come the doctor an’ lit a red lamp which he used for his +photographic muckin’s, an’ chocked it on the capstan. That was +finally gashly! +</p> + +<p> +“Then come twelve Marines guardin’ Glass ’ere. You +wouldn’t think to see ’im what a gratooitous an’ +aboundin’ terror he was that evenin’. ’E was in a white shirt +’e’d stole from Cockburn, an’ his regulation trousers, +barefooted. ’E’d pipe-clayed ’is ’ands an’ face +an’ feet an’ as much of his chest as the openin’ of his shirt +showed. ’E marched under escort with a firm an’ undeviatin’ +step to the capstan, an’ came to attention. The old man reinforced by an +extra strong split—his seventeenth, an’ ’e didn’t throw +<i>that</i> down the ventilator—come up on the bridge an’ stood +like a image. ’Op, ’oo was with ’im, says that ’e heard +Antonio’s teeth singin’, not chatterin’—singin’ +like funnel-stays in a typhoon. Yes, a moanin’ æolian harp, ’Op +said. +</p> + +<p> +“‘When you are ready, Sir, drop your ’andkerchief,’ +Number One whispers. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Good Lord!’ says the old man, with a jump. ‘Eh! What? +What a sight! What a sight!’ an’ he stood drinkin’ it in, I +suppose, for quite two minutes. +</p> + +<p> +“Glass never says a word. ’E shoved aside an ’andkerchief +which the sub-lootenant proffered ’im to bind ’is eyes +with—quiet an’ collected; an’ if we ’adn’t been +feelin’ so very much as we did feel, his gestures would ’ave +brought down the ’ouse.” +</p> + +<p> +“I can’t open my eyes, or I’ll be sick,” said the +Marine with appalling clearness. “I’m pretty far gone—I know +it—but there wasn’t anyone could ’ave beaten Edwardo Glass, +R.M.L.I., that time. Why, I scared myself nearly into the ’orrors. Go on, +Pye. Glass is in support—as ever.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then the old man drops ’is ’andkerchief, an’ the +firin’-party fires like one man. Glass drops forward, twitchin’ +an’ ’eavin’ horrid natural, into the shotted ’ammick +all spread out before him, and the firin’ party closes in to guard the +remains of the deceased while Sails is stitchin’ it up. An’ when +they lifted that ’ammick it was one wringin’ mess of blood! They +on’y expended one wardroom cock-bird, too. Did you know poultry bled that +extravagant? <i>I</i> never did. +</p> + +<p> +“The old man—so ’Op told me—stayed on the bridge, +brought up on a dead centre. Number One was similarly, though lesser, +impressed, but o’ course ’is duty was to think of ’is fine +white decks an’ the blood. ’Arf a mo’, Sir,’ he says, +when the old man was for leavin’. ‘We have to wait for the burial, +which I am informed takes place immejit.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘It’s beyond me,’ says the owner. ‘There was +general instructions for an execution, but I never knew I had such a dependable +push of mountebanks aboard,’ he says. ‘I’m all cold up my +back, still.’ +</p> + +<p> +“The Marines carried the corpse below. Then the bugle give us some more +‘Dead March,’ Then we ’eard a splash from a bow six-pounder +port, an’ the bugle struck up a cheerful tune. The whole lower deck was +complimentin’ Glass, ’oo took it very meek. ’E <i>is</i> a +good actor, for all ’e’s a leatherneck. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Now,’ said the old man, ‘we must turn over Antonio. +He’s in what I have ’eard called one perspirin’ funk.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Of course, I’m tellin’ it slow, but it all ’appened +much quicker. We run down our trampo—without o’ course +informin’ Antonio of ’is ’appy destiny—an’ +inquired of ’er if she had any use for a free and gratis stowaway. Oh, +yes? she said she’d be highly grateful, but she seemed a shade puzzled at +our generosity, as you might put it, an’ we lay by till she lowered a +boat. Then Antonio—who was un’appy, distinctly +un’appy—was politely requested to navigate elsewhere, which I +don’t think he looked for. ’Op was deputed to convey the +information, an’ ’Op got in one sixteen-inch kick which +’oisted ’im all up the ladder. ’Op ain’t really +vindictive, an’ ’e’s fond of the French, especially the +women, but his chances o’ kicking lootenants was like the +cartridge—reduced to a minimum. +</p> + +<p> +“The boat ’adn’t more than shoved off before a change, as you +might say, came o’er the spirit of our dream. The old man says, like +Elphinstone an’ Bruce in the Portsmouth election when I was a boy: +‘Gentlemen,’ he says, ‘for gentlemen you have shown +yourselves to be—from the bottom of my heart I thank you. The status +an’ position of our late lamented shipmate made it obligato,’ +’e says, ‘to take certain steps not strictly included in the +regulations. An’ nobly,’ says ’e, ‘have you assisted +me. Now,’ ’e says, ‘you hold the false and felonious +reputation of bein’ the smartest ship in the Service. Pigsties,’ +’e says, ‘is plane trigonometry alongside our present +disgustin’ state. Efface the effects of this indecent orgy,’ he +says. ‘Jump, you lop-eared, flat-footed, butter-backed Amalekites! Dig +out, you briny-eyed beggars!’” +</p> + +<p> +“Do captains talk like that in the Navy, Mr. Pyecroft?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve told you once I only give the grist of his arguments. The +Bosun’s mate translates it to the lower deck, as you may put it, and the +lower deck springs smartly to attention. It took us half the night ’fore +we got ’er anyway ship-shape; but by sunrise she was beautiful as ever, +and we resoomed. I’ve thought it over a lot since; yes, an’ +I’ve thought a lot of Antonio trimmin’ coal in that tramp’s +bunkers. ’E must ’ave been highly surprised. Wasn’t +he?” +</p> + +<p> +“He was, Mr. Pyecroft,” I responded. “But now we’re +talking of it, weren’t you all a little surprised?” +</p> + +<p> +“It come as a pleasant relief to the regular routine,” said Mr. +Pyecroft. “We appreciated it as an easy way o’ workin’ for +your country. But—the old man was right—a week o’ similar +manœuvres would ’ave knocked our moral double-bottoms bung out. Now, +couldn’t you oblige with Antonio’s account of Glass’s +execution?” +</p> + +<p> +I obliged for nearly ten minutes. It was at best but a feeble rendering of M. +de C.’s magnificent prose, through which the soul of the poet, the eye of +the mariner, and the heart of the patriot bore magnificent accord. His account +of his descent from the side of the “<i>infamous vessel consecrated to +blood</i>” in the “<i>vast and gathering dusk of the trembling +ocean</i>” could only be matched by his description of the dishonoured +hammock sinking unnoticed through the depths, while, above, the bugler played +music “<i>of an indefinable brutality</i>” +</p> + +<p> +“By the way, what did the bugler play after Glass’s funeral?” +I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Him? Oh! ’e played ‘The Strict Q.T.’ It’s a very +old song. We ’ad it in Fratton nearly fifteen years back,” said Mr. +Pyecroft sleepily. +</p> + +<p> +I stirred the sugar dregs in my glass. Suddenly entered armed men, wet and +discourteous, Tom Wessels smiling nervously in the background. +</p> + +<p> +“Where is that—minutely particularised person—Glass?” +said the sergeant of the picket. +</p> + +<p> +“’Ere!” The marine rose to the strictest of attentions. +“An’ it’s no good smelling of my breath, because I’m +strictly an’ ruinously sober.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh! An’ what may you have been doin’ with yourself?” +</p> + +<p> +“Listenin’ to tracts. You can look! I’ve had the +evenin’ of my little life. Lead on to the <i>Cornucopia’s</i> +midmost dunjing cell. There’s a crowd of brass-’atted blighters +there which will say I’ve been absent without leaf. Never mind. I forgive +them before’and. <i>The</i> evenin’ of my life, an’ please +don’t forget it.” Then in a tone of most ingratiating apology to +me: “I soaked it all in be’ind my shut eyes. +‘I’m”—he jerked a contemptuous thumb towards Mr. +Pyecroft—“’e’s a flatfoot, a indigo-blue matlow. +’E never saw the fun from first to last. A mournful beggar—most +depressin’.” Private Glass departed, leaning heavily on the +escort’s arm. +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Pyecroft wrinkled his brows in thought—the profound and far-reaching +meditation that follows five glasses of hot whisky-and-water. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I don’t see anything comical—greatly—except here +an’ there. Specially about those redooced charges in the guns. Do +<i>you</i> see anything funny in it?” +</p> + +<p> +There was that in his eye which warned me the night was too wet for argument. +</p> + +<p> +“No, Mr. Pyecroft, I don’t,” I replied. “It was a +beautiful tale, and I thank you very much.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap06"></a>A SAHIBS’ WAR</h2> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap05"></a>THE RUNNERS</h2> + +<p> + <i>News!</i><br/> + What is the word that they tell now—now—now!<br/> + The little drums beating in the bazaars?<br/> + <i>They</i> beat (among the buyers and sellers)<br/> + <i>“Nimrud—ah Nimrud!<br/> + God sends a gnat against Nimrud</i>!”<br/> + Watchers, O Watchers a thousand! +</p> + +<p> + <i>News!</i><br/> + At the edge of the crops—now—now—where the well-wheels are +halted,<br/> + One prepares to loose the bullocks and one scrapes his hoe,<br/> + <i>They</i> beat (among the sowers and the reapers)<br/> + <i>“Nimrud—ah Nimrud!<br/> + God prepares an ill day for Nimrud</i>!”<br/> + Watchers, O Watchers ten thousand. +</p> + +<p> + <i>News!</i><br/> + By the fires of the camps—now—now—where the travellers +meet<br/> + Where the camels come in and the horses: their men conferring,<br/> + <i>They</i> beat (among the packmen and the drivers)<br/> + <i>“Nimrud—ah Nimrud!<br/> + Thus it befell last noon to Nimrud</i>!”<br/> + Watchers, O Watchers an hundred thousand! +</p> + +<p> + <i>News!</i><br/> + Under the shadow of the border-peels—now—now—now!<br/> + In the rocks of the passes where the expectant shoe their horses,<br/> + <i>They</i> beat (among the rifles and the riders)<br/> + <i>“Nimrud—ah Nimrud!<br/> + Shall we go up against Nimrud</i>?”<br/> + Watchers, O Watchers a thousand thousand? +</p> + +<p> + <i>News!</i><br/> + Bring out the heaps of grain—open the account-books again!<br/> + Drive forward the well-bullocks against the taxable harvest!<br/> + Eat and lie under the trees—pitch the police-guarded fair-grounds,<br/> + O dancers!<br/> + Hide away the rifles and let down the ladders from the watch-towers!<br/> + <i>They</i> beat (among all the peoples)<br/> + <i>“Now—now—now!<br/> + God has reserved the Sword for Nimrud!<br/> + God has given Victory to Nimrud!”<br/> + Let us abide under Nimrud</i>!”<br/> + O Well-disposed and Heedful, an hundred thousand thousand! +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2>A SAHIBS’ WAR</h2> + +<p> +Pass? Pass? Pass? I have one pass already, allowing me to go by the <i>rêl</i> +from Kroonstadt to Eshtellenbosch, where the horses are, where I am to be paid +off, and whence I return to India. I am a—trooper of the Gurgaon Rissala +(cavalry regiment), the One Hundred and Forty-first Punjab Cavalry, Do not herd +me with these black Kaffirs. I am a Sikh—a trooper of the State. The +Lieutenant-Sahib does not understand my talk? Is there <i>any</i> Sahib on the +train who will interpret for a trooper of the Gurgaon Rissala going about his +business in this devil’s devising of a country, where there is no flour, +no oil, no spice, no red pepper, and no respect paid to a Sikh? Is there no +help?… God be thanked, here is such a Sahib! Protector of the Poor! +Heaven-born! Tell the young Lieutenant-Sahib that my name is Umr Singh; I +am—I was servant to Kurban Sahib, now dead; and I have a pass to go to +Eshtellenbosch, where the horses are. Do not let him herd me with these black +Kaffirs!… Yes, I will sit by this truck till the Heaven-born has explained the +matter to the young Lieutenant-Sahib who does not understand our tongue. +</p> + +<hr /> + +<p> +What orders? The young Lieutenant-Sahib will not detain me? Good! I go down to +Eshtellenbosch by the next <i>terain</i>? Good! I go with the Heaven-born? +Good! Then for this day I am the Heaven-born’s servant. Will the +Heaven-born bring the honour of his presence to a seat? Here is an empty truck; +I will spread my blanket over one corner thus—for the sun is hot, though +not so hot as our Punjab in May. I will prop it up thus, and I will arrange +this hay thus, so the Presence can sit at ease till God sends us a +<i>terain</i> for Eshtellenbosch…. +</p> + +<p> +The Presence knows the Punjab? Lahore? Amritzar? Attaree, belike? My village is +north over the fields three miles from Attaree, near the big white house which +was copied from a certain place of the Great Queen’s by—by—I +have forgotten the name. Can the Presence recall it? Sirdar Dyal Singh +Attareewalla! Yes, that is the very man; but how does the Presence know? Born +and bred in Hind, was he? O-o-oh! This is quite a different matter. The +Sahib’s nurse was a Surtee woman from the Bombay side? That was a pity. +She should have been an up-country wench; for those make stout nurses. There is +no land like the Punjab. There are no people like the Sikhs. Umr Singh is my +name, yes. An old man? Yes. A trooper only after all these years? Ye-es. Look +at my uniform, if the Sahib doubts. Nay—nay; the Sahib looks too closely. +All marks of rank were picked off it long ago, but—but it is +true—mine is not a common cloth such as troopers use for their coats, +and—the Sahib has sharp eyes—that black mark is such a mark as a +silver chain leaves when long worn on the breast. The Sahib says that troopers +do not wear silver chains? No-o. Troopers do not wear the Arder of Beritish +India? No. The Sahib should have been in the Police of the Punjab. I am not a +trooper, but I have been a Sahib’s servant for nearly a +year—bearer, butler, sweeper, any and all three. The Sahib says that +Sikhs do not take menial service? True; but it was for Kurban Sahib—my +Kurban Sahib—dead these three months! +</p> + +<hr /> + +<p> +Young—of a reddish face—with blue eyes, and he lilted a little on +his feet when he was pleased, and cracked his finger-joints. So did his father +before him, who was Deputy-Commissioner of Jullundur in my father’s time +when I rode with the Gurgaon Rissala. <i>My</i> father? Jwala Singh. A Sikh of +Sikhs—he fought against the English at Sobraon and carried the mark to +his death. So we were knit as it were by a blood-tie, I and my Kurban Sahib. +Yes, I was a trooper first—nay, I had risen to a Lance-Duffadar, I +remember—and my father gave me a dun stallion of his own breeding on that +day; and <i>he</i> was a little baba, sitting upon a wall by the parade-ground +with his ayah—all in white, Sahib—laughing at the end of our drill. +And his father and mine talked together, and mine beckoned to me, and I +dismounted, and the baba put his hand into +mine—eighteen—twenty-five—twenty-seven years gone +now—Kurban Sahib—my Kurban Sahib! Oh, we were great friends after +that! He cut his teeth on my sword-hilt, as the saying is. He called me Big Umr +Singh—Buwwa Umwa Singh, for he could not speak plain. He stood only this +high, Sahib, from the bottom of this truck, but he knew all our troopers by +name—every one…. And he went to England, and he became a young man, and +back he came, lilting a little in his walk, and cracking his +finger-joints—back to his own regiment and to me. He had not forgotten +either our speech or our customs. He was a Sikh at heart, Sahib. He was rich, +open-handed, just, a friend of poor troopers, keen-eyed, jestful, and careless. +<i>I</i> could tell tales about him in his first years. There was very little +he hid from <i>me</i>. I was his Umr Singh, and when we were alone he called me +Father, and I called him Son. Yes, that was how we spoke. We spoke freely +together on everything—about war, and women, and money, and advancement, +and such all. +</p> + +<p> +We spoke about this war, too, long before it came. There were many box-wallas, +pedlars, with Pathans a few, in this country, notably at the city of Yunasbagh +(Johannesburg), and they sent news in every week how the Sahibs lay without +weapons under the heel of the Boer-log; and how big guns were hauled up and +down the streets to keep Sahibs in order; and how a Sahib called Eger Sahib +(Edgar?) was killed for a jest by the Boer-log. The Sahib knows how we of Hind +hear all that passes over the earth? There was not a gun cocked in Yunasbagh +that the echo did not come into Hind in a month. The Sahibs are very clever, +but they forget their own cleverness has created the <i>dak</i> (the post), and +that for an anna or two all things become known. We of Hind listened and heard +and wondered; and when it was a sure thing, as reported by the pedlars and the +vegetable-sellers, that the Sahibs of Yunasbagh lay in bondage to the Boer-log, +certain among us asked questions and waited for signs. Others of us mistook the +meaning of those signs. <i>Wherefore, Sahib, came the long war in the +Tirah</i>! This Kurban Sahib knew, and we talked together. He said, +“There is no haste. Presently we shall fight, and we shall fight for all +Hind in that country round Yunasbagh. Here he spoke truth. Does the Sahib not +agree? Quite so. It is for Hind that the Sahibs are fighting this war. Ye +cannot in one place rule and in another bear service. Either ye must everywhere +rule or everywhere obey. God does not make the nations ringstraked. +True—true—true!” +</p> + +<p> +So did matters ripen—a step at a time. It was nothing to me, except I +think—and the Sahib sees this, too?—that it is foolish to make an +army and break their hearts in idleness. Why have they not sent for men of the +Tochi—the men of the Tirah—the men of Buner? Folly, a thousand +times. <i>We</i> could have done it all so gently—so gently. +</p> + +<p> +Then, upon a day, Kurban Sahib sent for me and said, “Ho, Dada, I am +sick, and the doctor gives me a certificate for many months.” And he +winked, and I said, “I will get leave and nurse thee, Child. Shall I +bring my uniform?” He said, “Yes, and a sword for a sick man to +lean on. We go to Bombay, and thence by sea to the country of the +Hubshis” (niggers). Mark his cleverness! He was first of all our men +among the native regiments to get leave for sickness and to come here. Now they +will not let our officers go away, sick or well, except they sign a bond not to +take part in this war-game upon the road. But <i>he</i> was clever. There was +no whisper of war when he took his sick-leave. I came also? Assuredly. I went +to my Colonel, and sitting in the chair (I am—I was—of that rank +for which a chair is placed when we speak with the Colonel) I said, “My +child goes sick. Give me leave, for I am old and sick also.” +</p> + +<p> +And the Colonel, making the word double between English and our tongue, said, +“Yes, thou art truly <i>Sikh</i>”; and he called me an old +devil—jestingly, as one soldier may jest with another; and he said my +Kurban Sahib was a liar as to his health (that was true, too), and at long last +he stood up and shook my hand, and bade me go and bring my Sahib safe again. My +Sahib back again—aie me! +</p> + +<p> +So I went to Bombay with Kurban Sahib, but there, at sight of the Black Water, +Wajib Ali, his bearer checked, and said that his mother was dead. Then I said +to Kurban Sahib, “What is one Mussulman pig more or less? Give me the +keys of the trunks, and I will lay out the white shirts for dinner.” Then +I beat Wajib Ali at the back of Watson’s Hotel, and that night I prepared +Kurban Sahib’s razors. I say, Sahib, that I, a Sikh of the Khalsa, an +unshorn man, prepared the razors. But I did not put on my uniform while I did +it. On the other hand, Kurban Sahib took for me, upon the steamer, a room in +all respects like to his own, and would have given me a servant. We spoke of +many things on the way to this country; and Kurban Sahib told me what he +perceived would be the conduct of the war. He said, “They have taken men +afoot to fight men ahorse, and they will foolishly show mercy to these Boer-log +because it is believed that they are white.” He said, “There is but +one fault in this war, and that is that the Government have not employed +<i>us</i>, but have made it altogether a Sahibs’ war. Very many men will +thus be killed, and no vengeance will be taken.” True talk—true +talk! It fell as Kurban Sahib foretold. +</p> + +<p> +And we came to this country, even to Cape Town over yonder, and Kurban Sahib +said, “Bear the baggage to the big dak-bungalow, and I will look for +employment fit for a sick man.” I put on the uniform of my rank and went +to the big dak-bungalow, called Maun Nihâl Seyn,<a href="#fn1" name="fnref1"><sup>[1]</sup></a> +and I caused the heavy baggage to be bestowed in that dark lower place—is +it known to the Sahib?—which was already full of the swords and baggage +of officers. It is fuller now—dead men’s kit all! I was careful to +secure a receipt for all three pieces. I have it in my belt. They must go back +to the Punjab. +</p> + +<p class="footnote"> +<a name="fn1"></a> <a href="#fnref1">[1]</a> +Mount Nelson? +</p> + +<p> +Anon came Kurban Sahib, lilting a little in his step, which sign I knew, and he +said, “We are born in a fortunate hour. We go to Eshtellenbosch to +oversee the despatch of horses.” Remember, Kurban Sahib was +squadron-leader of the Gurgaon Rissala, and <i>I</i> was Umr Singh. So I said, +speaking as we do—we did—when none was near, “Thou art a +groom and I am a grass-cutter, but is this any promotion, Child?” At this +he laughed, saying, “It is the way to better things. Have patience, +Father.” (Aye, he called me father when none were by.) “This war +ends not to-morrow nor the next day. I have seen the new Sahibs,” he +said, “and they are fathers of owls—all—all—all!” +</p> + +<p> +So we went to Eshtellenbosch, where the horses are; Kurban Sahib doing the +service of servants in that business. And the whole business was managed +without forethought by new Sahibs from God knows where, who had never seen a +tent pitched or a peg driven. They were full of zeal, but empty of all +knowledge. Then came, little by little from Hind, those Pathans—they are +just like those vultures up there, Sahib—they always follow slaughter. +And there came to Eshtellenbosch some Sikhs—Muzbees, though—and +some Madras monkey-men. They came with horses. Puttiala sent horses. Jhind and +Nabha sent horses. All the nations of the Khalsa sent horses. +</p> + +<p> +All the ends of the earth sent horses. God knows what the army did with them, +unless they ate them raw. They used horses as a courtesan uses oil: with both +hands. These needed many men. Kurban Sahib appointed me to the command (what a +command for me!) of certain woolly ones—<i>Hubshis</i>—whose touch +and shadow are pollution. They were enormous eaters; sleeping on their bellies; +laughing without cause; wholly like animals. Some were called Fingoes, and +some, I think, Red Kaffirs, but they were all Kaffirs—filth unspeakable. +I taught them to water and feed, and sweep and rub down. Yes, I oversaw the +work of sweepers—a <i>jemadar</i> of <i>mehtars</i> (headman of a +refuse-gang) was I, and Kurban Sahib little better, for five months. Evil +months! The war went as Kurban Sahib had said. Our new men were slain and no +vengeance was taken. It was a war of fools armed with the weapons of magicians. +Guns that slew at half a day’s march, and men who, being new, walked +blind into high grass and were driven off like cattle by the Boer-log! As to +the city of Eshtellenbosch, I am not a Sahib—only a Sikh. I would have +quartered one troop only of the Gurgaon Rissala in that city—one little +troop—and I would have schooled that city till its men learned to kiss +the shadow of a Government horse upon the ground. There are many <i>mullahs</i> +(priests) in Eshtellenbosch. They preached the Jehad against us. This is +true—all the camp knew it. And most of the houses were thatched! A war of +fools indeed! +</p> + +<p> +At the end of five months my Kurban Sahib, who had grown lean, said, “The +reward has come. We go up towards the front with horses to-morrow, and, once +away, I shall be too sick to return. Make ready the baggage.” Thus we got +away, with some Kaffirs in charge of new horses for a certain new regiment that +had come in a ship. The second day by <i>terain</i>, when we were watering at a +desolate place without any sort of a bazaar to it, slipped out from the +horse-boxes one Sikander Khan, that had been a <i>jemadar</i> of <i>saises</i> +(head-groom) at Eshtellenbosch, and was by service a trooper in a Border +regiment. Kurban Sahib gave him big abuse for his desertion; but the Pathan put +up his hands as excusing himself, and Kurban Sahib relented and added him to +our service. So there were three of us—Kurban Sahib, I, and Sikander +Khan—Sahib, Sikh, and <i>Sag</i> (dog). But the man said truly, “We +be far from our homes and both servants of the Raj. Make truce till we see the +Indus again.” I have eaten from the same dish as Sikander +Khan—beef, too, for aught I know! He said, on the night he stole some +swine’s flesh in a tin from a mess-tent, that in his Book, the Koran, it +is written that whoso engages in a holy war is freed from ceremonial +obligations. Wah! He had no more religion than the sword-point picks up of +sugar and water at baptism. He stole himself a horse at a place where there lay +a new and very raw regiment. I also procured myself a grey gelding there. They +let their horses stray too much, those new regiments. +</p> + +<p> +Some shameless regiments would indeed have made away with <i>our</i> horses on +the road! They exhibited indents and requisitions for horses, and once or twice +would have uncoupled the trucks; but Kurban Sahib was wise, and I am not +altogether a fool. There is not much honesty at the front. Notably, there was +one congregation of hard-bitten horse-thieves; tall, light Sahibs, who spoke +through their noses for the most part, and upon all occasions they said, +“Oah Hell!” which, in our tongue, signifies <i>Jehannum ko jao</i>. +They bore each man a vine-leaf upon their uniforms, and they rode like Rajputs. +Nay, they rode like Sikhs. They rode like the Ustrelyahs! The Ustrelyahs, whom +we met later, also spoke through their noses not little, and they were tall, +dark men, with grey, clear eyes, heavily eyelashed like camel’s +eyes—very proper men—a new brand of Sahib to me. They said on all +occasions, “No fee-ah,” which in our tongue means <i>Durro mut</i> +(“Do not be afraid”), so we called them the <i>Durro Muts</i>. +Dark, tall men, most excellent horsemen, hot and angry, waging war <i>as</i> +war, and drinking tea as a sandhill drinks water. Thieves? A little, Sahib. +Sikander Khan swore to me; and he comes of a horse-stealing clan for ten +generations; he swore a Pathan was a babe beside a <i>Durro Mut</i> in regard +to horse-lifting. The <i>Durro Muts</i> cannot walk on their feet at all. They +are like hens on the high road. Therefore they must have horses. Very proper +men, with a just lust for the war. Aah—“No fee-ah,” say the +<i>Durro Muts</i>. <i>They</i> saw the worth of Kurban Sahib. <i>They</i> did +not ask him to sweep stables. They would by no means let him go. He did +substitute for one of their troop-leaders who had a fever, one long day in a +country full of little hills—like the mouth of the Khaibar; and when they +returned in the evening, the <i>Durro Muts</i> said, “Wallah! This is a +man. Steal him!” So they stole my Kurban Sahib as they would have stolen +anything else that they needed, and they sent a sick officer back to +Eshtellenbosch in his place. +</p> + +<p> +Thus Kurban Sahib came to his own again, and I was his bearer, and Sikander +Khan was his cook. The law was strict that this was a Sahibs’ war, but +there was no order that a bearer and a cook should not ride with their +Sahib—and we had naught to wear but our uniforms. We rode up and down +this accursed country, where there is no bazaar, no pulse, no flour, no oil, no +spice, no red pepper, no firewood; nothing but raw corn and a little cattle. +There were no great battles as I saw it, but a plenty of gun-firing. When we +were many, the Boer-log came out with coffee to greet us, and to show us +<i>purwanas</i> (permits) from foolish English Generals who had gone that way +before, certifying they were peaceful and well-disposed. When we were few, they +hid behind stones and shot us. Now the order was that they were Sahibs, and +this was a Sahibs’ war. Good! But, as I understand it, when a Sahib goes +to war, he puts on the cloth of war, and only those who wear that cloth may +take part in the war. Good! That also I understand. But these people were as +they were in Burma, or as the Afridis are. They shot at their pleasure, and +when pressed hid the gun and exhibited <i>purwanas</i>, or lay in a house and +said they were farmers. Even such farmers as cut up the Madras troops at +Hlinedatalone in Burma! Even such farmers as slew Cavagnari Sahib and the +Guides at Kabul! We schooled <i>those</i> men, to be sure—fifteen, aye, +twenty of a morning pushed off the verandah in front of the Bala Hissar. I +looked that the Jung-i-lat Sahib (the Commander-in-Chief) would have remembered +the old days; but—no. All the people shot at us everywhere, and he issued +proclamations saying that he did not fight the people, but a certain army, +which army, in truth, was all the Boer-log, who, between them, did not wear +enough of uniform to make a loincloth. A fool’s war from first to last; +for it is manifest that he who fights should be hung if he fights with a gun in +one hand and a <i>purwana</i> in the other, as did all these people. Yet we, +when they had had their bellyful for the time, received them with honour, and +gave them permits, and refreshed them and fed their wives and their babes, and +severely punished our soldiers who took their fowls. So the work was to be done +not once with a few dead, but thrice and four times over. I talked much with +Kurban Sahib on this, and he said, “It is a Sahibs’ war. That is +the order;” and one night, when Sikander Khan would have lain out beyond +the pickets with his knife and shown them how it is worked on the Border, he +hit Sikander Khan between the eyes and came near to breaking in his head. Then +Sikander Khan, a bandage over his eyes, so that he looked like a sick camel, +talked to him half one march, and he was more bewildered than I, and vowed he +would return to Eshtellenbosch. But privately to me Kurban Sahib said we should +have loosed the Sikhs and the Gurkhas on these people till they came in with +their foreheads in the dust. For the war was not of that sort which they +comprehended. +</p> + +<p> +They shot us? Assuredly they shot us from houses adorned with a white flag; but +when they came to know our custom, their widows sent word by Kaffir runners, +and presently there was not quite so much firing. <i>No fee-ah</i>! All the +Boer-log with whom we dealt had <i>purwanas</i> signed by mad Generals +attesting that they were well-disposed to the State. +</p> + +<p> +They had also rifles not a few, and cartridges, which they hid in the roof. The +women wept very greatly when we burned such houses, but they did not approach +too near after the flames had taken good hold of the thatch, for fear of the +bursting cartridges. The women of the Boer-log are very clever. They are more +clever than the men. The Boer-log are clever? Never, never, no! It is the +Sahibs who are fools. For their own honour’s sake the Sahibs must say +that the Boer-log are clever; but it is the Sahibs’ wonderful folly that +has made the Boer-log. The Sahibs should have sent <i>us</i> into the game. +</p> + +<p> +But the <i>Durro Muts</i> did well. They dealt faithfully with all that country +thereabouts—not in any way as we of Hind should have dealt, but they were +not altogether fools. One night when we lay on the top of a ridge in the cold, +I saw far away a light in a house that appeared for the sixth part of an hour +and was obscured. Anon it appeared again thrice for the twelfth part of an +hour. I showed this to Kurban Sahib, for it was a house that had been +spared—the people having many permits and swearing fidelity at our +stirrup-leathers. I said to Kurban Sahib, “Send half a troop, Child, and +finish that house. They signal to their brethren.” And he laughed where +he lay and said, “If I listened to my bearer Umr Singh, there would not +be left ten houses in all this land.” I said, “What need to leave +one? This is as it was in Burma. They are farmers to-day and fighters +to-morrow. Let us deal justly with them.” He laughed and curled himself +up in his blanket, and I watched the far light in the house till day. I have +been on the border in eight wars, not counting Burma. The first Afghan War; the +second Afghan War; two Mahsud Waziri wars (that is four); two Black Mountain +wars, if I remember right; the Malakand and Tirah. I do not count Burma, or +some small things. <i>I</i> know when house signals to house! +</p> + +<p> +I pushed Sikandar Khan with my foot, and he saw it too. He said, “One of +the Boer-log who brought pumpkins for the mess, which I fried last night, lives +in yonder house.” I said, “How dost thou know?” He said, +“Because he rode out of the camp another way, but I marked how his horse +fought with him at the turn of the road; and before the light fell I stole out +of the camp for evening prayer with Kurban Sahib’s glasses, and from a +little hill I saw the pied horse of that pumpkin-seller hurrying to that +house.” I said naught, but took Kurban Sahib’s glasses from his +greasy hands and cleaned them with a silk handkerchief and returned them to +their case. Sikander Khan told me that he had been the first man in the Zenab +valley to use glasses—whereby he finished two blood-feuds cleanly in the +course of three months’ leave. But he was otherwise a liar. +</p> + +<p> +That day Kurban Sahib, with some ten troopers, was sent on to spy the land for +our camp. The <i>Durro Muts</i> moved slowly at that time. They were weighted +with grain and forage and carts, and they greatly wished to leave these all in +some town and go on light to other business which pressed. So Kurban Sahib +sought a short cut for them, a little off the line of march. We were twelve +miles before the main body, and we came to a house under a high bushed hill, +with a nullah, which they call a donga, behind it, and an old sangar of piled +stones, which they call a kraal, before it. Two thorn bushes grew on either +side of the door, like babul bushes, covered with a golden coloured bloom, and +the roof was all of thatch. Before the house was a valley of stones that rose +to another bush-covered hill. There was an old man in the verandah—an old +man with a white beard and a wart upon the left side of his neck; and a fat +woman with the eyes of a swine and the jowl of a swine; and a tall young man +deprived of understanding. His head was hairless, no larger than an orange, and +the pits of his nostrils were eaten away by a disease. He laughed and slavered +and he sported sportively before Kurban Sahib. The man brought coffee and the +woman showed us <i>purwanas</i> from three General Sahibs, certifying that they +were people of peace and goodwill. Here are the <i>purwanas</i>, Sahib. Does +the Sahib know the Generals who signed them? +</p> + +<p> +They swore the land was empty of Boer-log. They held up their hands and swore +it. That was about the time of the evening meal. I stood near the verandah with +Sikander Khan, who was nosing like a jackal on a lost scent. At last he took my +arm and said, “See yonder! There is the sun on the window of the house +that signalled last night. This house can see that house from here,” and +he looked at the hill behind him all hairy with bushes, and sucked in his +breath. Then the idiot with the shrivelled head danced by me and threw back +that head, and regarded the roof and laughed like a hyena, and the fat woman +talked loudly, as it were, to cover some noise. After this passed I to the back +of the house on pretence to get water for tea, and I saw fresh fresh horse-dung +on the ground, and that the ground was cut with the new marks of hoofs; and +there had dropped in the dirt one cartridge. Then Kurban Sahib called to me in +our tongue, saying, “Is this a good place to make tea?” and I +replied, knowing what he meant, “There are over many cooks in the +cook-house. Mount and go, Child.” Then I returned, and he said, smiling +to the woman, “Prepare food, and when we have loosened our girths we will +come in and eat;” but to his men he said in a whisper, “Ride +away!” No. He did not cover the old man or the fat woman with his rifle. +That was not his custom. Some fool of the <i>Durro Muts</i>, being hungry, +raised his voice to dispute the order to flee, and before we were in our +saddles many shots came from the roof—from rifles thrust through the +thatch. Upon this we rode across the valley of stones, and men fired at us from +the nullah behind the house, and from the hill behind the nullah, as well as +from the roof of the house—so many shots that it sounded like a drumming +in the hills. Then Sikandar Khan, riding low, said, “This play is not for +us alone, but for the rest of the <i>Durro Muts</i>,” and I said, +“Be quiet. Keep place!” for his place was behind me, and I rode +behind Kurban Sahib. But these new bullets will pass through five men a-row! We +were not hit—not one of us—and we reached the hill of rocks and +scattered among the stones, and Kurban Sahib turned in his saddle and said, +“Look at the old man!” He stood in the verandah firing swiftly with +a gun, the woman beside him and the idiot also—both with guns. Kurban +Sahib laughed, and I caught him by the wrist, but—his fate was written at +that hour. The bullet passed under my arm-pit and struck him in the liver, and +I pulled him backward between two great rocks atilt—Kurban Sahib, my +Kurban Sahib! From the nullah behind the house and from the hills came our +Boer-log in number more than a hundred, and Sikandar Khan said, +“<i>Now</i> we see the meaning of last night’s signal. Give me the +rifle.” He took Kurban Sahib’s rifle—in this war of fools +only the doctors carry swords—and lay belly-flat to the work, but Kurban +Sahib turned where he lay and said, “Be still. It is a Sahibs’ +war,” and Kurban Sahib put up his hand—thus; and then his eyes +rolled on me, and I gave him water that he might pass the more quickly. And at +the drinking his Spirit received permission…. +</p> + +<p> +Thus went our fight, Sahib. We <i>Durro Muts</i> were on a ridge working from +the north to the south, where lay our main body, and the Boer-log lay in a +valley working from east to west. There were more than a hundred, and our men +were ten, but they held the Boer-log in the valley while they swiftly passed +along the ridge to the south. I saw three Boers drop in the open. Then they all +hid again and fired heavily at the rocks that hid our men; but our men were +clever and did not show, but moved away and away, always south; and the noise +of the battle withdrew itself southward, where we could hear the sound of big +guns. So it fell stark dark, and Sikandar Khan found a deep old jackal’s +earth amid rocks, into which we slid the body of Kurban Sahib upright. Sikandar +Khan took his glasses, and I took his handkerchief and some letters and a +certain thing which I knew hung round his neck, and Sikandar Khan is witness +that I wrapped them all in the handkerchief. Then we took an oath together, and +lay still and mourned for Kurban Sahib. Sikandar Khan wept till +daybreak—even he, a Pathan, a Mohammedan! All that night we heard firing +to the southward, and when the dawn broke the valley was full of Boer-log in +carts and on horses. They gathered by the house, as we could see through Kurban +Sahib’s glasses, and the old man, who, I take it, was a priest, blessed +them, and preached the holy war, waving his arm; and the fat woman brought +coffee; and the idiot capered among them and kissed their horses. Presently +they went away in haste; they went over the hills and were not; and a black +slave came out and washed the door-sills with bright water. Sikandar Khan saw +through the glasses that the stain was blood, and he laughed, saying, +“Wounded men lie there. We shall yet get vengeance.” +</p> + +<p> +About noon we saw a thin, high smoke to the southward, such a smoke as a +burning house will make in sunshine, and Sikandar Khan, who knows how to take a +bearing across a hill, said, “At last we have burned the house of the +pumpkin-seller whence they signalled.” And I said: “What need now +that they have slain my child? Let me mourn.” It was a high smoke, and +the old man, as I saw, came out into the verandah to behold it, and shook his +clenched hands at it. So we lay till the twilight, foodless and without water, +for we had vowed a vow neither to eat nor to drink till we had accomplished the +matter. I had a little opium left, of which I gave Sikandar Khan the half, +because he loved Kurban Sahib. When it was full dark we sharpened our sabres +upon a certain softish rock which, mixed with water, sharpens steel well, and +we took off our boots and we went down to the house and looked through the +windows very softly. The old man sat reading in a book, and the woman sat by +the hearth; and the idiot lay on the floor with his head against her knee, and +he counted his fingers and laughed, and she laughed again. So I knew they were +mother and son, and I laughed, too, for I had suspected this when I claimed her +life and her body from Sikandar Khan, in our discussion of the spoil. Then we +entered with bare swords…. Indeed, these Boer-log do not understand the steel, +for the old man ran towards a rifle in the corner; but Sikandar Khan prevented +him with a blow of the flat across the hands, and he sat down and held up his +hands, and I put my fingers on my lips to signify they should be silent. But +the woman cried, and one stirred in an inner room, and a door opened, and a +man, bound about the head with rags, stood stupidly fumbling with a gun. His +whole head fell inside the door, and none followed him. It was a very pretty +stroke—for a Pathan. They then were silent, staring at the head upon the +floor, and I said to Sikandar Khan, “Fetch ropes! Not even for Kurban +Sahib’s sake will I defile my sword.” So he went to seek and +returned with three long leather ones, and said, “Four wounded lie +within, and doubtless each has a permit from a General,” and he stretched +the ropes and laughed. Then I bound the old man’s hands behind his back, +and unwillingly—for he laughed in my face, and would have fingered my +beard—the idiot’s. At this the woman with the swine’s eyes +and the jowl of a swine ran forward, and Sikandar Khan said, “Shall I +strike or bind? She was thy property on the division.” And I said, +“Refrain! I have made a chain to hold her. Open the door.” I pushed +out the two across the verandah into the darker shade of the thorn-trees, and +she followed upon her knees and lay along the ground, and pawed at my boots and +howled. Then Sikandar Khan bore out the lamp, saying that he was a butler and +would light the table, and I looked for a branch that would bear fruit. But the +woman hindered me not a little with her screechings and plungings, and spoke +fast in her tongue, and I replied in my tongue, “I am childless to-night +because of thy perfidy, and <i>my</i> child was praised among men and loved +among women. He would have begotten men—not animals. Thou hast more years +to live than I, but my grief is the greater.” +</p> + +<p> +I stooped to make sure the noose upon the idiot’s neck, and flung the end +over the branch, and Sikandar Khan held up the lamp that she might well see. +Then appeared suddenly, a little beyond the light of the lamp, the spirit of +Kurban Sahib. One hand he held to his side, even where the bullet had struck +him, and the other he put forward thus, and said, “No. It is a +Sahibs’ war.” And I said, “Wait a while, Child, and thou +shalt sleep.” But he came nearer, riding, as it were, upon my eyes, and +said, “No. It is a Sahibs’ war.” And Sikandar Khan said, +“Is it too heavy?” and set down the lamp and came to me; and as he +turned to tally on the rope, the spirit of Kurban Sahib stood up within +arm’s reach of us, and his face was very angry, and a third time he said, +“No. It is a Sahibs’ war.” And a little wind blew out the +lamp, and I heard Sikandar Khan’s teeth chatter in his head. +</p> + +<p> +So we stayed side by side, the ropes in our hand, a very long while, for we +could not shape any words. Then I heard Sikandar Khan open his water-bottle and +drink; and when his mouth was slaked he passed to me and said, “We are +absolved from our vow.” So I drank, and together we waited for the dawn +in that place where we stood—the ropes in our hand. A little after third +cockcrow we heard the feet of horses and gun wheels very far off, and so soon +as the light came a shell burst on the threshold of the house, and the roof of +the verandah that was thatched fell in and blazed before the windows. And I +said, “What of the wounded Boer-log within?” And Sikandar Khan +said, “We have heard the order. It is a Sahibs’ war. Stand +still.” Then came a second shell—good line, but short—and +scattered dust upon us where we stood; and then came ten of the little quick +shells from the gun that speaks like a stammerer—yes, pompom the Sahibs +call it—and the face of the house folded down like the nose and the chin +of an old man mumbling, and the forefront of the house lay down. Then Sikandar +Khan said, “If it be the fate of the wounded to die in the fire, <i>I</i> +shall not prevent it.” And he passed to the back of the house and +presently came back, and four wounded Boer-log came after him, of whom two +could not walk upright. And I said, “What hast thou done?” And he +said, “I have neither spoken to them nor laid hand on them. They follow +in hope of mercy.” And I said, “It is a Sahibs’ war. Let them +wait the Sahibs’ mercy.” So they lay still, the four men and the +idiot, and the fat woman under the thorn-tree, and the house burned furiously. +Then began the known sound of cartouches in the roof—one or two at first; +then a trill, and last of all one loud noise and the thatch blew here and +there, and the captives would have crawled aside on account of the heat that +was withering the thorn-trees, and on account of wood and bricks flying at +random. But I said, “Abide! Abide! Ye be Sahibs, and this is a +Sahibs’ war, O Sahibs. There is no order that ye should depart from this +war.” They did not understand my words. Yet they abode and they lived. +</p> + +<p> +Presently rode down five troopers of Kurban Sahib’s command, and one I +knew spoke my tongue, having sailed to Calcutta often with horses. So I told +him all my tale, using bazaar-talk, such as his kidney of Sahib would +understand; and at the end I said, “An order has reached us here from the +dead that this is a Sahibs’ war. I take the soul of my Kurban Sahib to +witness that I give over to the justice of the Sahibs these Sahibs who have +made me childless.” Then I gave him the ropes and fell down senseless, my +heart being very full, but my belly was empty, except for the little opium. +</p> + +<p> +They put me into a cart with one of their wounded, and after a while I +understood that they had fought against the Boer-log for two days and two +nights. It was all one big trap, Sahib, of which we, with Kurban Sahib, saw no +more than the outer edge. They were very angry, the <i>Durro +Muts</i>—very angry indeed. I have never seen Sahibs so angry. They +buried my Kurban Sahib with the rites of his faith upon the top of the ridge +overlooking the house, and I said the proper prayers of the faith, and Sikandar +Khan prayed in his fashion and stole five signalling-candles, which have each +three wicks, and lighted the grave as if it had been the grave of a saint on a +Friday. He wept very bitterly all that night, and I wept with him, and he took +hold of my feet and besought me to give him a remembrance from Kurban Sahib. So +I divided equally with him one of Kurban Sahib’s handkerchiefs—not +the silk ones, for those were given him by a certain woman; and I also gave him +a button from a coat, and a little steel ring of no value that Kurban Sahib +used for his keys, and he kissed them and put them into his bosom. The rest I +have here in that little bundle, and I must get the baggage from the hotel in +Cape Town—some four shirts we sent to be washed, for which we could not +wait when we went up-country—and I must give them all to my Colonel-Sahib +at Sialkote in the Punjab. For my child is dead—my baba is dead!… I would +have come away before; there was no need to stay, the child being dead; but we +were far from the rail, and the <i>Durro Muts</i> were as brothers to me, and I +had come to look upon Sikandar Khan as in some sort a friend, and he got me a +horse and I rode up and down with them; but the life had departed. God knows +what they called me—orderly, <i>chaprassi</i> (messenger), cook, sweeper, +I did not know nor care. But once I had pleasure. We came back in a month after +wide circles to that very valley. I knew it every stone, and I went up to the +grave, and a clever Sahib of the <i>Durro Muts</i> (we left a troop there for a +week to school those people with <i>purwanas</i>) had cut an inscription upon a +great rock; and they interpreted it to me, and it was a jest such as Kurban +Sahib himself would have loved. Oh! I have the inscription well copied here. +Read it aloud, Sahib, and I will explain the jests. There are two very good +ones. Begin, Sahib:— +</p> + +<p class="center"> +In Memory of<br/> +WALTER DECIES CORBYN<br/> +Late Captain 141st Punjab Cavalry +</p> + +<p> +The Gurgaon Rissala, that is. Go on, Sahib. +</p> + +<p class="center"> +Treacherously shot near this place by<br/> +The connivance of the late<br/> +HENDRIK DIRK UYS<br/> +A Minister of God<br/> +Who thrice took the oath of neutrality<br/> +And Piet his son,<br/> +This little work +</p> + +<p> +Aha! This is the first jest. The Sahib should see this little work! +</p> + +<p class="center"> +Was accomplished in partial<br/> +And inadequate recognition of their loss<br/> +By some men who loved him +</p> + +<p class="center"> +<i>Si monumentum requiris circumspice</i> +</p> + +<p> +That is the second jest. It signifies that those who would desire to behold a +proper memorial to Kurban Sahib must look out at the house. And, Sahib, the +house is not there, nor the well, nor the big tank which they call dams, nor +the little fruit-trees, nor the cattle. There is nothing at all, Sahib, except +the two trees withered by the fire. The rest is like the desert here—or +my hand—or my heart. Empty, Sahib—all empty! +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2>“THEIR LAWFUL OCCASIONS”</h2> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap07"></a>THE WET LITANY</h2> + +<p class="poem"> +When the water’s countenance<br/> +Blurrs ’twixt glance and second glance;<br/> +When the tattered smokes forerun<br/> +Ashen ’neath a silvered sun;<br/> +When the curtain of the haze<br/> +Shuts upon our helpless ways—<br/> + Hear the Channel Fleet at sea;<br/> + <i>Libera nos domine</i>!<br/> +<br/> +When the engines’ bated pulse<br/> +Scarcely thrills the nosing hulls;<br/> +When the wash along the side<br/> +Sounds, a sudden, magnified<br/> +When the intolerable blast<br/> +Marks each blindfold minute passed.<br/> +<br/> +When the fog-buoy’s squattering flight<br/> +Guides us through the haggard night;<br/> +When the warning bugle blows;<br/> +When the lettered doorways close;<br/> +When our brittle townships press,<br/> +Impotent, on emptiness.<br/> +<br/> +When the unseen leadsmen lean<br/> +Questioning a deep unseen;<br/> +When their lessened count they tell<br/> +To a bridge invisible;<br/> +When the hid and perilous<br/> +Cliffs return our cry to us.<br/> +<br/> +When the treble thickness spread<br/> +Swallows up our next-ahead;<br/> +When her siren’s frightened whine<br/> +Shows her sheering out of line;<br/> +When, her passage undiscerned,<br/> +We must turn where she has turned—<br/> + Hear the Channel Fleet at sea;<br/> + <i>Libera nos Domine</i>! +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap08"></a>“THEIR LAWFUL OCCASIONS”</h2> + +<p class="poem"> +“… And a security for such as pass on the seas upon their lawful +occasions.”—<i>Navy Prayer</i>. +</p> + +<h3>PART I</h3> + +<p> +Disregarding the inventions of the Marine Captain, whose other name is Gubbins, +let a plain statement suffice. +</p> + +<p> +H.M.S. <i>Caryatid</i> went to Portland to join Blue Fleet for manœuvres. I +travelled overland from London by way of Portsmouth, where I fell among +friends. When I reached Portland, H.M.S. <i>Caryatid</i>, whose guest I was to +have been, had, with Blue Fleet, already sailed for some secret rendezvous off +the west coast of Ireland, and Portland breakwater was filled with Red Fleet, +my official enemies and joyous acquaintances, who received me with unstinted +hospitality. For example, Lieutenant-Commander A. L. Hignett, in charge of +three destroyers, <i>Wraith, Stiletto</i>, and <i>Kobbold</i>, due to depart at +6 <small>P.M</small>. that evening, offered me a berth on his thirty-knot +flagship, but I preferred my comforts, and so accepted sleeping-room in H.M.S. +<i>Pedantic</i> (15,000 tons), leader of the second line. After dining aboard +her I took boat to Weymouth to get my kit aboard, as the battleships would go +to war at midnight. In transferring my allegiance from Blue to Red Fleet, +whatever the Marine Captain may say, I did no wrong. I truly intended to return +to the <i>Pedantic</i> and help to fight Blue Fleet. All I needed was a new +toothbrush, which I bought from a chemist in a side street at 9:15 +<small>P.M</small>. As I turned to go, one entered seeking alleviation of a +gum-boil. He was dressed in a checked ulster, a black silk hat three sizes too +small, cord-breeches, boots, and pure brass spurs. These he managed painfully, +stepping like a prisoner fresh from leg-irons. As he adjusted the +pepper-plaster to the gum the light fell on his face, and I recognised Mr. +Emanuel Pyecroft, late second-class petty officer of H.M.S. +<i>Archimandrite</i>, an unforgettable man, met a year before under Tom +Wessel’s roof in Plymouth. It occurred to me that when a petty officer +takes to spurs he may conceivably meditate desertion. For that reason I, though +a taxpayer, made no sign. Indeed, it was Mr. Pyecroft, following me out of the +shop, who said hollowly: “What might you be doing here?” +</p> + +<p> +“I’m going on manœuvres in the <i>Pedantic</i>,” I replied. +</p> + +<p> +“Ho!” said Mr. Pyecroft. “An’ what manner o’ +manœuvres d’you expect to see in a blighted cathedral like the +<i>Pedantic</i>? <i>I</i> know ’er. I knew her in Malta, when the +<i>Vulcan</i> was her permanent tender. Manoeuvres! You won’t see more +than ‘Man an’ arm watertight doors!’ in your little woollen +undervest.” +</p> + +<p> +“I’m sorry for that.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why?” He lurched heavily as his spurs caught and twanged like +tuning-forks. “War’s declared at midnight. <i>Pedantics</i> be +sugared! Buy an ’am an’ see life!” +</p> + +<p> +For the moment I fancied Mr. Pyecroft, a fugitive from justice, purposed that +we two should embrace a Robin Hood career in the uplands of Dorset. The spurs +troubled me, and I made bold to say as much. “Them!” he said, +coming to an intricate halt. “They’re part of the <i>prima +facie</i> evidence. But as for me—let me carry your bag—I’m +second in command, leadin’-hand, cook, steward, an’ lavatory man, +with a few incidentals for sixpence a day extra, on No. 267 +torpedo-boat.” +</p> + +<p> +“They wear spurs there?” +</p> + +<p> +“Well,” said Mr. Peycroft, “seein’ that Two Six Seven +belongs to Blue Fleet, which left the day before yesterday, disguises are +imperative. It transpired thus. The Right Honourable Lord Gawd Almighty Admiral +Master Frankie Frobisher, K.C.B., commandin’ Blue Fleet, can’t be +bothered with one tin-torpedo-boat more or less; and what with lyin’ in +the Reserve four years, an’ what with the new kind o’ tiffy which +cleans dynamos with brick-dust and oil (Blast these spurs! They won’t +render!), Two Six Seven’s steam-gadgets was paralytic. Our Mr. Moorshed +done his painstakin’ best—it’s his first command of a +war-canoe, matoor age nineteen (down that alleyway, please!) but be that as it +may, His Holiness Frankie is aware of us crabbin’ ourselves round the +breakwater at five knots, an’ steerin’ <i>pari passu</i>, as the +French say. (Up this alley-way, please!) If he’d given Mr. Hinchcliffe, +our chief engineer, a little time, it would never have transpired, for what +Hinch can’t drive he can coax; but the new port bein’ a trifle +cloudy, an’ ’is joints tinglin’ after a post-captain dinner, +Frankie come on the upper bridge seekin’ for a sacrifice. We, +offerin’ a broadside target, got it. He told us what ’is +grandmamma, ’oo was a lady an’ went to sea in stick- and +string-batteaus, had told him about steam. He throwed in his own prayers for +the ’ealth an’ safety of all steam-packets an’ their +officers. Then he give us several distinct orders. The first few—I kept +tally—was all about going to Hell; the next many was about not +evolutin’ in his company, when there; an’ the last all was simply +repeatin’ the motions in quick time. Knowin’ Frankie’s +groovin’ to be badly eroded by age and lack of attention, I didn’t +much panic; but our Mr. Moorshed, ’e took it a little to heart. Me +an’ Mr. Hinchcliffe consoled ’im as well as service conditions +permits of, an’ we had a <i>résumé</i>-supper at the back o’ the +Camber—secluded <i>an’</i> lugubrious! Then one thing leadin’ +up to another, an’ our orders, except about anchorin’ where +he’s booked for, leavin’ us a clear ’orizon, Number Two Six +Seven is now—mind the edge of the wharf—here!” +</p> + +<p> +By mysterious doublings he had brought me out on to the edge of a narrow strip +of water crowded with coastwise shipping that runs far up into Weymouth town. A +large foreign timber-brig lay at my feet, and under the round of her stern +cowered, close to the wharf-edge, a slate-coloured, unkempt, two-funnelled +craft of a type—but I am no expert—between the first-class +torpedo-boat and the full-blooded destroyer. From her archaic torpedo-tubes at +the stern, and quick-firers forward and amidship, she must have dated from the +early nineties. Hammerings and clinkings, with spurts of steam and fumes of hot +oil, arose from her inside, and a figure in a striped jersey squatted on the +engine-room gratings. +</p> + +<p> +“She ain’t much of a war-canoe, but you’ll see more life in +’er than on an whole squadron of bleedin’ <i>Pedantics.”</i> +</p> + +<p> +“But she’s laid up here—and Blue Fleet have gone,” I +protested. “Precisely. Only, in his comprehensive orders Frankie +didn’t put us out of action. Thus we’re a non-neglectable +fightin’ factor which you mightn’t think from this elevation; +<i>an’</i> m’rover, Red Fleet don’t know we’re +’ere. Most of us”—he glanced proudly at his +boots—“didn’t run to spurs, but we’re disguised pretty +devious, as you might say. Morgan, our signaliser, when last seen, was a +Dawlish bathing-machine proprietor. Hinchcliffe was naturally a German waiter, +and me you behold as a squire of low degree; while yonder Levantine dragoman on +the hatch is our Mr. Moorshed. He was the second cutter’s +snotty—<i>my</i> snotty—on the <i>Archimandrite</i>—two +years—Cape Station. Likewise on the West Coast, mangrove swampin’, +an’ gettin’ the cutter stove in on small an’ unlikely bars, +an’ manufacturin’ lies to correspond. What I don’t know about +Mr. Moorshed is precisely the same gauge as what Mr. Moorshed don’t know +about me—half a millimetre, as you might say. He comes into awful +opulence of his own when ’e’s of age; an’ judgin’ from +what passed between us when Frankie cursed ’im, I don’t think +’e cares whether he’s broke to-morrow or—the day after. Are +you beginnin’ to follow our tattics? They’ll be worth +followin’. Or <i>are</i> you goin’ back to your nice little cabin +on the <i>Pedantic</i>—which I lay they’ve just dismounted the +third engineer out of—to eat four fat meals per diem, an’ smoke in +the casement?” +</p> + +<p> +The figure in the jersey lifted its head and mumbled. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, Sir,” was Mr. Pyecroft’s answer. “I ’ave +ascertained that <i>Stiletto, Wraith</i>, and <i>Kobbold</i> left at 6 +<small>P.M</small>. with the first division o’ Red Fleet’s cruisers +except <i>Devolotion</i> and <i>Cryptic</i>, which are delayed by engine-room +defects.” Then to me: “Won’t you go aboard? Mr. Moorshed +’ud like some one to talk to. You buy an ’am an’ see +life.” +</p> + +<p> +At this he vanished; and the Demon of Pure Irresponsibility bade me lower +myself from the edge of the wharf to the tea-tray plates of No. 267. +</p> + +<p> +“What d’you want?” said the striped jersey. +</p> + +<p> +“I want to join Blue Fleet if I can,” I replied. “I’ve +been left behind by—an accident.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well?” +</p> + +<p> +“Mr. Pyecroft told me to buy a ham and see life. About how big a ham do +you need?” +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t want any ham, thank you. That’s the way up the +wharf. <i>Good</i>-night.” +</p> + +<p> +“Good-night!” I retraced my steps, wandered in the dark till I +found a shop, and there purchased, of sardines, canned tongue, lobster, and +salmon, not less than half a hundredweight. A belated sausage-shop supplied me +with a partially cut ham of pantomime tonnage. These things I, sweating, bore +out to the edge of the wharf and set down in the shadow of a crane. It was a +clear, dark summer night, and from time to time I laughed happily to myself. +The adventure was preordained on the face of it. Pyecroft alone, spurred or +barefoot, would have drawn me very far from the paths of circumspection. His +advice to buy a ham and see life clinched it. Presently Mr. Pyecroft—I +heard spurs clink—passed me. Then the jersey voice said: “What the +mischief’s that?” +</p> + +<p> +“’Asn’t the visitor come aboard, Sir? ’E told me +he’d purposely abandoned the <i>Pedantic</i> for the pleasure of the trip +with us. Told me he was official correspondent for the <i>Times</i>; an’ +I know he’s littery by the way ’e tries to talk Navy-talk. +Haven’t you seen ’im, Sir?” +</p> + +<p> +Slowly and dispassionately the answer drawled long on the night; “Pye, +you are without exception the biggest liar in the Service!” +</p> + +<p> +“Then what am I to do with the bag, Sir? It’s marked with his +name.” There was a pause till Mr. Moorshed said “Oh!” in a +tone which the listener might construe precisely as he pleased. +</p> + +<p> +“<i>He</i> was the maniac who wanted to buy a ham and see life—was +he? If he goes back to the <i>Pedantic</i>—” +</p> + +<p> +“Pre-cisely, Sir. Gives us all away, Sir.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then what possessed <i>you</i> to give it away to him, you owl?” +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve got his bag. If ’e gives anything away, he’ll +have to go naked.” +</p> + +<p> +At this point I thought it best to rattle my tins and step out of the shadow of +the crane. +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve bought the ham,” I called sweetly. “Have you +still any objection to my seeing life, Mr. Moorshed?” +</p> + +<p> +“All right, if you’re insured. Won’t you come down?” +</p> + +<p> +I descended; Pyecroft, by a silent flank movement, possessing himself of all +the provisions, which he bore to some hole forward. +</p> + +<p> +“Have you known Mr. Pyecroft long?” said my host. +</p> + +<p> +“Met him once, a year ago, at Devonport. What do you think of him?” +</p> + +<p> +“What do <i>you</i> think of him?” +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve left the <i>Pedantic</i>—her boat will be waiting for +me at ten o’clock, too—simply because I happened to meet +him,” I replied. +</p> + +<p> +“That’s all right. If you’ll come down below, we may get some +grub.” +</p> + +<p> +We descended a naked steel ladder to a steel-beamed tunnel, perhaps twelve feet +long by six high. Leather-topped lockers ran along either side; a swinging +table, with tray and lamp above, occupied the centre. Other furniture there was +none. +</p> + +<p> +“You can’t shave here, of course. We don’t wash, and, as a +rule, we eat with our fingers when we’re at sea. D’you mind?” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Moorshed, black-haired, black-browed, sallow-complexioned, looked me over +from head to foot and grinned. He was not handsome in any way, but his smile +drew the heart. “You didn’t happen to hear what Frankie told me +from the flagship, did you? His last instructions, and I’ve logged them +here in shorthand, were”—he opened a neat +pocket-book—”<i>‘Get out of this and conduct your own damned +manœuvres in your own damned tinker fashion! You’re a disgrace to the +Service, and your boat’s offal.’”</i> +</p> + +<p> +“Awful?” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“No—offal—tripes—swipes—ullage.” Mr. +Pyecroft entered, in the costume of his calling, with the ham and an assortment +of tin dishes, which he dealt out like cards. +</p> + +<p> +“I shall take these as my orders,” said Mr. Moorshed. +“I’m chucking the Service at the end of the year, so it +doesn’t matter.” +</p> + +<p> +We cut into the ham under the ill-trimmed lamp, washed it down with whisky, and +then smoked. From the foreside of the bulkhead came an uninterrupted hammering +and clinking, and now and then a hiss of steam. +</p> + +<p> +“That’s Mr. Hinchcliffe,” said Pyecroft. “He’s +what is called a first-class engine-room artificer. If you hand ’im a +drum of oil an’ leave ’im alone, he can coax a stolen bicycle to do +typewritin’.” +</p> + +<p> +Very leisurely, at the end of his first pipe, Mr. Moorshed drew out a folded +map, cut from a newspaper, of the area of manœuvres, with the rules that +regulate these wonderful things, below. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I suppose I know as much as an average stick-and-string +admiral,” he said, yawning. “Is our petticoat ready yet, Mr. +Pyecroft?” +</p> + +<p> +As a preparation for naval manœuvres these councils seemed inadequate. I +followed up the ladder into the gloom cast by the wharf edge and the big +lumber-ship’s side. As my eyes stretched to the darkness I saw that No. +267 had miraculously sprouted an extra pair of funnels—soft, for they +gave as I touched them. +</p> + +<p> +“More <i>prima facie</i> evidence. You runs a rope fore an’ aft, +an’ you erects perpendick-u-arly two canvas tubes, which you distends +with cane hoops, thus ’avin’ as many funnels as a destroyer. At the +word o’ command, up they go like a pair of concertinas, an’ +consequently collapses equally ’andy when requisite. Comin’ aft we +shall doubtless overtake the Dawlish bathin’-machine proprietor +fittin’ on her bustle.” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Pyecroft whispered this in my ear as Moorshed moved toward a group at the +stern. +</p> + +<p> +“None of us who ain’t built that way can be destroyers, but we can +look as near it as we can. Let me explain to you, Sir, that the stern of a +Thorneycroft boat, which we are <i>not</i>, comes out in a pretty bulge, +totally different from the Yarrow mark, which again we are not. But, on the +other ’and, <i>Dirk, Stiletto, Goblin, Ghoul, Djinn</i>, and +<i>A-frite</i>—Red Fleet dee-stroyers, with ’oom we hope to consort +later on terms o’ perfect equality—<i>are</i> Thorneycrofts, +an’ carry that Grecian bend which we are now adjustin’ to our +<i>arriere-pensée</i>—as the French would put it—by means of +painted canvas an’ iron rods bent as requisite. Between you an’ me +an’ Frankie, we are the <i>Gnome</i>, now in the Fleet Reserve at +Pompey—Portsmouth, I should say.” +</p> + +<p> +“The first sea will carry it all away,” said Moorshed, leaning +gloomily outboard, “but it will do for the present.” +</p> + +<p> +“We’ve a lot of <i>prima facie</i> evidence about us,” Mr. +Pyecroft went on. “A first-class torpedo boat sits lower in the water +than a destroyer. Hence we artificially raise our sides with a black canvas +wash-streak to represent extra freeboard; <i>at</i> the same time paddin’ +out the cover of the forward three-pounder like as if it was a twelve-pounder, +an’ variously fakin’ up the bows of ’er. As you might say, +we’ve took thought an’ added a cubic to our stature. It’s our +len’th that sugars us. A ’undred an’ forty feet, which is our +len’th into two ’undred and ten, which is about the +<i>Gnome’s,</i> leaves seventy feet over, which we haven’t +got.” +</p> + +<p> +“Is this all your own notion, Mr. Pyecroft?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“In spots, you might say—yes; though we all contributed to make up +deficiencies. But Mr. Moorshed, not much carin’ for further Navy after +what Frankie said, certainly threw himself into the part with avidity.” +</p> + +<p> +“What the dickens are we going to do?” +</p> + +<p> +“Speaking as a seaman gunner, I should say we’d wait till the +sights came on, an’ then fire. Speakin’ as a torpedo-coxswain, +L.T.O., T.I., M.D., etc., I presume we fall in—Number One in rear of the +tube, etc., secure tube to ball or diaphragm, clear away securin’-bar, +release safety-pin from lockin-levers, an’ pray Heaven to look down on +us. As second in command o’ 267, I say wait an’ see!” +</p> + +<p> +“What’s happened? We’re off,” I said. The timber ship +had slid away from us. +</p> + +<p> +“We are. Stern first, an’ broadside on! If we don’t hit +anything too hard, we’ll do.” +</p> + +<p> +“Come on the bridge,” said Mr. Moorshed. I saw no bridge, but fell +over some sort of conning-tower forward, near which was a wheel. For the next +few minutes I was more occupied with cursing my own folly than with the science +of navigation. Therefore I cannot say how we got out of Weymouth Harbour, nor +why it was necessary to turn sharp to the left and wallow in what appeared to +be surf. +</p> + +<p> +“Excuse me,” said Mr. Pyecroft behind us, “<i>I</i> +don’t mind rammin’ a bathin’-machine; but if only <i>one</i> +of them week-end Weymouth blighters has thrown his empty baccy-tin into the sea +here, we’ll rip our plates open on it; 267 isn’t the +<i>Archimandrite’s</i> old cutter.” +</p> + +<p> +“I am hugging the shore,” was the answer. +</p> + +<p> +“There’s no actual ’arm in huggin’, but it can come +expensive if pursooed.” +</p> + +<p> +“Right-O!” said Moorshed, putting down the wheel, and as we left +those scant waters I felt 267 move more freely. +</p> + +<p> +A thin cough ran up the speaking-tube. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, what is it, Mr. Hinchcliffe?” said Moorshed. +</p> + +<p> +“I merely wished to report that she is still continuin’ to go, +Sir.” +</p> + +<p> +“Right-O! Can we whack her up to fifteen, d’you think?” +</p> + +<p> +“I’ll try, Sir; but we’d prefer to have the engine-room hatch +open—at first, Sir.” +</p> + +<p> +Whacked up then she was, and for half an hour was careered largely through the +night, turning at last with a suddenness that slung us across the narrow deck. +</p> + +<p> +“This,” said Mr. Pyecroft, who received me on his chest as a large +rock receives a shadow, “represents the <i>Gnome</i> arrivin’ +cautious from the direction o’ Portsmouth, with Admiralty orders.” +</p> + +<p> +He pointed through the darkness ahead, and after much staring my eyes opened to +a dozen destroyers, in two lines, some few hundred yards away. +</p> + +<p> +“Those are the Red Fleet destroyer flotilla, which is too frail to panic +about among the full-blooded cruisers inside Portland breakwater, and several +millimetres too excited over the approachin’ war to keep a look-out +inshore. Hence our tattics!” +</p> + +<p> +We wailed through our siren—a long, malignant, hyena-like howl—and +a voice hailed us as we went astern tumultuously. +</p> + +<p> +“The <i>Gnome</i>—Carteret-Jones—from Portsmouth, with +orders—mm—mm—<i>Stiletto</i>,” Moorshed answered +through the megaphone in a high, whining voice, rather like a chaplain’s. +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Who</i>?” was the answer. +</p> + +<p> +“Carter—et—Jones.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, Lord!” +</p> + +<p> +There was a pause; a voice cried to some friend, “It’s Podgie, +adrift on the high seas in charge of a whole dee-stroyer!” +</p> + +<p> +Another voice echoed, “Podgie!” and from its note I gathered that +Mr. Carteret-Jones had a reputation, but not for independent command. +</p> + +<p> +“Who’s your sub?” said the first speaker, a shadow on the +bridge of the <i>Dirk</i>. +</p> + +<p> +“A gunner, at present, Sir. The <i>Stiletto</i>—broken +down—turns over to us.” +</p> + +<p> +“When did the <i>Stiletto</i> break down?” +</p> + +<p> +“Off the Start, Sir; two hours after—after she left here this +evening, I believe. My orders are to report to you for the manœuvre +signal-codes, and join Commander Hignett’s flotilla, which is in +attendance on <i>Stiletto</i>.” +</p> + +<p> +A smothered chuckle greeted this last. Moorshed’s voice was high and +uneasy. Said Pyecroft, with a sigh: “The amount o’ trouble me +an’ my bright spurs ’ad fishin’ out that information from +torpedo coxswains and similar blighters in pubs all this afternoon, you would +never believe.” +</p> + +<p> +“But has the <i>Stiletto</i> broken down?” I asked weakly. +</p> + +<p> +“How else are we to get Red Fleet’s private signal-code? Any way, +if she ’asn’t now, she will before manœuvres are ended. It’s +only executin’ in anticipation.” +</p> + +<p> +“Go astern and send your coxswain aboard for orders, Mr. Jones.” +Water carries sound well, but I do not know whether we were intended to hear +the next sentence: “They must have given him <i>one</i> intelligent +keeper.” +</p> + +<p> +“That’s me,” said Mr. Pyecroft, as a black and coal-stained +dinghy—I did not foresee how well I should come to know her—was +flung overside by three men. +</p> + +<p> +“Havin’ bought an ’am, we will now see life.” He +stepped into the boat and was away. +</p> + +<p> +“I say, Podgie!”—the speaker was in the last of the line of +destroyers, as we thumped astern—“aren’t you lonely out +there?” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, don’t rag me!” said Moorshed. “Do you suppose +I’ll have to manœuvre with your flo-tilla?” +</p> + +<p> +“No, Podgie! I’m pretty sure our commander will see you sifting +cinders in Tophet before you come with our flo-tilla.” +</p> + +<p> +“Thank you! She steers rather wild at high speeds.” +</p> + +<p> +Two men laughed together. +</p> + +<p> +“By the way, who is Mr. Carteret-Jones when he’s at home?” I +whispered. +</p> + +<p> +“I was with him in the <i>Britannia</i>. I didn’t like him much, +but I’m grateful to him now. I must tell him so some day.” +</p> + +<p> +“They seemed to know him hereabouts.” +</p> + +<p> +“He rammed the <i>Caryatid</i> twice with her own steam-pinnace.” +</p> + +<p> +Presently, moved by long strokes, Mr. Pyecroft returned, skimming across the +dark. The dinghy swung up behind him, even as his heel spurned it. +</p> + +<p> +“Commander Fasset’s compliments to Mr. L. Carteret-Jones, and the +sooner he digs out in pursuance of Admiralty orders as received at Portsmouth, +the better pleased Commander Fasset will be. But there’s a lot +more——” +</p> + +<p> +“Whack her up, Mr. Hinchcliffe! Come on to the bridge. We can settle it +as we go. Well?” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Pyecroft drew an important breath, and slid off his cap. +</p> + +<p> +“Day an’ night private signals of Red Fleet <i>com</i>plete, +Sir!” He handed a little paper to Moorshed. “You see, Sir, the +trouble was, that Mr. Carteret-Jones bein’, so to say, a little new to +his duties, ’ad forgot to give ’is gunner his Admiralty orders in +writin’, but, as I told Commander Fasset, Mr. Jones had been +repeatin’ ’em to me, nervous-like, most of the way from Portsmouth, +so I knew ’em by heart—an’ better. The Commander, +recognisin’ in me a man of agility, cautioned me to be a father an’ +mother to Mr. Carteret-Jones.” +</p> + +<p> +“Didn’t he know you?” I asked, thinking for the moment that +there could be no duplicates of Emanuel Pyecroft in the Navy. +</p> + +<p> +“What’s a torpedo-gunner more or less to a full lootenant +commanding six thirty-knot destroyers for the first time? ’E seemed to +cherish the ’ope that ’e might use the <i>Gnome</i> for ’is +own ’orrible purposes; but what I told him about Mr. Jones’s sad +lack o’ nerve comin’ from Pompey, an’ going dead slow on +account of the dark, short-circuited <i>that</i> connection. +‘M’rover,’ I says to him, ‘our orders is explicit; +<i>Stiletto’s</i> reported broke down somewhere off the Start, an’ +we’ve been tryin’ to coil down a new stiff wire hawser all the +evenin’, so it looks like towin’ ’er back, don’t +it?’ I says. That more than ever jams his turrets, an’ makes him +keen to get rid of us. ’E even hinted that Mr. Carteret-Jones +passin’ hawsers an’ assistin’ the impotent in a sea-way might +come pretty expensive on the tax-payer. I agreed in a disciplined way. I +ain’t proud. Gawd knows I ain’t proud! But when I’m really +diggin’ out in the fancy line, I sometimes think that me in a copper +punt, single-’anded, ’ud beat a cutter-full of De Rougemongs in a +row round the fleet.” +</p> + +<p> +At this point I reclined without shame on Mr. Pyecroft’s bosom, supported +by his quivering arm. +</p> + +<p> +“Well?” said Moorshed, scowling into the darkness, as 267’s +bows snapped at the shore seas of the broader Channel, and we swayed together. +</p> + +<p> +“‘You’d better go on,’ says Commander Fassett, +‘an’ do what you’re told to do. I don’t envy Hignett if +he has to dry-nurse the <i>Gnome’s</i> commander. But what d’you +want with signals?’ ’e says. ‘It’s criminal lunacy to +trust Mr. Jones with anything that steams.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘May I make an observation, Sir?’ I says. +‘Suppose,’ I says, ‘you was torpedo-gunner on the +<i>Gnome</i>, an’ Mr. Carteret-Jones was your commandin’ officer, +an’ you had your reputation <i>as</i> a second in command for the first +time,’ I says, well knowin’ it was his first command of a flotilla, +‘what ’ud you do, Sir?’ That gouged ’is unprotected +ends open—clear back to the citadel.” +</p> + +<p> +“What did he say?” Moorshed jerked over his shoulder. +</p> + +<p> +“If you were Mr. Carteret-Jones, it might be disrespect for me to repeat +it, Sir.” +</p> + +<p> +“Go ahead,” I heard the boy chuckle. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Do?’ ’e says. ‘I’d rub the young +blighter’s nose into it till I made a perishin’ man of him, or a +perspirin’ pillow-case,’ ’e says, ‘which,’ he +adds, ‘is forty per cent, more than he is at present.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Whilst he’s gettin’ the private signals—they’re +rather particular ones—I went forrard to see the <i>Dirk’s</i> +gunner about borrowin’ a holdin’-down bolt for our twelve-pounder. +My open ears, while I was rovin’ over his packet, got the followin’ +authentic particulars.” I heard his voice change, and his feet shifted. +“There’s been a last council o’ war of destroyer-captains at +the flagship, an’ a lot of things ’as come out. To begin with +<i>Cryptic</i> and <i>Devolution</i>, Captain Panke and Captain +Malan—” +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Cryptic</i> and <i>Devolution</i>, first-class cruisers,” said +Mr. Moorshed dreamily. “Go on, Pyecroft.” +</p> + +<p> +“—bein’ delayed by minor defects in engine-room, did +<i>not</i>, as we know, accompany Red Fleet’s first division of scouting +cruisers, whose rendezvous is unknown, but presumed to be somewhere off the +Lizard. <i>Cryptic</i> an’ <i>Devolution</i> left at 9:30 +<small>P.M</small>. still reportin’ copious minor defects in engine-room. +Admiral’s final instructions was they was to put into Torbay, an’ +mend themselves there. If they can do it in twenty-four hours, they’re to +come on and join the battle squadron at the first rendezvous, down Channel +somewhere. (I couldn’t get that, Sir.) If they can’t, he’ll +think about sendin’ them some destroyers for escort. But his present +intention is to go ’ammer and tongs down Channel, usin’ ’is +destroyers for all they’re worth, an’ thus keepin’ Blue Fleet +too busy off the Irish coast to sniff into any eshtuaries.” +</p> + +<p> +“But if those cruisers are crocks, why does the Admiral let ’em out +of Weymouth at all?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“The tax-payer,” said Mr. Moorshed. +</p> + +<p> +“An’ newspapers,” added Mr. Pyecroft. “In Torbay +they’ll look as they was muckin’ about for strategical +purposes—hammerin’ like blazes in the engine room all the weary +day, an’ the skipper droppin’ questions down the engine-room hatch +every two or three minutes. <i>I’ve</i> been there. Now, Sir?” I +saw the white of his eye turn broad on Mr. Moorshed. +</p> + +<p> +The boy dropped his chin over the speaking-tube. +</p> + +<p> +“Mr. Hinchcliffe, what’s her extreme economical radius?” +</p> + +<p> +“Three hundred and forty knots, down to swept bunkers.” +</p> + +<p> +“Can do,” said Moorshed. “By the way, have her revolutions +any bearing on her speed, Mr. Hinchcliffe?” +</p> + +<p> +“None that I can make out yet, Sir.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then slow to eight knots. We’ll jog down to forty-nine, +forty-five, or four about, and three east. That puts us say forty miles from +Torbay by nine o’clock to-morrow morning. We’ll have to muck about +till dusk before we run in and try our luck with the cruisers.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, Sir. Their picket boats will be panickin’ round them all +night. It’s considered good for the young gentlemen.” +</p> + +<p> +“Hallo! War’s declared! They’re off!” said Moorshed. +</p> + +<p> +He swung 267’s head round to get a better view. A few miles to our right +the low horizon was spangled with small balls of fire, while nearer ran a +procession of tiny cigar ends. +</p> + +<p> +“Red hot! Set ’em alight,” said Mr. Pyecroft. +“That’s the second destroyer flotilla diggin’ out for +Commander Fassett’s reputation.” +</p> + +<p> +The smaller lights disappeared; the glare of the destroyers’ funnels +dwindled even as we watched. +</p> + +<p> +“They’re going down Channel with lights out, thus showin’ +their zeal an’ drivin’ all watch-officers crazy. Now, if +you’ll excuse me, I think I’ll get you your pyjamas, an’ +you’ll turn in,” said Pyecroft. +</p> + +<p> +He piloted me to the steel tunnel, where the ham still swung majestically over +the swaying table, and dragged out trousers and a coat with a monk’s +hood, all hewn from one hairy inch-thick board. +</p> + +<p> +“If you fall over in these you’ll be drowned. They’re +lammies. I’ll chock you off with a pillow; but sleepin’ in a +torpedo-boat’s what you might call an acquired habit.” +</p> + +<p> +I coiled down on an iron-hard horse-hair pillow next the quivering steel wall +to acquire that habit. The sea, sliding over 267’s skin, worried me with +importunate, half-caught confidences. It drummed tackily to gather my +attention, coughed, spat, cleared its throat, and, on the eve of that +portentous communication, retired up stage as a multitude whispering. Anon, I +caught the tramp of armies afoot, the hum of crowded cities awaiting the event, +the single sob of a woman, and dry roaring of wild beasts. A dropped shovel +clanging on the stokehold floor was, naturally enough, the unbarring of arena +gates; our sucking uplift across the crest of some little swell, nothing less +than the haling forth of new worlds; our half-turning descent into the hollow +of its mate, the abysmal plunge of God-forgotten planets. Through all these +phenomena and more—though I ran with wild horses over illimitable plains +of rustling grass; though I crouched belly-flat under appalling fires of +musketry; though I was Livingstone, painless, and incurious in the grip of his +lion—my shut eyes saw the lamp swinging in its gimbals, the irregularly +gliding patch of light on the steel ladder, and every elastic shadow in the +corners of the frail angle-irons; while my body strove to accommodate itself to +the infernal vibration of the machine. At the last I rolled limply on the +floor, and woke to real life with a bruised nose and a great call to go on deck +at once. +</p> + +<p> +“It’s all right,” said a voice in my booming ears. +“Morgan and Laughton are worse than you!” +</p> + +<p> +I was gripping a rail. Mr. Pyecroft pointed with his foot to two bundles beside +a torpedo-tube, which at Weymouth had been a signaller and a most able seaman. +“She’d do better in a bigger sea,” said Mr. Pyecroft. +“This lop is what fetches it up.” +</p> + +<p> +The sky behind us whitened as I laboured, and the first dawn drove down the +Channel, tipping the wave-tops with a chill glare. To me that round wind which +runs before the true day has ever been fortunate and of good omen. It cleared +the trouble from my body, and set my soul dancing to 267’s heel and toe +across the northerly set of the waves—such waves as I had often watched +contemptuously from the deck of a ten-thousand-ton liner. They shouldered our +little hull sideways and passed, scalloped, and splayed out, toward the coast, +carrying our white wake in loops along their hollow backs. In succession we +looked down a lead-grey cutting of water for half a clear mile, were flung up +on its ridge, beheld the Channel traffic—full-sailed to that fair +breeze—all about us, and swung slantwise, light as a bladder, elastic as +a basket, into the next furrow. Then the sun found us, struck the wet gray bows +to living, leaping opal, the colourless deep to hard sapphire, the many sails +to pearl, and the little steam-plume of our escape to an inconstant rainbow. +</p> + +<p> +“A fair day and a fair wind for all, thank God!” said Emanuel +Pyecroft, throwing back the cowl-like hood of his blanket coat. His face was +pitted with coal-dust and grime, pallid for lack of sleep; but his eyes shone +like a gull’s. +</p> + +<p> +“I told you you’d see life. Think o’ the <i>Pedantic</i> now. +Think o’ her Number One chasin’ the mobilised gobbies round the +lower deck flats. Think o’ the pore little snotties now bein’ +washed, fed, and taught, an’ the yeoman o’ signals with a pink eye +wakin’ bright ’an brisk to another perishin’ day of five-flag +hoists. Whereas <i>we</i> shall caulk an’ smoke cigarettes, same as the +Spanish destroyers did for three weeks after war was declared.” He +dropped into the wardroom singing:— +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +If you’re going to marry me, marry me, Bill,<br/> +It’s no use muckin’ about! +</p> + +<p> +The man at the wheel, uniformed in what had once been a Tam-o’-shanter, a +pair of very worn R.M.L.I. trousers rolled up to the knee, and a black sweater, +was smoking a cigarette. Moorshed, in a gray Balaclava and a brown mackintosh +with a flapping cape, hauled at our supplementary funnel guys, and a thing like +a waiter from a Soho restaurant sat at the head of the engine-room ladder +exhorting the unseen below. The following wind beat down our smoke and covered +all things with an inch-thick layer of stokers, so that eyelids, teeth, and +feet gritted in their motions. I began to see that my previous experiences +among battleships and cruisers had been altogether beside the mark. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3><a name="chap09"></a>PART II</h3> + +<p class="poem"> +The wind went down with the sunset—<br/> + The fog came up with the tide,<br/> +When the Witch of the North took an Egg-shell (<i>bis</i>)<br/> + With a little Blue Devil inside.<br/> +“Sink,” she said, “or swim,” she said,<br/> + “It’s all you will get from me.<br/> +And that is the finish of him!” she said,<br/> + And the Egg-shell went to sea.<br/> +<br/> +The wind got up with the morning,<br/> + And the fog blew off with the rain,<br/> +When the Witch of the North saw the Egg-shell<br/> + And the little Blue Devil again.<br/> +“Did you swim?” she said. “Did you sink?” she +said,<br/> + And the little Blue Devil replied:<br/> +“For myself I swam, but I think,” he said,<br/> + “There’s somebody sinking outside.” +</p> + +<p> +But for the small detail that I was a passenger and a civilian, and might not +alter her course, torpedo-boat No. 267 was mine to me all that priceless day. +Moorshed, after breakfast—frizzled ham and a devil that Pyecroft made out +of sardines, anchovies, and French mustard smashed together with a +spanner—showed me his few and simple navigating tools, and took an +observation. Morgan, the signaller, let me hold the chamois leathers while he +cleaned the searchlight (we seemed to be better equipped with electricity than +most of our class), that lived under a bulbous umbrella-cover amidship. Then +Pyecroft and Morgan, standing easy, talked together of the King’s Service +as reformers and revolutionists, so notably, that were I not engaged on this +tale I would, for its conclusion, substitute theirs. +</p> + +<p> +I would speak of Hinchcliffe—Henry Salt Hinchcliffe, first-class +engine-room artificer, and genius in his line, who was prouder of having taken +part in the Hat Crusade in his youth than of all his daring, his skill, and his +nickel-steel nerve. I consorted with him for an hour in the packed and dancing +engine-room, when Moorshed suggested “whacking her up” to eighteen +knots, to see if she would stand it. The floor was ankle-deep in a creamy +batter of oil and water; each moving part flicking more oil in +zoetrope-circles, and the gauges invisible for their dizzy chattering on the +chattering steel bulkhead. Leading stoker Grant, said to be a bigamist, an +ox-eyed man smothered in hair, took me to the stokehold and planted me between +a searing white furnace and some hell-hot iron plate for fifteen minutes, while +I listened to the drone of fans and the worry of the sea without, striving to +wrench all that palpitating firepot wide open. +</p> + +<p> +Then I came on deck and watched Moorshed—revolving in his orbit from the +canvas bustle and torpedo-tubes aft, by way of engine-room, conning-tower, and +wheel, to the doll’s house of a foc’sle—learned in experience +withheld from me, moved by laws beyond my knowledge, authoritative, entirely +adequate, and yet, in heart, a child at his play. <i>I</i> could not take ten +steps along the crowded deck but I collided with some body or thing; but he and +his satellites swung, passed, and returned on their vocations with the freedom +and spaciousness of the well-poised stars. +</p> + +<p> +Even now I can at will recall every tone and gesture, with each dissolving +picture inboard or overside—Hinchcliffe’s white arm buried to the +shoulder in a hornet’s nest of spinning machinery; Moorshed’s halt +and jerk to windward as he looked across the water; Pyecroft’s back bent +over the Berthon collapsible boat, while he drilled three men in expanding it +swiftly; the outflung white water at the foot of a homeward-bound Chinaman not +a hundred yards away, and her shadow-slashed, rope-purfled sails bulging +sideways like insolent cheeks; the ribbed and pitted coal-dust on our decks, +all iridescent under the sun; the first filmy haze that paled the shadows of +our funnels about lunch time; the gradual die-down and dulling over of the +short, cheery seas; the sea that changed to a swell: the swell that crumbled up +and ran allwhither oilily: the triumphant, almost audible roll inward of +wandering fog-walls that had been stalking us for two hours, and—welt +upon welt, chill as the grave—the drive of the interminable main fog of +the Atlantic. We slowed to little more than steerage-way and lay listening. +Presently a hand-bellows foghorn jarred like a corncrake, and there rattled out +of the mist a big ship literally above us. We could count the rivets in her +plates as we scrooped by, and the little drops of dew gathered below them. +</p> + +<p> +“Wonder why they’re always barks—always steel—always +four-masted—an’ never less than two thousand tons. But they +are,” said Pyecroft. He was out on the turtle-backed bows of her; +Moorshed was at the wheel, and another man worked the whistle. +</p> + +<p> +“This fog is the best thing could ha’ happened to us,” said +Moorshed. “It gives us our chance to run in on the quiet…. Hal-lo!” +</p> + +<p> +A cracked bell rang. Clean and sharp (beautifully grained, too), a bowsprit +surged over our starboard bow, the bobstay confidentially hooking itself into +our forward rail. +</p> + +<p> +I saw Pyecroft’s arm fly up; heard at the same moment the severing of the +tense rope, the working of the wheel, Moorshed’s voice down the tube +saying, “Astern a little, please, Mr. Hinchcliffe!” and +Pyecroft’s cry, “Trawler with her gear down! Look out for our +propeller, Sir, or we’ll be wrapped up in the rope.” +</p> + +<p> +267 surged quickly under my feet, as the pressure of the downward-bearing +bobstay was removed. Half-a-dozen men of the foc’sle had already thrown +out fenders, and stood by to bear off a just visible bulwark. +</p> + +<p> +Still going astern, we touched slowly, broadside on, to a suggestive crunching +of fenders, and I looked into the deck of a Brixham trawler, her crew struck +dumb. +</p> + +<p> +“Any luck?” said Moorshed politely. +</p> + +<p> +“Not till we met yeou,” was the answer. “The Lard he saved us +from they big ships to be spitted by the little wan. Where be’e gwine tu +with our fine new bobstay?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yah! You’ve had time to splice it by now,” said Pyecroft +with contempt. +</p> + +<p> +“Aie; but we’m all crushed to port like aigs. You was runnin’ +twenty-seven knots, us reckoned it. Didn’t us, Albert?” +</p> + +<p> +“Liker twenty-nine, an’ niver no whistle.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, we always do that. Do you want a tow to Brixham?” said +Moorshed. +</p> + +<p> +A great silence fell upon those wet men of the sea. +</p> + +<p> +We lifted a little toward their side, but our silent, quick-breathing crew, +braced and strained outboard, bore us off as though we had been a mere +picket-boat. +</p> + +<p> +“What for?” said a puzzled voice. +</p> + +<p> +“For love; for nothing. You’ll be abed in Brixham by +midnight.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yiss; but trawl’s down.” +</p> + +<p> +“No hurry. I’ll pass you a line and go ahead. Sing out when +you’re ready.” A rope smacked on their deck with the word; they +made it fast; we slid forward, and in ten seconds saw nothing save a few feet +of the wire rope running into fog over our stern; but we heard the noise of +debate. +</p> + +<p> +“Catch a Brixham trawler letting go of a free tow in a fog,” said +Moorshed listening. +</p> + +<p> +“But what in the world do you want him for?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, he’ll came in handy later.” +</p> + +<p> +“Was that your first collision?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” I shook hands with him in silence, and our tow hailed us. +</p> + +<p> +“Aie! yeou little man-o’-war!” The voice rose muffled and +wailing. “After us’ve upped trawl, us’ll be glad of a tow. +Leave line just slack abaout as ’tis now, and kip a good fine look-out +be’ind ’ee.” +</p> + +<p> +“There’s an accommodatin’ blighter for you!” said +Pyecroft. “Where does he expect we’ll be, with these currents +evolutin’ like sailormen at the Agricultural Hall?” +</p> + +<p> +I left the bridge to watch the wire-rope at the stern as it drew out and +smacked down upon the water. By what instinct or guidance 267 kept it from +fouling her languidly flapping propeller, I cannot tell. The fog now thickened +and thinned in streaks that bothered the eyes like the glare of intermittent +flash-lamps; by turns granting us the vision of a sick sun that leered and +fled, or burying all a thousand fathom deep in gulfs of vapours. At no time +could we see the trawler though we heard the click of her windlass, the jar of +her trawl-beam, and the very flap of the fish on her deck. Forward was Pyecroft +with the lead; on the bridge Moorshed pawed a Channel chart; aft sat I, +listening to the whole of the British Mercantile Marine (never a keel less) +returning to England, and watching the fog-dew run round the bight of the tow +back to its mother-fog. +</p> + +<p> +“Aie! yeou little man-o’-war! We’m done with trawl. You can +take us home if you know the road.” +</p> + +<p> +“Right O!” said Moorshed. “We’ll give the fishmonger a +run for his money. Whack her up, Mr. Hinchcliffe.” +</p> + +<p> +The next few hours completed my education. I saw that I ought to be afraid, but +more clearly (this was when a liner hooted down the back of my neck) that any +fear which would begin to do justice to the situation would, if yielded to, +incapacitate me for the rest of my days. A shadow of spread sails, deeper than +the darkening twilight, brooding over us like the wings of Azrael (Pyecroft +said she was a Swede), and, miraculously withdrawn, persuaded me that there was +a working chance that I should reach the beach—any beach—alive, if +not dry; and (this was when an economical tramp laved our port-rail with her +condenser water) were I so spared, I vowed I would tell my tale worthily. +</p> + +<p> +Thus we floated in space as souls drift through raw time. Night added herself +to the fog, and I laid hold on my limbs jealously, lest they, too, should melt +in the general dissolution. +</p> + +<p> +“Where’s that prevaricatin’ fishmonger?” said Pyecroft, +turning a lantern on a scant yard of the gleaming wire-rope that pointed like a +stick to my left. “He’s doin’ some fancy steerin’ on +his own. No wonder Mr. Hincheliffe is blasphemious. The tow’s sheered off +to starboard, Sir. He’ll fair pull the stern out of us.” +</p> + +<p> +Moorshed, invisible, cursed through the megaphone into invisibility. +</p> + +<p> +“Aie! yeou little man-o’-war!” The voice butted through the +fog with the monotonous insistence of a strayed sheep’s. “We +don’t all like the road you’m takin’. ’Tis no road to +Brixham. You’ll be buckled up under Prawle Point by’mbye.” +</p> + +<p> +“Do you pretend to know where you are?” the megaphone roared. +</p> + +<p> +“Iss, I reckon; but there’s no pretence to me!” +</p> + +<p> +“O Peter!” said Pyecroft. “Let’s hang him at ’is +own gaff.” +</p> + +<p> +I could not see what followed, but Moorshed said: “Take another man with +you. If you lose the tow, you’re done. I’ll slow her down.” +</p> + +<p> +I heard the dinghy splash overboard ere I could cry “Murder!” Heard +the rasp of a boat-hook along the wire-rope, and then, as it had been in my +ear, Pyecroft’s enormous and jubilant bellow astern: “Why, +he’s here! Right atop of us! The blighter ’as pouched half the tow, +like a shark!” A long pause filled with soft Devonian bleatings. Then +Pyecroft, <i>solo arpeggio</i>: “Rum? Rum? Rum? Is that all? Come +an’ try it, uncle.” +</p> + +<p> +I lifted my face to where once God’s sky had been, and besought The Trues +I might not die inarticulate, amid these half-worked miracles, but live at +least till my fellow-mortals could be made one-millionth as happy as I was +happy. I prayed and I waited, and we went slow—slow as the processes of +evolution—till the boat-hook rasped again. +</p> + +<p> +“He’s not what you might call a scientific navigator,” said +Pyecroft, still in the dinghy, but rising like a fairy from a pantomime trap. +“The lead’s what ’e goes by mostly; rum is what he’s +come for; an’ Brixham is ’is ’ome. Lay on, Mucduff!” +</p> + +<p> +A white whiskered man in a frock-coat—as I live by bread, a +frock-coat!—sea-boots, and a comforter crawled over the torpedo-tube into +Moorshed’s grip and vanished forward. +</p> + +<p> +“’E’ll probably ’old three gallon (look sharp with that +dinghy!); but ’is nephew, left in charge of the <i>Agatha</i>, wants two +bottles command-allowance. You’re a tax-payer, Sir. Do you think that +excessive?” +</p> + +<p> +“Lead there! Lead!” rang out from forward. +</p> + +<p> +“Didn’t I say ’e wouldn’t understand compass +deviations? Watch him close. It’ll be worth it!” +</p> + +<p> +As I neared the bridge I heard the stranger say: “Let me zmell un!” +and to his nose was the lead presented by a trained man of the King’s +Navy. +</p> + +<p> +“I’ll tell ’ee where to goo, if yeou’ll tell your +donkey-man what to du. I’m no hand wi’ steam.” On these lines +we proceeded miraculously, and, under Moorshed’s orders—I was the +fisherman’s Ganymede, even as “M. de C.” had served the +captain—I found both rum and curaçoa in a locker, and mixed them equal +bulk in an enamelled iron cup. +</p> + +<p> +“Now we’m just abeam o’ where we should be,” he said at +last, “an’ here we’ll lay till she lifts. I’d take +’e in for another bottle—and wan for my nevvy; but I reckon +yeou’m shart-allowanced for rum. That’s nivver no Navy rum +yeou’m give me. Knowed ’ee by the smack tu un. Anchor now!” +</p> + +<p> +I was between Pyecroft and Moorshed on the bridge, and heard them spring to +vibrating attention at my side. A man with a lead a few feet to port caught the +panic through my body, and checked like a wild boar at gaze, for not far away +an unmistakable ship’s bell was ringing. It ceased, and another began. +</p> + +<p> +“Them!” said Pyecroft. “Anchored!” +</p> + +<p> +“More!” said our pilot, passing me the cup, and I filled it. The +trawler astern clattered vehemently on her bell. Pyecroft with a jerk of his +arm threw loose the forward three-pounder. The bar of the back-sight was +heavily blobbed with dew; the foresight was invisible. +</p> + +<p> +“No—they wouldn’t have their picket-boats out in this +weather, though they ought to.” He returned the barrel to its crotch +slowly. +</p> + +<p> +“Be yeou gwine to anchor?” said Macduff, smacking his lips, +“or be yeou gwine straight on to Livermead Beach?” +</p> + +<p> +“Tell him what we’re driving at. Get it into his head +somehow,” said Moorshed; and Pyecroft, snatching the cup from me, +enfolded the old man with an arm and a mist of wonderful words. +</p> + +<p> +“And if you pull it off,” said Moorshed at the last, +“I’ll give you a fiver.” +</p> + +<p> +“Lard! What’s fivers to me, young man? My nevvy, he likes +’em; but I do cherish more on fine drink than filthy lucre any day +o’ God’s good weeks. Leave goo my arm, yeou common sailorman! I +tall ’ee, gentlemen, I hain’t the ram-faced, ruddle-nosed old fule +yeou reckon I be. Before the mast I’ve fared in my time; fisherman +I’ve been since I seed the unsense of sea-dangerin’. Baccy and +spirits—yiss, an’ cigars too, I’ve run a plenty. I’m no +blind harse or boy to be coaxed with your forty-mile free towin’ and rum +atop of all. There’s none more sober to Brix’am this tide, I +don’t care who ’tis—than me. <i>I</i> know—<i>I</i> +know. Yander’m two great King’s ships. Yeou’m wishful to +sink, burn, and destroy they while us kips ’em busy sellin’ fish. +No need tall me so twanty taime over. Us’ll find they ships! Us’ll +find ’em, if us has to break our fine new bowsprit so close as +Crump’s bull’s horn!” +</p> + +<p> +“Good egg!” quoth Moorshed, and brought his hand down on the wide +shoulders with the smack of a beaver’s tail. +</p> + +<p> +“Us’ll go look for they by hand. Us’ll give they something to +play upon; an’ do ’ee deal with them faithfully, an’ may the +Lard have mercy on your sowls! Amen. Put I in dinghy again.” +</p> + +<p> +The fog was as dense as ever—we moved in the very womb of night—but +I cannot recall that I took the faintest note of it as the dinghy, guided by +the tow-rope, disappeared toward the <i>Agatha</i>, Pyecroft rowing. The bell +began again on the starboard bow. +</p> + +<p> +“We’re pretty near,” said Moorshed, slowing down. “Out +with the Berthon. (<i>We’ll</i> sell ’em fish, too.) And if any one +rows Navy-stroke, I’ll break his jaw with the tiller. Mr. Hinchcliffe +(this down the tube), “you’ll stay here in charge with Gregory and +Shergold and the engine-room staff. Morgan stays, too, for signalling +purposes.” A deep groan broke from Morgan’s chest, but he said +nothing. “If the fog thins and you’re seen by any one, +keep’em quiet with the signals. I can’t think of the precise lie +just now, but <i>you</i> can, Morgan.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, Sir.” +</p> + +<p> +“Suppose their torpedo-nets are down?” I whispered, shivering with +excitement. +</p> + +<p> +“If they’ve been repairing minor defects all day, they won’t +have any one to spare from the engine-room, and ‘Out nets!’ is a +job for the whole ship’s company. I expect they’ve trusted to the +fog—like us. Well, Pyecroft?” +</p> + +<p> +That great soul had blown up on to the bridge like a feather. “’Ad +to see the first o’ the rum into the <i>Agathites</i>, Sir. They was a +bit jealous o’ their commandin’ officer comin’ ’ome so +richly lacquered, and at first the <i>conversazione</i> languished, as you +might say. But they sprang to attention ere I left. Six sharp strokes on the +bells, if any of ’em are sober enough to keep tally, will be the signal +that our consort ’as cast off her tow an’ is manceuvrin’ on +’er own.” +</p> + +<p> +“Right O! Take Laughton with you in the dinghy. Put that Berthon over +quietly there! Are you all right, Mr. Hinchcliffe?” +</p> + +<p> +I stood back to avoid the rush of half-a-dozen shadows dropping into the +Berthon boat. A hand caught me by the slack of my garments, moved me in +generous arcs through the night, and I rested on the bottom of the dinghy. +</p> + +<p> +“I want you for <i>prima facie</i> evidence, in case the vaccination +don’t take,” said Pyecroft in my ear. “Push off, Alf!” +</p> + +<p> +The last bell-ringing was high overhead. It was followed by six little tinkles +from the <i>Agatha</i>, the roar of her falling anchor, the clash of pans, and +loose shouting. +</p> + +<p> +“Where be gwine tu? Port your ’ellum. Aie! you mud-dredger in the +fairway, goo astern! Out boats! She’ll sink us!” +</p> + +<p> +A clear-cut Navy voice drawled from the clouds: “Quiet! you gardeners +there. This is the <i>Cryptic</i> at anchor.” +</p> + +<p> +“Thank you for the range,” said Pyecroft, and paddled gingerly. +“Feel well out in front of you, Alf. Remember your fat fist is our only +Marconi installation.” The voices resumed: +</p> + +<p> +“Bournemouth steamer he says she be.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then where be Brixham Harbor?” +</p> + +<p> +“Damme, I’m a tax-payer tu. They’ve no right to cruise about +this way. I’ll have the laa on ’ee if anything carries away.” +</p> + +<p> +Then the man-of-war: +</p> + +<p> +“Short on your anchor! Heave short, you howling maniacs! You’ll get +yourselves smashed in a minute if you drift.” +</p> + +<p> +The air was full of these and other voices as the dinghy, checking, swung. I +passed one hand down Laughton’s stretched arm and felt an iron gooseneck +and a foot or two of a backward-sloping torpedo-net boom. The other hand I laid +on broad, cold iron—even the flanks of H.M.S. <i>Cryptic</i>, which is +twelve thousand tons. +</p> + +<p> +I heard a scrubby, raspy sound, as though Pyecroft had chosen that hour to +shave, and I smelled paint. “Drop aft a bit, Alf; we’ll put a +stencil under the stern six-inch casements.” +</p> + +<p> +Boom by boom Laughlin slid the dinghy along the towering curved wall. Once, +twice, and again we stopped, and the keen scrubbing sound was renewed. +</p> + +<p> +“Umpires are ’ard-’earted blighters, but this ought to +convince ’em…. Captain Panke’s stern-walk is now above our +defenceless ’eads. Repeat the evolution up the starboard side, +Alf.” +</p> + +<p> +I was only conscious that we moved around an iron world palpitating with life. +Though my knowledge was all by touch—as, for example, when Pyecroft led +my surrendered hand to the base of some bulging sponson, or when my palm closed +on the knife-edge of the stem and patted it timidly—yet I felt lonely and +unprotected as the enormous, helpless ship was withdrawn, and we drifted away +into the void where voices sang: +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +Tom Pearce, Tom Pearce, lend me thy gray mare,<br/> +All along, out along, down along lea!<br/> +I want for to go to Widdicombe Fair<br/> +With Bill Brewer, Sam Sewer, Peter Gurney, Harry Hawke,<br/> +Old Uncle Tom Cobley an’ all! +</p> + +<p> +“That’s old Sinbad an’ ’is little lot from the +<i>Agatha</i>! Give way, Alf! <i>You</i> might sing somethin’, +too.” +</p> + +<p> +“I’m no burnin’ Patti. Ain’t there noise enough for +you, Pye?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, but it’s only amateurs. Give me the tones of ’earth and +’ome. Ha! List to the blighter on the ’orizon sayin’ his +prayers, Navy-fashion. ’Eaven ’elp me argue that way when I’m +a warrant-officer!” +</p> + +<p> +We headed with little lapping strokes toward what seemed to be a fair-sized +riot. +</p> + +<p> +“An’ I’ve ’eard the <i>Devolution</i> called a happy +ship, too,” said Pyecroft. “Just shows ’ow a man’s +misled by prejudice. She’s peevish—that’s what she +is—nasty-peevish. Prob’ly all because the <i>Agathites</i> are +scratching ’er paint. Well, rub along, Alf. I’ve got the +lymph!” +</p> + +<p> +A voice, which Mr. Pyecroft assured me belonged to a chief carpenter, was +speaking through an aperture (starboard bow twelve-pounder on the lower deck). +He did not wish to purchase any fish, even at grossly reduced rates. Nobody +wished to buy any fish. This ship was the <i>Devolution</i> at anchor, and +desired no communication with shore boats. +</p> + +<p> +“Mark how the Navy ’olds it’s own. He’s sober. The +<i>Agathites</i> are not, as you might say, an’ yet they can’t live +with ’im. It’s the discipline that does it. ’Ark to the bald +an’ unconvincin’ watch-officer chimin’ in. I wonder where Mr. +Moorshed has got to?” +</p> + +<p> +We drifted down the <i>Devolution’s</i> side, as we had drifted down her +sister’s; and we dealt with her in that dense gloom as we had dealt with +her sister. +</p> + +<p> +“Whai! ’Tis a man-o’-war, after all! I can see the +captain’s whisker all gilt at the edges! We took ’ee for the +Bournemouth steamer. Three cheers for the real man-o’-war!” +</p> + +<p> +That cry came from under the <i>Devolution’s</i> stern. Pyecroft held +something in his teeth, for I heard him mumble, “Our Mister +Moorshed!” +</p> + +<p> +Said a boy’s voice above us, just as we dodged a jet of hot water from +some valve: “I don’t half like that cheer. If I’d been the +old man I’d ha’ turned loose the quick-firers at the first go-off. +Aren’t they rowing Navy-stroke, yonder?” +</p> + +<p> +“True,” said Pyecroft, listening to retreating oars. +“It’s time to go ’ome when snotties begin to think. The +fog’s thinnin’, too.” +</p> + +<p> +I felt a chill breath on my forehead, and saw a few feet of the steel stand out +darker than the darkness, disappear—it was then the dinghy shot away from +it—and emerge once more. +</p> + +<p> +“Hallo! what boat’s that?” said the voice suspiciously. +</p> + +<p> +“Why, I do believe it’s a real man-o’-war, after all,” +said Pyecroft, and kicked Laughton. +</p> + +<p> +“What’s that for?” Laughton was no dramatist. +</p> + +<p> +“Answer in character, you blighter! Say somethin’ opposite.” +</p> + +<p> +“What boat’s <i>thatt</i>?” The hail was repeated. +</p> + +<p> +“What do yee say-ay?” Pyecroft bellowed, and, under his breath to +me: “Give us a hand.” +</p> + +<p> +“It’s called the <i>Marietta</i>—F. J. +Stokes—Torquay,” I began, quaveringly. “At least, +that’s the name on the name-board. I’ve been dining—on a +yacht.” +</p> + +<p> +“I see.” The voice shook a little, and my way opened before me with +disgraceful ease. +</p> + +<p> +“Yesh. Dining private yacht. <i>Eshmesheralda</i>. I belong to Torquay +Yacht Club. <i>Are</i> you member Torquay Yacht Club?” +</p> + +<p> +“You’d better go to bed, Sir. Good-night.” We slid into the +rapidly thinning fog. +</p> + +<p> +“Dig out, Alf. Put your <i>nix mangiare</i> back into it. The fog’s +peelin’ off like a petticoat. Where’s Two Six Seven?” +</p> + +<p> +“I can’t see her,” I replied, “but there’s a +light low down ahead.” +</p> + +<p> +“The <i>Agatha</i>!” They rowed desperately through the uneasy +dispersal of the fog for ten minutes and ducked round the trawler’s bow. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, Emanuel means ‘God with us’—so far.” +Pyecroft wiped his brow, laid a hand on the low rail, and as he boosted me up +to the trawler, I saw Moorshed’s face, white as pearl in the thinning +dark. +</p> + +<p> +“Was it all right?” said he, over the bulwarks. +</p> + +<p> +“Vaccination ain’t in it. She’s took beautiful. But +where’s 267, Sir?” Pyecroft replied. +</p> + +<p> +“Gone. We came here as the fog lifted. I gave the <i>Devolution</i> four. +Was that you behind us?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, sir; but I only got in three on the <i>Devolution</i>. I gave the +<i>Cryptic</i> nine, though. They’re what you might call more or less +vaccinated.” +</p> + +<p> +He lifted me inboard, where Moorshed and six pirates lay round the +<i>Agatha’s</i> hatch. There was a hint of daylight in the cool air. +</p> + +<p> +“Where is the old man?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Still selling ’em fish, I suppose. He’s a darling! But I +wish I could get this filthy paint off my hands. Hallo! What the deuce is the +<i>Cryptic</i> signalling?” +</p> + +<p> +A pale masthead light winked through the last of the fog. It was answered by a +white pencil to the southward. +</p> + +<p> +“Destroyer signalling with searchlight.” Pyecroft leaped on the +stern-rail. “The first part is private signals. Ah! now she’s +Morsing against the fog. ‘P-O-S-T—yes, +‘postpone’—‘D-E-P- (go on)! +departure—till—further—orders—which—will—be +com (he’s dropped the other m) unicated—verbally. End,’. He +swung round. “<i>Cryptic</i> is now answering: +‘Ready—proceed—immediately. +What—news—promised—destroyer—flotilla?’” +</p> + +<p> +“Hallo!” said Moorshed. “Well, never mind, They’ll come +too late.” +</p> + +<p> +“Whew! That’s some ’igh-born suckling on the destroyer. +Destroyer signals: ‘Care not. All will be known later.’ What merry +beehive’s broken loose now?” +</p> + +<p> +“What odds! We’ve done our little job.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why—why—it’s Two Six Seven!” +</p> + +<p> +Here Pyecroft dropped from the rail among the fishy nets and shook the +<i>Agatha</i> with heavings. Moorshed cast aside his cigarette, looked over the +stern, and fell into his subordinate’s arms. I heard the guggle of +engines, the rattle of a little anchor going over not a hundred yards away, a +cough, and Morgan’s subdued hail. … So far as I remember, it was Laughton +whom I hugged; but the men who hugged me most were Pyecroft and Moorshed, +adrift among the fishy nets. +</p> + +<p> +There was no semblance of discipline in our flight over the +<i>Agatha’s</i> side, nor, indeed, were ordinary precautions taken for +the common safety, because (I was in the Berthon) they held that patent boat +open by hand for the most part. We regained our own craft, cackling like wild +geese, and crowded round Moorshed and Hinchcliffe. Behind us the +<i>Agatha’s</i> boat, returning from her fish-selling cruise, yelled: +“Have ’ee done the trick? Have ’ee done the trick?” and +we could only shout hoarsely over the stern, guaranteeing them rum by the +hold-full. +</p> + +<p> +“Fog got patchy here at 12:27,” said Henry Salt Hinchcliffe, +growing clearer every instant in the dawn. “Went down to Brixham Harbour +to keep out of the road. Heard whistles to the south and went to look. I had +her up to sixteen good. Morgan kept on shedding private Red Fleet signals out +of the signal-book, as the fog cleared, till we was answered by three +destroyers. Morgan signalled ’em by searchlight: ‘Alter course to +South Seventeen East, so as not to lose time.’ They came round quick. We +kept well away—on their port beam—and Morgan gave ’em their +orders.” He looked at Morgan and coughed. +</p> + +<p> +“The signalman, acting as second in command,” said Morgan, +swelling, “then informed destroyer flotilla that <i>Cryptic</i> and +<i>Devolution</i> had made good defects, and, in obedience to Admiral’s +supplementary orders (I was afraid they might suspect that, but they +didn’t), had proceeded at seven knots at 11:23 <small>P.M</small>. to rendezvous near +Channel Islands, seven miles N.N.W. the Casquet light. (I’ve rendezvoused +there myself, Sir.) Destroyer flotilla would therefore follow cruisers and +catch up with them on their course. Destroyer flotilla then dug out on course +indicated, all funnels sparking briskly.” +</p> + +<p> +“Who were the destroyers?” +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Wraith, Kobbold, Stiletto</i>, Lieutenant-Commander A. L. Hignett, +acting under Admiral’s orders to escort cruisers received off the Dodman +at 7 <small>P.M</small>. They’d come slow on account of fog.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then who were you?” +</p> + +<p> +“We were the <i>Afrite</i>, port-engine broke down, put in to Torbay, and +there instructed by <i>Cryptic</i>, previous to her departure with +<i>Devolution</i>) to inform Commander Hignett of change of plans. +Lieutenant-Commander Hignett signalled that our meeting was quite providential. +After this we returned to pick up our commanding officer, and being +interrogated by <i>Cryptic</i>, marked time signalling as requisite, which you +may have seen. The <i>Agatha</i> representing the last known +rallying-point—or, as I should say, pivot-ship of the evolution—it +was decided to repair to the <i>Agatha</i> at conclusion of manœuvre.” +</p> + +<p> +We breathed deeply, all of us, but no one spoke a word till Moorshed said: +“Is there such a thing as one fine big drink aboard this one fine big +battleship?” +</p> + +<p> +“Can do, sir,” said Pyecroft, and got it. Beginning with Mr. +Moorshed and ending with myself, junior to the third first-class stoker, we +drank, and it was as water of the brook, that two and a half inches of stiff, +treacly, Navy rum. And we looked each in the other’s face, and we nodded, +bright-eyed, burning with bliss. +</p> + +<p> +Moorshed walked aft to the torpedo-tubes and paced back and forth, a captain +victorious on his own quarterdeck; and the triumphant day broke over the +green-bedded villas of Torquay to show us the magnitude of our victory. There +lay the cruisers (I have reason to believe that they had made good their +defects). They were each four hundred and forty feet long and sixty-six wide; +they held close upon eight hundred men apiece, and they had cost, say, a +million and a half the pair. And they were ours, and they did not know it. +Indeed, the <i>Cryptic</i>, senior ship, was signalling vehement remarks to our +address, which we did not notice. +</p> + +<p> +“If you take these glasses, you’ll get the general run o’ +last night’s vaccination,” said Pyecroft. “Each one +represents a torpedo got ’ome, as you might say.” +</p> + +<p> +I saw on the <i>Cryptic’s</i> port side, as she lay half a mile away +across the glassy water, four neat white squares in outline, a white blur in +the centre. +</p> + +<p> +“There are five more to starboard. ’Ere’s the +original!” He handed me a paint-dappled copper stencil-plate, two feet +square, bearing in the centre the six-inch initials, “G.M.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ten minutes ago I’d ha’ eulogised about that little trick of +ours, but Morgan’s performance has short-circuited me. Are you happy, +Morgan?” +</p> + +<p> +“Bustin’,” said the signalman briefly. +</p> + +<p> +“You may be. Gawd forgive you, Morgan, for as Queen ’Enrietta said +to the ’ousemaid, <i>I</i> never will. I’d ha’ given a +year’s pay for ten minutes o’ your signallin’ work this +mornin’.” +</p> + +<p> +“I wouldn’t ’ave took it up,” was the answer. +“Perishin’ ’Eavens above! Look at the +<i>Devolution’s</i> semaphore!” Two black wooden arms waved from +the junior ship’s upper bridge. “They’ve seen it.” +</p> + +<p> +“<i>The</i> mote <i>on</i> their neighbour’s beam, of +course,” said Pyecroft, and read syllable by syllable: +“‘Captain Malan to Captain Panke. Is—sten—cilled frieze +your starboard side new Admiralty regulation, or your Number One’s +private expense?’ Now <i>Cryptic</i> is saying, ‘Not +understood.’ Poor old <i>Crippy</i>, the <i>Devolute’s</i> +raggin’ ’er sore. ‘Who is G.M.?’ she says. That’s +fetched the <i>Cryptic</i>. She’s answerin’: ‘You ought to +know. Examine own paintwork.’ Oh, Lord! they’re both on to it now. +This is balm. This is beginning to be balm. I forgive you, Morgan!” +</p> + +<p> +Two frantic pipes twittered. From either cruiser a whaler dropped into the +water and madly rowed round the ship: as a gay-coloured hoist rose to the +<i>Cryptic’s</i> yardarm: “Destroyer will close at once. Wish to +speak by semaphore.” Then on the bridge semaphore itself: “Have +been trying to attract your attention last half hour. Send commanding officer +aboard at once.” +</p> + +<p> +“Our attention? After all the attention we’ve given ’er, +too,” said Pyecroft. “What a greedy old woman!” To Moorshed: +“Signal from the <i>Cryptic</i>, Sir.” +</p> + +<p> +“Never mind that!” said the boy, peering through his glasses. +“Our dinghy quick, or they’ll paint our marks out. Come +along!” +</p> + +<p> +By this time I was long past even hysteria. I remember Pyecroft’s bending +back, the surge of the driven dinghy, a knot of amazed faces as we skimmed the +<i>Cryptic’s</i> ram, and the dropped jaw of the midshipman in her whaler +when we barged fairly into him. +</p> + +<p> +“Mind my paint!” he yelled. +</p> + +<p> +“You mind mine, snotty,” said Moorshed. “I was all night +putting these little ear-marks on you for the umpires to sit on. Leave +’em alone.” +</p> + +<p> +We splashed past him to the <i>Devolution’s</i> boat, where sat no one +less than her first lieutenant, a singularly unhandy-looking officer. +</p> + +<p> +“What the deuce is the meaning of this?” he roared, with an +accusing forefinger. +</p> + +<p> +“You’re sunk, that’s all. You’ve been dead half a +tide.” +</p> + +<p> +“Dead, am I? I’ll show you whether I’m dead or not, +Sir!” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, you may be a survivor,” said Moorshed ingratiatingly, +“though it isn’t at all likely.” +</p> + +<p> +The officer choked for a minute. The midshipman crouched up in stern said, half +aloud: “Then I <i>was</i> right—last night.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yesh,” I gasped from the dinghy’s coal-dust. “Are you +member Torquay Yacht Club?” +</p> + +<p> +“Hell!” said the first lieutenant, and fled away. The +<i>Cryptic’s</i> boat was already at that cruiser’s side, and +semaphores flicked zealously from ship to ship. We floated, a minute speck, +between the two hulls, while the pipes went for the captain’s galley on +the <i>Devolution</i>. +</p> + +<p> +“That’s all right,” said Moorshed. “Wait till the +gangway’s down and then board her decently. We oughtn’t to be +expected to climb up a ship we’ve sunk.” +</p> + +<p> +Pyecroft lay on his disreputable oars till Captain Malan, full-uniformed, +descended the <i>Devolution’s</i> side. With due compliments—not +acknowledged, I grieve to say—we fell in behind his sumptuous galley, and +at last, upon pressing invitation, climbed, black as sweeps all, the lowered +gangway of the <i>Cryptic</i>. At the top stood as fine a constellation of +marine stars as ever sang together of a morning on a King’s ship. Every +one who could get within earshot found that his work took him aft. I counted +eleven able seamen polishing the breechblock of the stern nine-point-two, four +marines zealously relieving each other at the life-buoy, six call-boys, nine +midshipmen of the watch, exclusive of naval cadets, and the higher ranks past +all census. +</p> + +<p> +“If I die o’ joy,” said Pyecroft behind his hand, +“remember I died forgivin’ Morgan from the bottom of my +’eart, because, like Martha, we ’ave scoffed the better part. +You’d better try to come to attention, Sir.” +</p> + +<p> +Moorshed ran his eye voluptuously over the upper deck battery, the huge beam, +and the immaculate perspective of power. Captain Panke and Captain Malan stood +on the well-browned flash-plates by the dazzling hatch. Precisely over the +flagstaff I saw Two Six Seven astern, her black petticoat half hitched up, +meekly floating on the still sea. She looked like the pious Abigail who has +just spoken her mind, and, with folded hands, sits thanking Heaven among the +pieces. I could almost have sworn that she wore black worsted gloves and had a +little dry cough. But it was Captain Panke that coughed so austerely. He +favoured us with a lecture on uniform, deportment, and the urgent necessity of +answering signals from a senior ship. He told us that he disapproved of +masquerading, that he loved discipline, and would be obliged by an explanation. +And while he delivered himself deeper and more deeply into our hands, I saw +Captain Malan wince. He was watching Moorshed’s eye. +</p> + +<p> +“I belong to Blue Fleet, Sir. I command Number Two Six Seven,” said +Moorshed, and Captain Planke was dumb. “Have you such a thing as a +frame-plan of the <i>Cryptic</i> aboard?” He spoke with winning +politeness as he opened a small and neatly folded paper. +</p> + +<p> +“I have, sir.” The little man’s face was working with +passion. +</p> + +<p> +“Ah! Then I shall be able to show you precisely where you were torpedoed +last night in”—he consulted the paper with one finely arched +eyebrow—“in nine places. And since the <i>Devolution</i> is, I +understand, a sister ship”—he bowed slightly toward Caplain +Malan—“the same plan——” +</p> + +<p> +I had followed the clear precision of each word with a dumb amazement which +seemed to leave my mind abnormally clear. I saw Captain Malan’s eye turn +from Moorshed and seek that of the <i>Cryptic’s</i> commander. And he +telegraphed as clearly as Moorshed was speaking: “My dear friend and +brother officer, <i>I</i> know Panke; <i>you</i> know Panke; <i>we</i> know +Panke—good little Panke! In less than three Greenwich chronometer seconds +Panke will make an enormous ass of himself, and I shall have to put things +straight, unless you who are a man of tact and discernment——” +</p> + +<p> +“Carry on.” The Commander’s order supplied the unspoken word. +The cruiser boiled about her business around us; watch and watch officers +together, up to the limit of noise permissible. I saw Captain Malan turn to his +senior. +</p> + +<p> +“Come to my cabin!” said Panke gratingly, and led the way. Pyecroft +and I stayed still. +</p> + +<p> +“It’s all right,” said Pyecroft. “They daren’t +leave us loose aboard for one revolution,” and I knew that he had seen +what I had seen. +</p> + +<p> +“You, too!” said Captain Malan, returning suddenly. We passed the +sentry between white enamelled walls of speckless small arms, and since that +Royal Marine Light infantryman was visibly suffocating from curiosity, I winked +at him. We entered the chintz-adorned, photo-speckled, brass-fendered, +tile-stoved main cabin. Moorshed, with a ruler, was demonstrating before the +frame-plan of H.M.S. <i>Cryptic</i>. +</p> + +<p> +“—making nine stencils in all of my initials G.M.,” I heard +him say. “Further, you will find attached to your rudder, and you, too, +Sir”—he bowed to Captain Malan yet again—“one +fourteen-inch Mark IV practice torpedo, as issued to first-class torpedo-boats, +properly buoyed. I have sent full particulars by telegraph to the umpires, and +have requested them to judge on the facts as they—appear.” He +nodded through the large window to the stencilled <i>Devolution</i> awink with +brass work in the morning sun, and ceased. +</p> + +<p> +Captain Panke faced us. I remembered that this was only play, and caught myself +wondering with what keener agony comes the real defeat. +</p> + +<p> +“Good God, Johnny!” he said, dropping his lower lip like a child, +“this young pup says he has put us both out of action. +Inconceivable—eh? My first command of one of the class. Eh? What shall we +do with him? What shall we do with him—eh?” +</p> + +<p> +“As far as I can see, there’s no getting over the stencils,” +his companion answered. +</p> + +<p> +“Why didn’t I have the nets down? Why didn’t I have the nets +down?” The cry tore itself from Captain Panke’s chest as he twisted +his hands. +</p> + +<p> +“I suppose we’d better wait and find out what the umpires will say. +The Admiral won’t be exactly pleased.” Captain Malan spoke very +soothingly. Moorshed looked out through the stern door at Two Six Seven. +Pyecroft and I, at attention, studied the paintwork opposite. Captain Panke had +dropped into his desk chair, and scribbled nervously at a blotting-pad. +</p> + +<p> +Just before the tension became unendurable, he looked at his junior for a lead. +“What—what are you going to do about it, Johnny—eh?” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, if you don’t want him, I’m going to ask this young +gentleman to breakfast, and then we’ll make and mend clothes till the +umpires have decided.” +</p> + +<p> +Captain Panke flung out a hand swiftly. +</p> + +<p> +“Come with me,” said Captain Malan. “Your men had better go +back in the dinghy to—their—own—ship.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, I think so,” said Moorshed, and passed out behind the +captain. We followed at a respectful interval, waiting till they had ascended +the ladder. +</p> + +<p> +Said the sentry, rigid as the naked barometer behind him: “For +Gawd’s sake! ’Ere, come ’ere! For Gawd’s sake! +What’s ’appened? Oh! come ’<i>ere</i> an’ tell.” +</p> + +<p> +“Tell? You?” said Pyecroft. Neither man’s lips moved, and the +words were whispers: “Your ultimate illegitimate grandchildren might +begin to understand, not you—nor ever will.” +</p> + +<p> +“Captain Malan’s galley away, Sir,” cried a voice above; and +one replied: “Then get those two greasers into their dinghy and hoist the +blue peter. We’re out of action.” +</p> + +<p> +“Can you do it, Sir?” said Pyecroft at the foot of the ladder. +“Do you think it is in the English language, or do you not?” +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t think I can, but I’ll try. If it takes me two years, +I’ll try.” +</p> + +<hr /> + +<p> +There are witnesses who can testify that I have used no artifice. I have, on +the contrary, cut away priceless slabs of <i>opus alexandrinum</i>. My gold I +have lacquered down to dull bronze, my purples overlaid with sepia of the sea, +and for hell-hearted ruby and blinding diamond I have substituted pale amethyst +and mere jargoon. Because I would say again “Disregarding the inventions +of the Marine Captain whose other name is Gubbins, let a plain statement +suffice.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap11"></a>THE COMPREHENSION OF PRIVATE COPPER</h2> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap10"></a>THE KING’S TASK</h2> + +<p class="poem"> +After the sack of the City, when Rome was sunk to a name,<br/> +In the years when the Lights were darkened, or ever Saint Wilfrid came.<br/> +Low on the borders of Britain, the ancient poets sing,<br/> +Between the cliff and the forest there ruled a Saxon king.<br/> +<br/> +Stubborn all were his people, a stark and a jealous horde—<br/> +Not to be schooled by the cudgel, scarce to be cowed by the sword;<br/> +Blithe to turn at their pleasure, bitter to cross in their mood,<br/> +And set on the ways of their choosing as the hogs of Andred’s Wood …<br/> +<br/> +They made them laws in the Witan, the laws of flaying and fine,<br/> +Folkland, common and pannage, the theft and the track of kine;<br/> +Statutes of tun and of market for the fish and the malt and the meal,<br/> +The tax on the Bramber packhorse and the tax on the Hastings keel.<br/> +Over the graves of the Druids and over the wreck of Rome<br/> +Rudely but deeply they bedded the plinth of the days to come.<br/> +Behind the feet of the Legions and before the Northman’s ire,<br/> +Rudely but greatly begat they the body of state and of shire.<br/> +Rudely but greatly they laboured, and their labour stands till now<br/> +If we trace on our ancient headlands the twist of their eight-ox plough. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2>THE COMPREHENSION OF PRIVATE COPPER</h2> + +<p> +Private Copper’s father was a Southdown shepherd; in early youth Copper +had studied under him. Five years’ army service had somewhat blunted +Private Copper’s pastoral instincts, but it occurred to him as a memory +of the Chalk that sheep, or in this case buck, do not move towards one across +turf, or in this case, the Colesberg kopjes unless a stranger, or in this case +an enemy, is in the neighbourhood. Copper, helmet back-first advanced with +caution, leaving his mates of the picket full a mile behind. The picket, +concerned for its evening meal, did not protest. A year ago it would have been +an officer’s command, moving as such. To-day it paid casual allegiance to +a Canadian, nominally a sergeant, actually a trooper of Irregular Horse, +discovered convalescent in Naauwport Hospital, and forthwith employed on odd +jobs. Private Copper crawled up the side of a bluish rock-strewn hill thinly +fringed with brush atop, and remembering how he had peered at Sussex conies +through the edge of furze-clumps, cautiously parted the dry stems before his +face. At the foot of the long slope sat three farmers smoking. To his natural +lust for tobacco was added personal wrath because spiky plants were pricking +his belly, and Private Copper slid the backsight up to fifteen hundred yards…. +</p> + +<p> +“Good evening, Khaki. Please don’t move,” said a voice on his +left, and as he jerked his head round he saw entirely down the barrel of a +well-kept Lee-Metford protruding from an insignificant tuft of thorn. Very few +graven images have moved less than did Private Copper through the next ten +seconds. +</p> + +<p> +“It’s nearer seventeen hundred than fifteen,” said a young +man in an obviously ready-made suit of grey tweed, possessing himself of +Private Copper’s rifle. “Thank <i>you</i>. We’ve got a post +of thirty-seven men out yonder. You’ve eleven—eh? We don’t +want to kill ’em. We have no quarrel with poor uneducated Khakis, and we +do not want prisoners we do not keep. It is demoralising to both +sides—eh?” +</p> + +<p> +Private Copper did not feel called upon to lay down the conduct of guerilla +warfare. This dark-skinned, dark-haired, and dark-eyed stranger was his first +intimate enemy. He spoke, allowing for a clipped cadence that recalled to +Copper vague memories of Umballa, in precisely the same offensive accent that +the young squire of Wilmington had used fifteen years ago when he caught and +kicked Alf Copper, a rabbit in each pocket, out of the ditches of Cuckmere. The +enemy looked Copper up and down, folded and re-pocketed a copy of an English +weekly which he had been reading, and said: “You seem an inarticulate +sort of swine—like the rest of them—eh?” +</p> + +<p> +“You,” said Copper, thinking, somehow, of the crushing answers he +had never given to the young squire, “are a renegid. Why, you ain’t +Dutch. You’re English, same as me.” +</p> + +<p> +“<i>No</i>, khaki. If you cannot talk civilly to a gentleman I will blow +your head off.” +</p> + +<p> +Copper cringed, and the action overbalanced him so that he rolled some six or +eight feet downhill, under the lee of a rough rock. His brain was working with +a swiftness and clarity strange in all his experience of Alf Copper. While he +rolled he spoke, and the voice from his own jaws amazed him: “If you did, +’twouldn’t make you any less of a renegid.” As a useful +afterthought he added: “I’ve sprained my ankle.” +</p> + +<p> +The young man was at his side in a flash. Copper made no motion to rise, but, +cross-legged under the rock, grunted: “’Ow much did old Krujer pay +you for this? What was you wanted for at ’ome? Where did you desert +from?” +</p> + +<p> +“Khaki,” said the young man, sitting down in his turn, “you +are a shade better than your mates. You did not make much more noise than a +yoke of oxen when you tried to come up this hill, but you are an ignorant +diseased beast like the rest of your people—eh? When you were at the +Ragged Schools did they teach you any history, Tommy—’istory I +mean?” +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t need no schoolin’ to know a renegid,” said +Copper. He had made three yards down the hill—out of sight, unless they +could see through rocks, of the enemy’s smoking party. +</p> + +<p> +The young man laughed; and tossed the soldier a black sweating stick of +“True Affection.” (Private Copper had not smoked a pipe for three +weeks.) +</p> + +<p> +“<i>You</i> don’t get this—eh?” said the young man. +“<i>We</i> do. We take it from the trains as we want it. You can keep the +cake—you po-ah Tommee.” Copper rammed the good stuff into his +long-cold pipe and puffed luxuriously. Two years ago the sister of gunner-guard +De Souza, East India Railway, had, at a dance given by the sergeants to the +Allahabad Railway Volunteers, informed Copper that she could not think of +waltzing with “a poo-ah Tommee.” Private Copper wondered why that +memory should have returned at this hour. +</p> + +<p> +“I’m going to waste a little trouble on you before I send you back +to your picket <i>quite</i> naked—eh? Then you can say how you were +overpowered by twenty of us and fired off your last round—like the men we +picked up at the drift playing cards at Stryden’s farm—eh? +What’s your name—eh?” +</p> + +<p> +Private Copper thought for a moment of a far-away housemaid who might still, if +the local postman had not gone too far, be interested in his fate. On the other +hand, he was, by temperament, economical of the truth. “Pennycuik,” +he said, “John Pennycuik.” +</p> + +<p> +“Thank you. Well, Mr. John Pennycuik, I’m going to teach you a +little ’istory, as you’d call it—eh?” +</p> + +<p> +“’Ow!” said Copper, stuffing his left hand in his mouth. +“So long since I’ve smoked I’ve burned my +’and—an’ the pipe’s dropped too. No objection to my +movin’ down to fetch it, is there—Sir?” +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve got you covered,” said the young man, graciously, and +Private Copper, hopping on one leg, because of his sprain, recovered the pipe +yet another three yards downhill and squatted under another rock slightly +larger than the first. A roundish boulder made a pleasant rest for his captor, +who sat cross-legged once more, facing Copper, his rifle across his knee, his +hand on the trigger-guard. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, Mr. Pennycuik, as I was going to tell you. A little after you were +born in your English workhouse, your kind, honourable, brave country, England, +sent an English gentleman, who could not tell a lie, to say that so long as the +sun rose and the rivers ran in their courses the Transvaal would belong to +England. Did you ever hear that, khaki—eh?” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh no, Sir,” said Copper. This sentence about the sun and the +rivers happened to be a very aged jest of McBride, the professional humorist of +D Company, when they discussed the probable length of the war. Copper had +thrown beef-tins at McBride in the grey dawn of many wet and dry camps for +intoning it. +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Of</i> course you would not. Now, mann, I tell you, listen.” He +spat aside and cleared his throat. “Because of that little promise, my +father he moved into the Transvaal and bought a farm—a little place of +twenty or thirty thousand acres, don’t—you—know.” +</p> + +<p> +The tone, in spite of the sing-song cadence fighting with the laboured parody +of the English drawl, was unbearably like the young Wilmington squire’s, +and Copper found himself saying: “I ought to. I’ve ’elped +burn some.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, you’ll pay for that later. <i>And</i> he opened a +store.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ho! Shopkeeper was he?” +</p> + +<p> +“The kind you call “Sir” and sweep the floor for, Pennycuik…. +You see, in those days one used to believe in the British Government. My father +did. <i>Then</i> the Transvaal wiped thee earth with the English. They beat +them six times running. You know <i>thatt</i>—eh?” +</p> + +<p> +“Isn’t what we’ve come ’ere for.” +</p> + +<p> +“<i>But</i> my father (he knows better now) kept on believing in the +English. I suppose it was the pretty talk about rivers and suns that cheated +him—eh? Anyhow, he believed in his own country. Inn his own country. +<i>So</i>—you see—he was a little startled when he found himself +handed over to the Transvaal as a prisoner of war. That’s what it came +to, Tommy—a prisoner of war. You know what that is—eh? England was +too honourable and too gentlemanly to take trouble. There were no terms made +for my father.” +</p> + +<p> +“So ’e made ’em ’imself. Useful old bird.” +Private Copper sliced up another pipeful and looked out across the wrinkled sea +of kopjes, through which came the roar of the rushing Orange River, so unlike +quiet Cuckmere. +</p> + +<p> +The young man’s face darkened. “I think I shall sjambok you myself +when I’ve quite done with you. <i>No</i>, my father (he was a fool) made +no terms for eight years—ninety-six months—and for every day of +them the Transvaal made his life hell for my father and—his +people.” +</p> + +<p> +“I’m glad to hear that,” said the impenitent Copper. +</p> + +<p> +“Are you? You can think of it when I’m taking the skin off your +back—eh?… My father, he lost everything—everything down to his +self-respect. You don’t know what <i>thatt</i> means—eh?” +</p> + +<p> +“Why?” said Copper. “I’m smokin’ baccy stole by a +renegid. Why wouldn’t I know?” +</p> + +<p> +If it came to a flogging on that hillside there might be a chance of reprisals. +Of course, he might be marched to the Boer camp in the next valley and there +operated upon; but Army life teaches no man to cross bridges unnecessarily. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, after eight years, my father, cheated by your bitch of a country, +he found out who was the upper dog in South Africa.” +</p> + +<p> +“That’s me,” said Copper valiantly. “If it takes +another ’alf century, it’s me an’ the likes of me.” +</p> + +<p> +“You? Heaven help you! You’ll be screaming at a wagon-wheel in an +hour…. Then it struck my father that he’d like to shoot the people +who’d betrayed him. You—you—<i>you</i>! He told his son all +about it. He told him never to trust the English. He told him to do them all +the harm he could. Mann, I tell you, I don’t want much telling. I was +born in the Transvaal—I’m a burgher. If my father didn’t love +the English, by the Lord, mann, I tell you, I hate them from the bottom of my +soul.” +</p> + +<p> +The voice quavered and ran high. Once more, for no conceivable reason, Private +Copper found his inward eye turned upon Umballa cantonments of a dry dusty +afternoon, when the saddle-coloured son of a local hotel-keeper came to the +barracks to complain of a theft of fowls. He saw the dark face, the +plover’s-egg-tinted eyeballs, and the thin excited hands. Above all, he +remembered the passionate, queerly-strung words. Slowly he returned to South +Africa, using the very sentence his sergeant had used to the poultry man. +</p> + +<p> +“Go on with your complaint. I’m listenin’.” +</p> + +<p> +“Complaint! Complaint about <i>you</i>, you ox! We strip and kick your +sort by thousands.” +</p> + +<p> +The young man rocked to and fro above the rifle, whose muzzle thus deflected +itself from the pit of Private Copper’s stomach. His face was dusky with +rage. +</p> + +<p> +“Yess, I’m a Transvaal burgher. It took us about twenty years to +find out how rotten you were. <i>We</i> know and you know it now. Your +army—it is the laughing-stock of the Continent.” He tapped the +newspaper in his pocket. “You think you’re going to win, you poor +fools. Your people—your own people—your silly rotten fools of +people will crawl out of it as they did after Majuba. They are beginning now. +Look what your own working classes, the diseased, lying, drinking white stuff +that you come out of, are saying.” He thrust the English weekly, doubled +at the leading article, on Copper’s knee. “See what dirty dogs your +masters are. They do not even back you in your dirty work. <i>We</i> cleared +the country down to Ladysmith—to Estcourt. We cleared the country down to +Colesberg.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, we ’ad to clean up be’ind you. Messy, I call it.” +</p> + +<p> +“You’ve had to stop farm-burning because your people daren’t +do it. They were afraid. You daren’t kill a spy. You daren’t shoot +a spy when you catch him in your own uniform. You daren’t touch our +loyall people in Cape Town! Your masters won’t let you. You will feed our +women and children till we are quite ready to take them back. <i>You</i> +can’t put your cowardly noses out of the towns you say you’ve +occupied. <i>You</i> daren’t move a convoy twenty miles. You think +you’ve done something? You’ve done nothing, and you’ve taken +a quarter of a million of men to do it! There isn’t a nigger in South +Africa that doesn’t obey us if we lift our finger. You pay the stuff four +pounds a month and they lie to you. <i>We</i> flog ’em, as I shall flog +you.” +</p> + +<p> +He clasped his hands together and leaned forward his out-thrust chin within two +feet of Copper’s left, or pipe hand. +</p> + +<p> +“Yuss,” said Copper, “it’s a fair knock-out.” The +fist landed to a hair on the chin-point, the neck snicked like a gun-lock, and +the back of the head crashed on the boulder behind. +</p> + +<p> +Copper grabbed up both rifles, unshipped the cross-bandoliers, drew forth the +English weekly, and picking up the lax hands, looked long and intently at the +fingernails. +</p> + +<p> +“No! Not a sign of it there,” he said. “’Is nails are +as clean as mine—but he talks just like ’em, though. And he’s +a landlord too! A landed proprietor! Shockin’, I call it.” +</p> + +<p> +The arms began to flap with returning consciousness. Private Copper rose up and +whispered: “If you open your head, I’ll bash it.” There was +no suggestion of sprain in the flung-back left boot. “Now walk in front +of me, both arms perpendicularly elevated. I’m only a third-class shot, +so, if you don’t object, I’ll rest the muzzle of my rifle lightly +but firmly on your collar-button—coverin’ the serviceable +vertebree. If your friends see us thus engaged, you +pray—’ard.” +</p> + +<p> +Private and prisoner staggered downhill. No shots broke the peace of the +afternoon, but once the young man checked and was sick. +</p> + +<p> +“There’s a lot of things I could say to you,” Copper +observed, at the close of the paroxysm, “but it doesn’t matter. +Look ’ere, you call me ‘pore Tommy’ again.” +</p> + +<p> +The prisoner hesitated. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, I ain’t goin’ to do anythin’ <i>to</i> you. +I’m recon-noiterin’ in my own. Say ‘pore Tommy’ +’alf-a-dozen times.” +</p> + +<p> +The prisoner obeyed. +</p> + +<p> +“<i>That’s</i> what’s been puzzlin’ me since I +’ad the pleasure o’ meetin’ you,” said Copper. +“You ain’t ’alf-caste, but you talk +<i>chee-chee</i>—<i>pukka</i> bazar chee-chee. <i>Pro</i>ceed.” +</p> + +<p> +“Hullo,” said the Sergeant of the picket, twenty minutes later, +“where did you round him up?” +</p> + +<p> +“On the top o’ yonder craggy mounting. There’s a mob of +’em sitting round their Bibles seventeen ’undred yards (you said it +was seventeen ’undred?) t’other side—an’ I want some +coffee.” He sat down on the smoke-blackened stones by the fire. +</p> + +<p> +“’Ow did you get ’im?” said McBride, professional +humorist, quietly filching the English weekly from under Copper’s armpit. +</p> + +<p> +“On the chin—while ’e was waggin’ it at me.” +</p> + +<p> +“What is ’e? ’Nother Colonial rebel to be ’orribly +disenfranchised, or a Cape Minister, or only a loyal farmer with dynamite in +both boots. Tell us all about it, Burjer!” +</p> + +<p> +“You leave my prisoner alone,” said Private Copper. +“’E’s ’ad losses an’ trouble; an’ +it’s in the family too. ’E thought I never read the papers, so +’e kindly lent me his very own <i>Jerrold’s +Weekly</i>—an’ ’e explained it to me as patronisin’ as +a—as a militia subaltern doin’ Railway Staff Officer. +’E’s a left-over from Majuba—one of the worst kind, an’ +’earin’ the evidence as I did, I don’t exactly blame +’im. It was this way.” +</p> + +<p> +To the picket Private Copper held forth for ten minutes on the life-history of +his captive. Allowing for some purple patches, it was an absolute fair +rendering. +</p> + +<p> +“But what I dis-liked was this baccy-priggin’ beggar, +’oo’s people, on ’is own showin’, couldn’t +’ave been more than thirty or forty years in the coun—on this +Gawd-forsaken dust-’eap, comin’ the squire over me. They’re +all parsons—we know <i>that</i>, but parson <i>an’</i> squire is a +bit too thick for Alf Copper. Why, I caught ’im in the shameful act of +tryin’ to start a aristocracy on a gun an’ a wagon an’ a +<i>shambuk</i>! Yes; that’s what it was: a bloomin’ +aristocracy.” +</p> + +<p> +“No, it weren’t,” said McBride, at length, on the dirt, above +the purloined weekly. “You’re the aristocrat, Alf. Old +<i>Jerrold’s</i> givin’ it you ’ot. You’re the +uneducated ’ireling of a callous aristocracy which ’as sold itself +to the ’Ebrew financier. Meantime, Ducky”—he ran his finger +down a column of assorted paragraphs—“you’re slakin’ +your brutal instincks in furious excesses. Shriekin’ women an’ +desolated ’omesteads is what you enjoy, Alf …, Halloa! What’s a +smokin’ ’ektacomb?” +</p> + +<p> +“’Ere! Let’s look. ’Aven’t seen a proper spicy +paper for a year. Good old <i>Jerrold’s!”</i> Pinewood and Moppet, +reservists, flung themselves on McBride’s shoulders, pinning him to the +ground. +</p> + +<p> +“Lie over your own bloomin’ side of the bed, an’ we can all +look,” he protested. +</p> + +<p> +“They’re only po-ah Tommies,” said Copper, apologetically, to +the prisoner. “Po-ah unedicated Khakis. <i>They</i> don’t know what +they’re fightin’ for. They’re lookin’ for what the +diseased, lying, drinkin’ white stuff that they come from is sayin’ +about ’em!” +</p> + +<p> +The prisoner set down his tin of coffee and stared helplessly round the circle. +</p> + +<p> +“I—I don’t understand them.” +</p> + +<p> +The Canadian sergeant, picking his teeth with a thorn, nodded sympathetically: +</p> + +<p> +“If it comes to that, <i>we</i> don’t in my country!… Say, boys, +when you’re through with your English mail you might’s well provide +an escort for your prisoner. He’s waitin’.” +</p> + +<p> +“Arf a mo’, Sergeant,” said McBride, still reading. +</p> + +<p> +“’Ere’s Old Barbarity on the ramp again with some of +’is lady friends, ’oo don’t like concentration camps. Wish +they’d visit ours. Pinewood’s a married man. He’d know how to +be’ave!” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I ain’t goin’ to amuse my prisoner alone. +’E’s gettin’ ’omesick,” cried Copper. “One +of you thieves read out what’s vexin’ Old Barbarity an’ +’is ’arem these days. You’d better listen, Burjer, because, +afterwards, I’m goin’ to fall out an’ perpetrate those +nameless barbarities all over you to keep up the reputation of the British +Army.” +</p> + +<p> +From that English weekly, to bar out which a large and perspiring staff of +Press censors toiled seven days of the week at Cape Town, did Pinewood of the +Reserve read unctuously excerpts of the speeches of the accredited leaders of +His Majesty’s Opposition. The night-picket arrived in the middle of it, +but stayed entranced without paying any compliments, till Pinewood had entirely +finished the leading article, and several occasional notes. +</p> + +<p> +“Gentlemen of the jury,” said Alf Copper, hitching up what war had +left to him of trousers—“you’ve ’eard what +’e’s been fed up with. <i>Do</i> you blame the beggar? ’Cause +I don’t! … Leave ’im alone, McBride. He’s my first and only +cap-ture, an’ I’m goin’ to walk ’ome with ’im, +ain’t I, Ducky? … Fall in, Burjer. It’s Bermuda, or Umballa, or +Ceylon for you—and I’d give a month’s pay to be in your +little shoes.” +</p> + +<p> +As not infrequently happens, the actual moving off the ground broke the +prisoner’s nerve. He stared at the tinted hills round him, gasped and +began to struggle—kicking, swearing, weeping, and fluttering all +together. +</p> + +<p> +“Pore beggar—oh pore, <i>pore</i> beggar!” said Alf, leaning +in on one side of him, while Pinewood blocked him on the other. +</p> + +<p> +“Let me go! Let me go! Mann, I tell you, let me go——” +</p> + +<p> +“’E screams like a woman!” said McBride. “They’ll +’ear ’im five miles off.” +</p> + +<p> +“There’s one or two ought to ’ear ’im—in +England,” said Copper, putting aside a wildly waving arm. +</p> + +<p> +“Married, ain’t ’e?” said Pinewood. “I’ve +seen ’em go like this before—just at the last. ’<i>Old</i> +on, old man, No one’s goin’ to ’urt you.” +</p> + +<p> +The last of the sun threw the enormous shadow of a kopje over the little, +anxious, wriggling group. +</p> + +<p> +“Quit that,” said the Serjeant of a sudden. “You’re +only making him worse. Hands <i>up</i>, prisoner! Now you get a holt of +yourself, or this’ll go off.” +</p> + +<p> +And indeed the revolver-barrel square at the man’s panting chest seemed +to act like a tonic; he choked, recovered himself, and fell in between Copper +and Pinewood. +</p> + +<p> +As the picket neared the camp it broke into song that was heard among the +officers’ tents: +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +’E sent us ’is blessin’ from London town,<br/> + (The beggar that kep’ the cordite down,)<br/> +But what do we care if ’e smile or frown,<br/> + The beggar that kep’ the cordite down?<br/> +The mildly nefarious<br/> +Wildly barbarious<br/> + Beggar that kept the cordite down! +</p> + +<p> +Said a captain a mile away: “Why are they singing <i>that?</i> We +haven’t had a mail for a month, have we?” +</p> + +<p> +An hour later the same captain said to his servant: “Jenkins, I +understand the picket have got a—got a newspaper off a prisoner to-day. I +wish you could lay hands on it, Jenkins. Copy of the <i>Times</i>, I +think.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, Sir. Copy of the <i>Times</i>, Sir,” said Jenkins, without a +quiver, and went forth to make his own arrangements. +</p> + +<p> +“Copy of the <i>Times</i>,” said the blameless Alf, from beneath +his blanket. “I ain’t a member of the Soldier’s Institoot. Go +an’ look in the reg’mental Readin’-room—Veldt Row, +Kopje Street, second turnin’ to the left between ’ere an’ +Naauwport.” +</p> + +<p> +Jenkins summarised briefly in a tense whisper the thing that Alf Copper need +not be. +</p> + +<p> +“But my particular copy of the <i>Times</i> is specially pro’ibited +by the censor from corruptin’ the morals of the Army. Get a written order +from K. o’ K., properly countersigned, an’ I’ll think about +it.” +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve got all <i>you</i> want,” said Jenkins. +“’Urry up. I want to ’ave a squint myself.” +</p> + +<p> +Something gurgled in the darkness, and Private Copper fell back smacking his +lips. +</p> + +<p> +“Gawd bless my prisoner, and make me a good boy. Amen. ’Ere you +are, Jenkins. It’s dirt cheap at a tot.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap13"></a>STEAM TACTICS</h2> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap12"></a>THE NECESSITARIAN</h2> + +<p class="poem"> +I know not in whose hands are laid<br/> + To empty upon earth<br/> +From unsuspected ambuscade<br/> + The very Urns of Mirth:<br/> +<br/> +Who bids the Heavenly Lark arise<br/> + And cheer our solemn round—<br/> +The Jest beheld with streaming eyes<br/> + And grovellings on the ground;<br/> +<br/> +Who joins the flats of Time and Chance<br/> + Behind the prey preferred,<br/> +And thrones on Shrieking Circumstance<br/> + The Sacredly Absurd,<br/> +<br/> +Till Laughter, voiceless through excess.<br/> + Waves mute appeal and sore,<br/> +Above the midriff’s deep distress,<br/> + For breath to laugh once more.<br/> +<br/> +No creed hath dared to hail him Lord,<br/> + No raptured choirs proclaim,<br/> +And Nature’s strenuous Overword<br/> + Hath nowhere breathed his name.<br/> +<br/> +Yet, may it be, on wayside jape,<br/> + The selfsame Power bestows<br/> +The selfsame power as went to shape<br/> + His Planet or His Rose. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2>STEAM TACTICS</h2> + +<p> +I caught sight of their faces as we came up behind the cart in the narrow +Sussex lane; but though it was not eleven o’clock, they were both asleep. +</p> + +<p> +That the carrier was on the wrong side of the road made no difference to his +language when I rang my bell. He said aloud of motor-cars, and specially of +steam ones, all the things which I had read in the faces of superior coachmen. +Then he pulled slantwise across me. +</p> + +<p> +There was a vociferous steam air-pump attached to that car which could be +applied at pleasure…. +</p> + +<p> +The cart was removed about a bowshot’s length in seven and a quarter +seconds, to the accompaniment of parcels clattering. At the foot of the next +hill the horse stopped, and the two men came out over the tail-board. +</p> + +<p> +My engineer backed and swung the car, ready to move out of reach. +</p> + +<p> +“The blighted egg-boiler has steam up,” said Mr. Hinchcliffe, +pausing to gather a large stone. “Temporise with the beggar, Pye, till +the sights come on!” +</p> + +<p> +“I can’t leave my ’orse!” roared the carrier; +“but bring ’em up ’ere, an’ I’ll kill ’em +all over again.” +</p> + +<p> +“Good morning, Mr. Pyecroft,” I called cheerfully. “Can I +give you a lift anywhere?” +</p> + +<p> +The attack broke up round my forewheels. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, we <i>do</i> ’ave the knack o’ meeting <i>in puris +naturalibus,</i> as I’ve so often said.” Mr. Pyecroft wrung my +hand. “Yes, I’m on leaf. So’s Hinch. We’re visiting +friends among these kopjes.” +</p> + +<p> +A monotonous bellowing up the road persisted, where the carrier was still +calling for corpses. +</p> + +<p> +“That’s Agg. He’s Hinch’s cousin. You aren’t +fortunit in your family connections, Hinch. ’E’s usin’ +language in derogation of good manners. Go and abolish ’im.” +</p> + +<p> +Henry Salt Hinchcliffe stalked back to the cart and spoke to his cousin. I +recall much that the wind bore to me of his words and the carrier’s. It +seemed as if the friendship of years were dissolving amid throes. +</p> + +<p> +“’Ave it your own silly way, then,” roared the carrier, +“an’ get into Linghurst on your own silly feet. I’ve done +with you two runagates.” He lashed his horse and passed out of sight +still rumbling. +</p> + +<p> +“The fleet’s sailed,” said Pyecroft, “leavin’ us +on the beach as before. Had you any particular port in your mind?” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I was going to meet a friend at Instead Wick, but I don’t +mind—” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh! that’ll do as well as anything! We’re on leaf, you +see.” +</p> + +<p> +“She’ll hardly hold four,” said my engineer. I had broken him +of the foolish habit of being surprised at things, but he was visibly uneasy. +</p> + +<p> +Hinchcliffe returned, drawn as by ropes to my steam-car, round which he walked +in narrowing circles. +</p> + +<p> +“What’s her speed?” he demanded of the engineer. +</p> + +<p> +“Twenty-five,” said that loyal man. +</p> + +<p> +“Easy to run?” +</p> + +<p> +“No; very difficult,” was the emphatic answer. +</p> + +<p> +“That just shows that you ain’t fit for your rating. D’you +suppose that a man who earns his livin’ by runnin’ 30-knot +destroyers for a parstime—for a parstime, mark you!—is going to lie +down before any blighted land-crabbing steam-pinnace on springs?” +</p> + +<p> +Yet that was what he did. Directly under the car he lay and looked upward into +pipes—petrol, steam, and water—with a keen and searching eye. +</p> + +<p> +I telegraphed Mr. Pyecroft a question. +</p> + +<p> +“Not—in—the—least,” was the answer. “Steam +gadgets always take him that way. We had a bit of a riot at Parsley Green +through his tryin’ to show a traction-engine haulin’ gipsy-wagons +how to turn corners.” +</p> + +<p> +“Tell him everything he wants to know,” I said to the engineer, as +I dragged out a rug and spread it on the roadside. +</p> + +<p> +“<i>He</i> don’t want much showing,” said the engineer. Now, +the two men had not, counting the time we took to stuff our pipes, been +together more than three minutes. +</p> + +<p> +“This,” said Pyecroft, driving an elbow back into the deep verdure +of the hedge-foot, “is a little bit of all right. Hinch, I +shouldn’t let too much o’ that hot muckings drop in my eyes. Your +leaf’s up in a fortnight, an’ you’ll be wantin’ +’em.” +</p> + +<p> +“Here!” said Hinchcliffe, still on his back, to the engineer. +“Come here and show me the lead of this pipe.” And the engineer lay +down beside him. +</p> + +<p> +“That’s all right,” said Mr. Hinchcliffe, rising. “But +she’s more of a bag of tricks than I thought. Unship this superstructure +aft”—he pointed to the back seat—“and I’ll have a +look at the forced draught.” +</p> + +<p> +The engineer obeyed with alacrity. I heard him volunteer the fact that he had a +brother an artificer in the Navy. +</p> + +<p> +“They couple very well, those two,” said Pyecroft critically, while +Hinchcliffe sniffed round the asbestos-lagged boiler and turned on gay jets of +steam. +</p> + +<p> +“Now take me up the road,” he said. My man, for form’s sake, +looked at me. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, take him,” I said. “He’s all right.” +</p> + +<p> +“No, I’m not,” said Hinchcliffe of a sudden—“not +if I’m expected to judge my water out of a little shaving-glass.” +</p> + +<p> +The water-gauge of that steam-car was reflected on a mirror to the right of the +dashboard. I also had found it inconvenient. +</p> + +<p> +“Throw up your arm and look at the gauge under your armpit. Only mind how +you steer while you’re doing it, or you’ll get ditched!” I +cried, as the car ran down the road. +</p> + +<p> +“I wonder!” said Pyecroft, musing. “But, after all, +it’s your steamin’ gadgets he’s usin’ for his libretto, +as you might put it. He said to me after breakfast only this mornin’ +’ow he thanked his Maker, on all fours, that he wouldn’t see nor +smell nor thumb a runnin’ bulgine till the nineteenth prox. Now look at +him! Only look at ’im!” +</p> + +<p> +We could see, down the long slope of the road, my driver surrendering his seat +to Hinchcliffe, while the car flickered generously from hedge to hedge. +</p> + +<p> +“What happens if he upsets?” +</p> + +<p> +“The petrol will light up and the boiler may blow up.” +</p> + +<p> +“How rambunkshus! And”—Pyecroft blew a slow +cloud—“Agg’s about three hoops up this mornin’, +too.” +</p> + +<p> +“What’s that to do with us? He’s gone down the road,” I +retorted. +</p> + +<p> +“Ye—es, but we’ll overtake him. He’s a vindictive +carrier. He and Hinch ’ad words about pig-breeding this morning. O’ +course, Hinch don’t know the elements o’ that evolution; but he +fell back on ’is naval rank an’ office, an’ Agg grew peevish. +I wasn’t sorry to get out of the cart … Have you ever considered how, +when you an’ I meet, so to say, there’s nearly always a remarkable +hectic day ahead of us! Hullo! Behold the beef-boat returnin’!” +</p> + +<p> +He rose as the car climbed up the slope, and shouted: “In bow! Way +’nuff!” +</p> + +<p> +“You be quiet!” cried Hinchcliffe, and drew up opposite the rug, +his dark face shining with joy. “She’s the Poetry o’ Motion! +She’s the Angel’s Dream. She’s———” He +shut off steam, and the slope being against her, the car slid soberly downhill +again. +</p> + +<p> +“What’s this? I’ve got the brake on!” he yelled. +</p> + +<p> +“It doesn’t hold backwards,” I said. “Put her on the +mid-link.” +</p> + +<p> +“That’s a nasty one for the chief engineer o’ the +<i>Djinn</i>, 31-knot, T.B.D.,” said Pyecroft. “<i>Do</i> you know +what the mid-link is, Hinch?” +</p> + +<p> +Once more the car returned to us; but as Pyecroft stooped to gather up the rug, +Hinchcliffe jerked the lever testily, and with prawn-like speed she retired +backwards into her own steam. +</p> + +<p> +“Apparently ’e don’t,” said Pyecroft. +“What’s he done now, Sir?” +</p> + +<p> +“Reversed her. I’ve done it myself.” +</p> + +<p> +“But he’s an engineer.” +</p> + +<p> +For the third time the car manœuvred up the hill. +</p> + +<p> +“I’ll teach you to come alongside properly, if I keep you +’tiffies out all night!” shouted Pyecroft. It was evidently a +quotation. Hinchcliffe’s face grew livid, and, his hand ever so slightly +working on the throttle, the car buzzed twenty yards uphill. +</p> + +<p> +“That’s enough. We’ll take your word for it. The mountain +will go to Ma’ommed. Stand <i>fast</i>!” +</p> + +<p> +Pyecroft and I and the rug marched up where she and Hinchcliffe fumed together. +</p> + +<p> +“Not as easy as it looks—eh, Hinch?” +</p> + +<p> +“It is dead easy. I’m going to drive her to Instead +Wick—aren’t I?” said the first-class engine-room artificer. I +thought of his performances with No. 267 and nodded. After all, it was a small +privilege to accord to pure genius. +</p> + +<p> +“But my engineer will stand by—at first,” I added. +</p> + +<p> +“An’ you a family man, too,” muttered Pyecroft, swinging +himself into the right rear seat. “Sure to be a remarkably hectic day +when we meet.” +</p> + +<p> +We adjusted ourselves and, in the language of the immortal Navy doctor, paved +our way towards Linghurst, distant by mile-post 11-3/4 miles. +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Hinchcliffe, every nerve and muscle braced, talked only to the engineer, +and that professionally. I recalled the time when I, too, had enjoyed the rack +on which he voluntarily extended himself. +</p> + +<p> +And the County of Sussex slid by in slow time. +</p> + +<p> +“How cautious is the ’tiffy-bird!” said Pyecroft. +</p> + +<p> +“Even in a destroyer,” Hinch snapped over his shoulder, “you +ain’t expected to con and drive simultaneous. Don’t address any +remarks to <i>me!</i>” +</p> + +<p> +“Pump!” said the engineer. “Your water’s +droppin’.” +</p> + +<p> +“<i>I</i> know that. Where the Heavens is that blighted by-pass?” +</p> + +<p> +He beat his right or throttle hand madly on the side of the car till he found +the bent rod that more or less controls the pump, and, neglecting all else, +twisted it furiously. +</p> + +<p> +My engineer grabbed the steering-bar just in time to save us lurching into a +ditch. +</p> + +<p> +“If I was a burnin’ peacock, with two hundred bloodshot eyes in my +shinin’ tail, I’d need ’em all on this job!” said +Hinch. +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t talk! Steer! This ain’t the North Atlantic,” +Pyecroft replied. +</p> + +<p> +“Blast my stokers! Why, the steam’s dropped fifty pounds!” +Hinchcliffe cried. +</p> + +<p> +“Fire’s blown out,” said the engineer. “Stop +her!” +</p> + +<p> +“Does she do that often?” said Hinch, descending. +</p> + +<p> +“Sometimes.” +</p> + +<p> +“Anytime?” +</p> + +<p> +“Any time a cross-wind catches her.” +</p> + +<p> +The engineer produced a match and stooped. +</p> + +<p> +That car (now, thank Heaven, no more than an evil memory) never lit twice in +the same fashion. This time she back-fired superbly, and Pyecroft went out over +the right rear wheel in a column of rich yellow flame. +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve seen a mine explode at +Bantry—once—prematoor,” he volunteered. +</p> + +<p> +“That’s all right,” said Hinchcliffe, brushing down his +singed beard with a singed forefinger. (He had been watching too closely.) +“Has she any more little surprises up her dainty sleeve?” +</p> + +<p> +“She hasn’t begun yet,” said my engineer, with a scornful +cough. “Some one ’as opened the petrol-supply-valve too +wide.” +</p> + +<p> +“Change places with me, Pyecroft,” I commanded, for I remembered +that the petrol-supply, the steam-lock, and the forced draught were all +controlled from the right rear seat. +</p> + +<p> +“Me? Why? There’s a whole switchboard full o’ nickel-plated +muckin’s which I haven’t begun to play with yet. The starboard +side’s crawlin’ with ’em.” +</p> + +<p> +“Change, or I’ll kill you!” said Hinchcliffe, and he looked +like it. +</p> + +<p> +“That’s the ’tiffy all over. When anything goes wrong, blame +it on the lower deck. Navigate by your automatic self, then! <i>I</i> +won’t help you any more.” +</p> + +<p> +We navigated for a mile in dead silence. +</p> + +<p> +“Talkin’ o’ wakes——” said Pyecroft +suddenly. +</p> + +<p> +“We weren’t,” Hinchcliffe grunted. +</p> + +<p> +“There’s some wakes would break a snake’s back; but this of +yours, so to speak, would fair turn a tapeworm giddy. That’s all I wish +to observe, Hinch. … Cart at anchor on the port-bow. It’s Agg!” +</p> + +<p> +Far up the shaded road into secluded Bromlingleigh we saw the carrier’s +cart at rest before the post-office. +</p> + +<p> +“He’s bung in the fairway. How’m I to get past?” said +Hinchcliffe. “There’s no room. Here, Pye, come and relieve the +wheel!” +</p> + +<p> +“Nay, nay, Pauline. You’ve made your own bed. You’ve as good +as left your happy home an’ family cart to steal it. Now you lie on +it.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ring your bell,” I suggested. +</p> + +<p> +“Glory!” said Pyecroft, falling forward into the nape of +Hinchcliffe’s neck as the car stopped dead. +</p> + +<p> +“Get out o’ my back-hair! That must have been the brake I touched +off,” Hinchcliffe muttered, and repaired his error tumultuously. +</p> + +<p> +We passed the cart as though we had been all Bruges belfry. Agg, from the +port-office door, regarded us with a too pacific eye. I remembered later that +the pretty postmistress looked on us pityingly. +</p> + +<p> +Hinchcliffe wiped the sweat from his brow and drew breath. It was the first +vehicle that he had passed, and I sympathised with him. +</p> + +<p> +“You needn’t grip so hard,” said my engineer. “She +steers as easy as a bicycle.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ho! You suppose I ride bicycles up an’ down my engine-room?” +was the answer. “I’ve other things to think about. She’s a +terror. She’s a whistlin’ lunatic. I’d sooner run the old +South-Easter at Simon’s Town than her!” +</p> + +<p> +“One of the nice things they say about her,” I interrupted, +“is that no engineer is needed to run this machine.” +</p> + +<p> +“No. They’d need about seven.” +</p> + +<p> +“‘Common-sense only is needed,’” I quoted. +</p> + +<p> +“Make a note of that, Hinch. Just common-sense,” Pyecroft put in. +</p> + +<p> +“And now,” I said, “we’ll have to take in water. There +isn’t more than a couple of inches of water in the tank.” +</p> + +<p> +“Where d’you get it from?” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh!—cottages and such-like.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, but that being so, where does your much-advertised twenty-five +miles an hour come in? Ain’t a dung-cart more to the point?” +</p> + +<p> +“If you want to go anywhere, I suppose it would be,” I replied. +</p> + +<p> +“<i>I</i> don’t want to go anywhere. I’m thinkin’ of +you who’ve got to live with her. She’ll burn her tubes if she loses +her water?” +</p> + +<p> +“She will.” +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve never scorched yet, and I not beginnin’ now.” He +shut off steam firmly. “Out you get, Pye, an’ shove her along by +hand.” +</p> + +<p> +“Where to?” +</p> + +<p> +“The nearest water-tank,” was the reply. “And Sussex is a dry +county.” +</p> + +<p> +“She ought to have drag-ropes—little pipe-clayed ones,” said +Pyecroft. +</p> + +<p> +We got out and pushed under the hot sun for half-a-mile till we came to a +cottage, sparsely inhabited by one child who wept. +</p> + +<p> +“All out haymakin’, o’ course,” said Pyecroft, +thrusting his head into the parlour for an instant. “What’s the +evolution now?” +</p> + +<p> +“Skirmish till we find a well,” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“Hmm! But they wouldn’t ’ave left that kid without a +chaperon, so to say… I thought so! Where’s a stick?” +</p> + +<p> +A bluish and silent beast of the true old sheep-dog breed glided from behind an +outhouse and without words fell to work. +</p> + +<p> +Pyecroft kept him at bay with a rake-handle while our party, in +rallying-square, retired along the box-bordered brick-path to the car. +</p> + +<p> +At the garden gate the dumb devil halted, looked back on the child, and sat +down to scratch. +</p> + +<p> +“That’s his three-mile limit, thank Heaven!” said Pyecroft. +“Fall in, push-party, and proceed with land-transport o’ pinnace. +I’ll protect your flanks in case this sniffin’ flea-bag is tempted +beyond ’is strength.” +</p> + +<p> +We pushed off in silence. The car weighed 1,200 lb., and even on ball-bearings +was a powerful sudorific. From somewhere behind a hedge we heard a gross rustic +laugh. +</p> + +<p> +“Those are the beggars we lie awake for, patrollin’ the high seas. +There ain’t a port in China where we wouldn’t be better treated. +Yes, a Boxer ’ud be ashamed of it,” said Pyecroft. +</p> + +<p> +A cloud of fine dust boomed down the road. +</p> + +<p> +“Some happy craft with a well-found engine-room! How different!” +panted Hinchcliffe, bent over the starboard mudguard. +</p> + +<p> +It was a claret-coloured petrol car, and it stopped courteously, as good cars +will at sight of trouble. +</p> + +<p> +“Water, only water,” I answered in reply to offers of help. +</p> + +<p> +“There’s a lodge at the end of these oak palings. They’ll +give you all you want. Say I sent you. Gregory—Michael Gregory. +Good-bye!” +</p> + +<p> +“Ought to ’ave been in the Service. Prob’ly is,” was +Pyecroft’s comment. +</p> + +<p> +At that thrice-blessed lodge our water-tank was filled (I dare not quote Mr. +Hinchcliffe’s remarks when he saw the collapsible rubber bucket with +which we did it) and we re-embarked. It seemed that Sir Michael Gregory owned +many acres, and that his park ran for miles. +</p> + +<p> +“No objection to your going through it,” said the lodge-keeper. +“It’ll save you a goodish bit to Instead Wick.” +</p> + +<p> +But we needed petrol, which could be purchased at Pigginfold, a few miles +farther up, and so we held to the main road, as our fate had decreed. +</p> + +<p> +“We’ve come seven miles in fifty-four minutes, so far,” said +Hinchcliffe (he was driving with greater freedom and less responsibility), +“and now we have to fill our bunkers. This is worse than the Channel +Fleet.” +</p> + +<p> +At Pigginfold, after ten minutes, we refilled our petrol tank and lavishly +oiled our engines. Mr. Hinchcliffe wished to discharge our engineer on the +grounds that he (Mr. Hinchcliffe) was now entirely abreast of his work. To this +I demurred, for I knew my car. She had, in the language of the road, held up +for a day and a half, and by most bitter experience I suspected that her time +was very near. Therefore, three miles short of Linghurst, I was less surprised +than any one, excepting always my engineer, when the engines set up a lunatic +clucking, and, after two or three kicks, jammed. +</p> + +<p> +“Heaven forgive me all the harsh things I may have said about destroyers +in my sinful time!” wailed Hinchcliffe, snapping back the throttle. +“What’s worryin’ Ada now?” +</p> + +<p> +“The forward eccentric-strap screw’s dropped off,” said the +engineer, investigating. +</p> + +<p> +“That all? I thought it was a propeller-blade.” +</p> + +<p> +“We must go an’ look for it. There isn’t another.” +</p> + +<p> +“Not me,” said Pyecroft from his seat. “Out pinnace, Hinch, +an’ creep for it. It won’t be more than five miles back.” +</p> + +<p> +The two men, with bowed heads, moved up the road. +</p> + +<p> +“Look like etymologists, don’t they? Does she decant her innards +often, so to speak?” Pyecroft asked. +</p> + +<p> +I told him the true tale of a race-full of ball bearings strewn four miles +along a Hampshire road, and by me recovered in detail. He was profoundly +touched. +</p> + +<p> +“Poor Hinch! Poor—poor Hinch!” he said. “And +that’s only one of her little games, is it? He’ll be homesick for +the Navy by night.” +</p> + +<p> +When the search-party doubled back with the missing screw, it was Hinchcliffe +who replaced it in less than five minutes, while my engineer looked on +admiringly. +</p> + +<p> +“Your boiler’s only seated on four little paperclips,” he +said, crawling from beneath her. “She’s a wicker-willow +lunch-basket below. She’s a runnin’ miracle. Have you had this +combustible spirit-lamp long?” +</p> + +<p> +I told him. +</p> + +<p> +“And yet you were afraid to come into the <i>Nightmare’s</i> +engine-room when we were runnin’ trials!” +</p> + +<p> +“It’s all a matter of taste,” Pyecroft volunteered. +“But I will say for you, Hinch, you’ve certainly got the hang of +her steamin’ gadgets in quick time.” +</p> + +<p> +He was driving her very sweetly, but with a worried look in his eye and a +tremor in his arm. +</p> + +<p> +“She don’t seem so answer her helm somehow,” he said. +</p> + +<p> +“There’s a lot of play to the steering-gear,” said my +engineer. “We generally tighten it up every few miles.” +</p> + +<p> +“‘Like me to stop now? We’ve run as much as one mile and a +half without incident,” he replied tartly. +</p> + +<p> +“Then you’re lucky,” said my engineer, bristling in turn. +</p> + +<p> +“They’ll wreck the whole turret out o’ nasty professional +spite in a minute,” said Pyecroft. “That’s the worst o’ +machinery. Man dead ahead, Hinch—semaphorin’ like the flagship in a +fit!” +</p> + +<p> +“Amen!” said Hinchcliffe. “Shall I stop, or shall I cut him +down?” +</p> + +<p> +He stopped, for full in the centre of the Linghurst Road stood a person in +pepper-and-salt raiment (ready-made), with a brown telegraph envelope in his +hands. +</p> + +<p> +“Twenty-three and a half miles an hour,” he began, weighing a small +beam-engine of a Waterbury in one red paw. “From the top of the hill over +our measured quarter-mile—twenty-three and a half.” +</p> + +<p> +“You manurial gardener——” Hinchcliffe began. I prodded +him warningly from behind, and laid the other hand on Pyecroft’s +stiffening knee. +</p> + +<p> +“Also—on information received—drunk and disorderly in charge +of a motor-car—to the common danger—two men like sailors in +appearance,” the man went on. +</p> + +<p> +“Like sailors! … That’s Agg’s little <i>roose</i>. No wonder +he smiled at us,” said Pyecroft. +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve been waiting for you some time,” the man concluded, +folding up the telegram. +</p> + +<p> +“Who’s the owner?” +</p> + +<p> +I indicated myself. +</p> + +<p> +“Then I want you as well as the two seafaring men. Drunk and disorderly +can be treated summary. You come on.” +</p> + +<p> +My relations with the Sussex constabulary have, so far, been of the best, but I +could not love this person. +</p> + +<p> +“Of course you have your authority to show?” I hinted. +</p> + +<p> +“I’ll show it you at Linghurst,” he retorted +hotly——“all the authority you want.” +</p> + +<p> +“I only want the badge, or warrant, or whatever it is a plain-clothes man +has to show.” +</p> + +<p> +He made as though to produce it, but checked himself, repeating less politely +the invitation to Linghurst. The action and the tone confirmed my many-times +tested theory that the bulk of English shoregoing institutions are based on +conformable strata of absolutely impervious inaccuracy. I reflected and became +aware of a drumming on the back of the front seat that Pyecroft, bowed forward +and relaxed, was tapping with his knuckles. The hardly-checked fury on +Hinchcliffe’s brow had given place to a greasy imbecility, and he nodded +over the steering-bar. In longs and shorts, as laid down by the pious and +immortal Mr. Morse, Pyecroft tapped out, “Sham drunk. Get him in the +car.” +</p> + +<p> +“I can’t stay here all day,” said the constable. +</p> + +<p> +Pyecroft raised his head. Then was seen with what majesty the British +sailor-man envisages a new situation. +</p> + +<p> +“Met gennelman heavy sheeway,” said he. “Do tell me British +gelman can’t give ’ole Brish Navy lif’ own blighted +ste’ cart. Have another drink!” +</p> + +<p> +“I didn’t know they were as drunk as all that when they stopped +me,” I explained. +</p> + +<p> +“You can say all that at Linghurst,” was the answer. “Come +on.” +</p> + +<p> +“Quite right,” I said. “But the question is, if you take +these two out on the road, they’ll fall down or start killing you.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then I’d call on you to assist me in the execution o’ my +duty.” +</p> + +<p> +“But I’d see you further first. You’d better come with us in +the car. I’ll turn this passenger out.” (This was my engineer, +sitting quite silent.) “You don’t want him, and, anyhow, he’d +only be a witness for the defence.” +</p> + +<p> +“That’s true,” said the constable. “But it +wouldn’t make any odds—at Linghurst.” +</p> + +<p> +My engineer skipped into the bracken like a rabbit. I bade him cut across Sir +Michael Gregory’s park, and if he caught my friend, to tell him I should +probably be rather late for lunch. +</p> + +<p> +“I ain’t going to be driven by <i>him</i>.” Our destined prey +pointed at Hinchcliffe with apprehension. +</p> + +<p> +“Of course not. You take my seat and keep the big sailor in order. +He’s too drunk to do much. I’ll change places with the other one. +Only be quick; I want to pay my fine and get it over.” +</p> + +<p> +“That’s the way to look at it,” he said, dropping into the +left rear seat. “We’re making quite a lot out o’ you motor +gentry.” He folded his arms judicially as the car gathered way under +Hinchcliffe’s stealthy hand. +</p> + +<p> +“But <i>you</i> aren’t driving?” he cried, half rising. +</p> + +<p> +“You’ve noticed it?” said Pyecroft, and embraced him with one +anaconda-like left arm. +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t kill him,” said Hinchcliffe briefly. “I want to +show him what twenty-three and a quarter is.” We were going a fair +twelve, which was about the car’s limit. +</p> + +<p> +Our passenger swore something and then groaned. +</p> + +<p> +“Hush, darling!” said Pyecroft, “or I’ll have to hug +you.” +</p> + +<p> +The main road, white under the noon sun, lay broad before us, running north to +Linghurst. We slowed and looked anxiously for a side track. +</p> + +<p> +“And now,” said I, “I want to see your authority.” +</p> + +<p> +“The badge of your ratin’?” Pyecroft added. +</p> + +<p> +“I’m a constable,” he said, and kicked. Indeed, his boots +would have bewrayed him across half a county’s plough; but boots are not +legal evidence. +</p> + +<p> +“I want your authority,” I repeated coldly; “some evidence +that you are not a common drunken tramp.” +</p> + +<p> +It was as I had expected. He had forgotten or mislaid his badge. He had +neglected to learn the outlines of the work for which he received money and +consideration; and he expected me, the tax-payer, to go to infinite trouble to +supplement his deficiencies. +</p> + +<p> +“If you don’t believe me, come to Linghurst,” was the burden +of his almost national anthem. +</p> + +<p> +“But I can’t run all over Sussex every time a blackmailer jumps up +and says he is a policeman.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why, it’s quite close,” he persisted. +</p> + +<p> +“’Twon’t be—soon,” said Hinchcliffe. +</p> + +<p> +“None of the other people ever made any trouble. To be sure, <i>they</i> +was gentlemen,” he cried. “All I can say is, it may be very funny, +but it ain’t fair.” +</p> + +<p> +I laboured with him in this dense fog, but to no end. He had forgotten his +badge, and we were villains for that we did not cart him to the pub or barracks +where he had left it. +</p> + +<p> +Pyecroft listened critically as we spun along the hard road. +</p> + +<p> +“If he was a concentrated Boer, he couldn’t expect much +more,” he observed. “Now, suppose I’d been a lady in a +delicate state o’ health—you’d ha’ made me very ill +with your doings.” +</p> + +<p> +“I wish I ’ad. ’Ere! ’Elp! ’Elp! Hi!” +</p> + +<p> +The man had seen a constable in uniform fifty yards ahead, where a lane ran +into the road, and would have said more but that Hinchcliffe jerked her up that +lane with a wrench that nearly capsized us as the constable came running +heavily. +</p> + +<p> +It seemed to me that both our guest and his fellow-villain in uniform smiled as +we fled down the road easterly betwixt the narrowing hedges. +</p> + +<p> +“You’ll know all about it in a little time,” said our guest. +“You’ve only yourselves to thank for runnin’ your ’ead +into a trap.” And he whistled ostentatiously. +</p> + +<p> +We made no answer. +</p> + +<p> +“If that man ’ad chose, ’e could have identified me,” +he said. +</p> + +<p> +Still we were silent. +</p> + +<p> +“But ’e’ll do it later, when you’re caught.” +</p> + +<p> +“Not if you go on talking. ’E won’t be able to,” said +Pyecroft. “I don’t know what traverse you think you’re +workin’, but your duty till you’re put in cells for a highway +robber is to love, honour, an’ cherish <i>me</i> most +special—performin’ all evolutions signalled in rapid time. I tell +you this, in case o’ anything turnin’ up.” +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t you fret about things turnin’ up,” was the +reply. +</p> + +<p> +Hinchcliffe had given the car a generous throttle, and she was well set to +work, when, without warning, the road—there are two or three in Sussex +like it—turned down and ceased. +</p> + +<p> +“Holy Muckins!” he cried, and stood on both brakes as our helpless +tyres slithered over wet grass and bracken—down and down into +forest—early British woodland. It was the change of a nightmare, and that +all should fit, fifty yards ahead of us a babbling brook barred our way. On the +far side a velvet green ride, sprinkled with rabbits and fern, gently sloped +upwards and away, but behind us was no hope. Forty horse-power would never have +rolled wet pneumatic tyres up that verdurous cliff we had descended. +</p> + +<p> +“H’m!” Our guest coughed significantly. “A great many +cars thinks they can take this road; but they all come back. We walks after +’em at our convenience.” +</p> + +<p> +“Meanin’ that the other jaunty is now pursuin’ us on his lily +feet?” said Pyecroft. +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Pre</i>cisely.” +</p> + +<p> +“An’ you think,” said Pyecroft (I have no hope to render the +scorn of the words), “<i>that’ll</i> make any odds? Get out!” +</p> + +<p> +The man obeyed with alacrity. +</p> + +<p> +“See those spars up-ended over there? I mean that wickyup-thing. +Hop-poles, then, you rural blighter. Keep on fetching me hop-poles at the +double.” +</p> + +<p> +And he doubled, Pyecroft at his heels; for they had arrived at a perfect +understanding. +</p> + +<p> +There was a stack of hurdles a few yards down stream, laid aside after +sheep-washing; and there were stepping-stones in the brook. Hinchcliffe +rearranged these last to make some sort of causeway; I brought up the hurdles; +and when Pyecroft and his subaltern had dropped a dozen hop-poles across the +stream, laid them down over all. +</p> + +<p> +“Talk o’ the Agricultur’l Hall!” he said, mopping his +brow—“’tisn’t in it with us. The approach to the bridge +must now be paved with hurdles, owin’ to the squashy nature o’ the +country. Yes, an’ we’d better have one or two on the far side to +lead her on to <i>terror fermior</i>. Now, Hinch! Give her full steam and +’op along. If she slips off, we’re done. Shall I take the +wheel?” +</p> + +<p> +“No. This is my job,” said the first-class engine-room artificer. +“Get over the far side, and be ready to catch her if she jibs on the +uphill.” +</p> + +<p> +We crossed that elastic structure and stood ready amid the bracken. Hinchcliffe +gave her a full steam and she came like a destroyer on her trial. There was a +crack, a flicker of white water, and she was in our arms fifty yards up the +slope; or rather, we were behind her, pushing her madly towards a patch of raw +gravel whereon her wheels could bite. Of the bridge remained only a few wildly +vibrating hop-poles, and those hurdles which had been sunk in the mud of the +approaches. +</p> + +<p> +“She—she kicked out all the loose ones behind her as she finished +with ’em,” Hinchcliffe panted. +</p> + +<p> +“At the Agricultural Hall they would ’ave been fastened down with +ribbons,” said Pyecroft. “But this ain’t Olympia.” +</p> + +<p> +“She nearly wrenched the tiller out of my hand. Don’t you think I +conned her like a cock-angel, Pye?” +</p> + +<p> +“<i>I</i> never saw anything like it,” said our guest +propitiatingly. “And now, gentlemen, if you’ll let me go back to +Linghurst, I promise you you won’t hear another word from me.” +</p> + +<p> +“Get in,” said Pyecroft, as we puffed out on to a metalled road +once more. “We ’aven’t begun on <i>you</i> yet.” +</p> + +<p> +“A joke’s a joke,” he replied. “I don’t mind a +little bit of a joke myself, but this is going beyond it.” +</p> + +<p> +“Miles an’ miles beyond it, if this machine stands up. We’ll +want water pretty soon.” +</p> + +<p> +Our guest’s countenance brightened, and Pyecroft perceived it. +</p> + +<p> +“Let me tell you,” he said earnestly, “It won’t make +any difference to you whatever happens. Barrin’ a dhow or two +Tajurrah-way, prizes are scarce in the Navy. Hence we never abandon +’em.” +</p> + +<p> +There was a long silence. Pyecroft broke it suddenly. +</p> + +<p> +“Robert,” he said, “have you a mother?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +“Have you a big brother?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +“An’ a little sister?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +“Robert. Does your mamma keep a dog?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes. Why?” +</p> + +<p> +“All right, Robert. I won’t forget it.” +</p> + +<p> +I looked for an explanation. +</p> + +<p> +“I saw his cabinet photograph in full uniform on the mantelpiece o’ +that cottage before faithful Fido turned up,” Pyecroft whispered. +“Ain’t you glad it’s all in the family somehow?” +</p> + +<p> +We filled with water at a cottage on the edge of St. Leonard’s Forest, +and, despite our increasing leakage, made shift to climb the ridge above +Instead Wick. Knowing the car as I did, I felt sure that final collapse would +not be long delayed. My sole concern was to run our guest well into the +wilderness before that came. +</p> + +<p> +On the roof of the world—a naked plateau clothed with young +heather—she retired from active life in floods of tears. Her +feed-water-heater (Hinchcliffe blessed it and its maker for three minutes) was +leaking beyond hope of repair; she had shifted most of her packing, and her +water-pump would not lift. +</p> + +<p> +“If I had a bit of piping I could disconnect this tin cartridge-case +an’ feed direct into the boiler. It ’ud knock down her speed, but +we could get on,” said he, and looked hopelessly at the long dun ridges +that hove us above the panorama of Sussex. Northward we could see the London +haze. Southward, between gaps of the whale-backed Downs, lay the +Channel’s zinc-blue. But all our available population in that vast survey +was one cow and a kestrel. +</p> + +<p> +“It’s down hill to Instead Wick. We can run her there by +gravity,” I said at last. +</p> + +<p> +“Then he’ll only have to walk to the station to get home. Unless we +take off ’is boots first,” Pyecroft replied. +</p> + +<p> +“That,” said our guest earnestly, “would be theft atop of +assault and very serious.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, let’s hang him an’ be done,” Hinchcliffe grunted. +“It’s evidently what he’s sufferin’ for.” +</p> + +<p> +Somehow murder did not appeal to us that warm noon. We sat down to smoke in the +heather, and presently out of the valley below came the thick beat of a +petrol-motor ascending. I paid little attention to it till I heard the roar of +a horn that has no duplicate in all the Home Counties. +</p> + +<p> +“That’s the man I was going to lunch with!” I cried. +“Hold on!” and I ran down the road. +</p> + +<p> +It was a big, black, black-dashed, tonneaued twenty-four horse Octopod; and it +bore not only Kysh my friend, and Salmon his engineer, but my own man, who for +the first time in our acquaintance smiled. +</p> + +<p> +“Did they get you? What did you get? I was coming into Linghurst as +witness to character—your man told me what happened—but I was +stopped near Instead Wick myself,” cried Kysh. +</p> + +<p> +“What for?” +</p> + +<p> +“Leaving car unattended. An infernal swindle, when you think of the loose +carts outside every pub in the county. I was jawing with the police for an +hour, but it’s no use. They’ve got it all their own way, and +we’re helpless.” +</p> + +<p> +Hereupon I told him my tale, and for proof, as we topped the hill, pointed out +the little group round my car. +</p> + +<p> +All supreme emotion is dumb. Kysh put on the brake and hugged me to his bosom +till I groaned. Then, as I remember, he crooned like a mother returned to her +suckling. +</p> + +<p> +“Divine! Divine!” he murmured. “Command me.” +</p> + +<p> +“Take charge of the situation,” I said. “You’ll find a +Mr. Pyecroft on the quarter-deck. I’m altogether out of it.” +</p> + +<p> +“He shall stay there. Who am I but the instrument of vengeance in the +hands of an over-ruling Providence? (And I put in fresh sparking-plugs this +morning.) Salmon, take that steam-kettle home, somehow. I would be +alone.” +</p> + +<p> +“Leggat,” I said to my man, “help Salmon home with my +car.” +</p> + +<p> +“Home? Now? It’s hard. It’s cruel hard,” said Leggat, +almost with a sob. +</p> + +<p> +Hinchcliffe outlined my car’s condition briefly to the two engineers. Mr. +Pyecroft clung to our guest, who stared with affrighted eyes at the palpitating +Octopod; and the free wind of high Sussex whimpered across the ling. +</p> + +<p> +“I am quite agreeable to walkin’ ’ome all the way on my +feet,” said our guest. “I wouldn’t go to any railway station. +It ’ud be just the proper finish to our little joke.” He laughed +nervously. +</p> + +<p> +“What’s the evolution?” said Pyecroft. “Do we turn over +to the new cruiser?” +</p> + +<p> +I nodded, and he escorted our guest to the tonneau with care. When I was in, he +sat himself broad-armed on the little flap-seat which controls the door. +Hinchcliffe sat by Kysh. +</p> + +<p> +“You drive?” Kysh asked, with the smile that has won him his +chequered way through the world. +</p> + +<p> +“Steam only, and I’ve about had my whack for to-day, thanks.” +</p> + +<p> +“I see.” +</p> + +<p> +The long, low car slid forward and then dropped like a bullet down the descent +our steam toy had so painfully climbed. Our guest’s face blanched, and he +clutched the back of the tonneau. +</p> + +<p> +“New commander’s evidently been trained on a destroyer,” said +Hinchcliffe. +</p> + +<p> +“What’s ’is wonderful name?” whispered Pyecroft. +“Ho! Well, I’m glad it ain’t Saul we’ve run up +against—nor Nimshi, for that matter. This is makin’ me feel +religious.” +</p> + +<p> +Our impetus carried us half-way up the next slope, where we steadied to a +resonant fifteen an hour against the collar. +</p> + +<p> +“What do you think?” I called to Hinchcliffe. +</p> + +<p> +“’Taint as sweet as steam, o’ course; but for power +it’s twice the <i>Furious</i> against half the <i>Jaseur</i> in a +head-sea.” +</p> + +<p> +Volumes could not have touched it more exactly. His bright eyes were glued on +Kysh’s hands juggling with levers behind the discreet backward sloping +dash. +</p> + +<p> +“An’ what sort of a brake might you use?” he said politely. +</p> + +<p> +“This,” Kysh replied, as the last of the hill shot up to one in +eight. He let the car run back a few feet and caught her deftly on the brake, +repeating the performance cup and ball fashion. It was like being daped above +the Pit at the end of an uncoiled solar plexus. Even Pyecroft held his breath. +</p> + +<p> +“It ain’t fair! It ain’t fair!” our guest moaned. +“You’re makin’ me sick.” +</p> + +<p> +“What an ungrateful blighter he is!” said Pyecroft. “Money +couldn’t buy you a run like this … Do it well overboard!” +</p> + +<p> +“We’ll just trundle up the Forest and drop into the Park Row, I +think,” said Kysh. “There’s a bit of good going +hereabouts.” +</p> + +<p> +He flung a careless knee over the low raking tiller that the ordinary expert +puts under his armpit, and down four miles of yellow road, cut through barren +waste, the Octopod sang like a six-inch shell. +</p> + +<p> +“Whew! But you know your job,” said Hinchcliffe. +“You’re wasted here. I’d give something to have you in my +engine-room.” +</p> + +<p> +“He’s steering with ’is little hind-legs,” said +Pyecroft. “Stand up and look at him, Robert. You’ll never see such +a sight again!” +</p> + +<p> +“Nor don’t want to,” was our guest’s reply. “Five +’undred pounds wouldn’t begin to cover ’is fines even since +I’ve been with him.” +</p> + +<p> +Park Row is reached by one hill which drops three hundred feet in half a mile. +Kysh had the thought to steer with his hand down the abyss, but the manner in +which he took the curved bridge at the bottom brought my few remaining hairs +much nearer the grave. +</p> + +<p> +“We’re in Surrey now; better look out,” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“Never mind. I’ll roll her into Kent for a bit. We’ve lots of +time; it’s only three o’clock.” +</p> + +<p> +“Won’t you want to fill your bunkers, or take water, or oil her +up?” said Hinchcliffe. +</p> + +<p> +“We don’t use water, and she’s good for two hundred on one +tank o’ petrol if she doesn’t break down.” +</p> + +<p> +“Two hundred miles from ’ome and mother <i>and</i> faithful Fido +to-night, Robert,” said Pyecroft, slapping our guest on the knee. +“Cheer up! Why, I’ve known a destroyer do less.” +</p> + +<p> +We passed with some decency through some towns, till by way of the Hastings +road we whirled into Cramberhurst, which is a deep pit. +</p> + +<p> +“Now,” said Kysh, “we begin.” +</p> + +<p> +“Previous service not reckoned towards pension,” said Pyecroft. +“We are doin’ you lavish, Robert.” +</p> + +<p> +“But when’s this silly game to finish, any’ow?” our +guest snarled. +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t worry about the <i>when</i> of it, Robert. The +<i>where’s</i> the interestin’ point for you just now.” +</p> + +<p> +I had seen Kysh drive before, and I thought I knew the Octopod, but that +afternoon he and she were exalted beyond my knowledge. He improvised on the +keys—the snapping levers and quivering accelerators—marvellous +variations, so that our progress was sometimes a fugue and sometimes a +barn-dance, varied on open greens by the weaving of fairy rings. When I +protested, all that he would say was: “I’ll hypnotise the fowl! +I’ll dazzle the rooster!” or other words equally futile. And +she—oh! that I could do her justice!—she turned her broad black +bows to the westering light, and lifted us high upon hills that we might see +and rejoice with her. She whooped into veiled hollows of elm and Sussex oak; +she devoured infinite perspectives of park palings; she surged through +forgotten hamlets, whose single streets gave back, reduplicated, the clatter of +her exhaust, and, tireless, she repeated the motions. Over naked uplands she +droned like a homing bee, her shadow lengthening in the sun that she chased to +his lair. She nosed up unparochial byways and accommodation-roads of the least +accommodation, and put old scarred turf or new-raised molehills under her most +marvellous springs with never a jar. And since the King’s highway is used +for every purpose save traffic, in mid-career she stepped aside for, or flung +amazing loops about, the brainless driver, the driverless horse, the drunken +carrier, the engaged couple, the female student of the bicycle and her +staggering instructor, the pig, the perambulator, and the infant school (where +it disembogued yelping on cross-roads), with the grace of Nellie Farren (upon +whom be the Peace) and the lithe abandon of all the Vokes family. But at heart +she was ever Judic as I remember that Judic long ago—Judic clad in +bourgeois black from wrist to ankle, achieving incredible improprieties. +</p> + +<p> +We were silent—Hinchcliffe and Pyecroft through professional +appreciation; I with a layman’s delight in the expert; and our guest +because of fear. +</p> + +<p> +At the edge of the evening she smelt the sea to southward and sheered thither +like the strong-winged albatross, to circle enormously amid green flats fringed +by martello towers. +</p> + +<p> +“Ain’t that Eastbourne yonder?” said our guest, reviving. +“I’ve a aunt there—she’s cook to a J.P.—could +identify me.” +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t worry her for a little thing like that,” said +Pyecroft; and ere he had ceased to praise family love, our unpaid judiciary, +and domestic service, the Downs rose between us and the sea, and the Long Man +of Hillingdon lay out upon the turf. +</p> + +<p> +“Trevington—up yonder—is a fairly isolated little +dorp,” I said, for I was beginning to feel hungry. +</p> + +<p> +“No,” said Kysh. “He’d get a lift to the railway in no +time…. Besides, I’m enjoying myself…. Three pounds eighteen and sixpence. +Infernal swindle!” +</p> + +<p> +I take it one of his more recent fines was rankling in Kysh’s brain; but +he drove like the Archangel of the Twilight. +</p> + +<p> +About the longitude of Cassocks, Hinchcliffe yawned. “Aren’t we +goin’ to maroon our Robert? I’m hungry, too.” +</p> + +<p> +“The commodore wants his money back,” I answered. +</p> + +<p> +“If he drives like this habitual, there must be a tidyish little lump +owin’ to him,” said Pyecroft. “Well, I’m +agreeable.” +</p> + +<p> +“I didn’t know it could be done. S’welp me, I +didn’t,” our guest murmured. +</p> + +<p> +“But you will,” said Kysh. And that was the first and last time he +addressed the man. +</p> + +<p> +We ran through Penfield Green, half stupefied with open air, drugged with the +relentless boom of the Octopod, and extinct with famine. +</p> + +<p> +“I used to shoot about here,” said Kysh, a few miles further on. +“Open that gate, please,” and he slowed as the sun touched the +sky-line. At this point we left metalled roads and bucked vigorously amid +ditches and under trees for twenty minutes. +</p> + +<p> +“Only cross-country car on the market,” he said, as we wheeled into +a straw-yard where a lone bull bellowed defiance to our growlings. “Open +that gate, please. I hope the cattle-bridge will stand up.” +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve took a few risks in my time,” said Pyecroft as timbers +cracked beneath us and we entered between thickets, “but I’m a babe +to this man, Hinch.” +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t talk to me. Watch <i>him!</i> It’s a liberal +education, as Shakespeare says. Fallen tree on the port bow, Sir.” +</p> + +<p> +“Right! That’s my mark. Sit tight!” +</p> + +<p> +She flung up her tail like a sounding whale and buried us in a fifteen-foot +deep bridle-path buttressed with the exposed roots of enormous beeches. The +wheels leaped from root to rounded boulder, and it was very dark in the shadow +of the foliage. +</p> + +<p> +“There ought to be a hammer-pond somewhere about here.” Kysh was +letting her down this chute in brakeful spasms. +</p> + +<p> +“Water dead ahead, Sir. Stack o’ brushwood on the starboard beam, +and—no road,” sang Pyecroft. +</p> + +<p> +“Cr-r-ri-key!” said Hinchcliffe, as the car on a wild cant to the +left went astern, screwing herself round the angle of a track that overhung the +pond. “If she only had two propellers, I believe she’d talk poetry. +She can do everything else.” +</p> + +<p> +“We’re rather on our port wheels now,” said Kysh; “but +I don’t think she’ll capsize. This road isn’t used much by +motors.” +</p> + +<p> +“You don’t say so,” said Pyecroft. “What a pity!” +</p> + +<p> +She bored through a mass of crackling brushwood, and emerged into an upward +sloping fern-glade fenced with woods so virgin, so untouched, that William +Rufus might have ridden off as we entered. We climbed out of the violet-purple +shadows towards the upland where the last of the day lingered. I was filled to +my moist eyes with the almost sacred beauty of sense and association that clad +the landscape. +</p> + +<p> +“Does ’unger produce ’alluciations?” said Pyecroft in a +whisper. “Because I’ve just seen a sacred ibis walkin’ arm in +arm with a British cock-pheasant.” +</p> + +<p> +“What are you panickin’ at?” said Hinchcliffe. +“I’ve been seein’ zebra for the last two minutes, but I +’aven’t complained.” +</p> + +<p> +He pointed behind us, and I beheld a superb painted zebra (Burchell’s, I +think), following our track with palpitating nostrils. The car stopped, and it +fled away. +</p> + +<p> +There was a little pond in front of us from which rose a dome of irregular +sticks crowned with a blunt-muzzled beast that sat upon its haunches. +</p> + +<p> +“Is it catching?” said Pyecroft. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes. I’m seeing beaver,” I replied. +</p> + +<p> +“It is here!” said Kysh, with the air and gesture of Captain Nemo, +and half turned. +</p> + +<p> +“No—no—no! For ’Eaven’s sake—not +’ere!” Our guest gasped like a sea-bathed child, as four efficient +hands swung him far out-board on to the turf. The car ran back noiselessly down +the slope. +</p> + +<p> +“Look! Look! It’s sorcery!” cried Hinchcliffe. +</p> + +<p> +There was a report like a pistol shot as the beaver dived from the roof of his +lodge, but we watched our guest. He was on his knees, praying to kangaroos. +Yea, in his bowler hat he kneeled before kangaroos—gigantic, erect, +silhouetted against the light—four buck-kangaroos in the heart of Sussex! +</p> + +<p> +And we retrogressed over the velvet grass till our hind-wheels struck +well-rolled gravel, leading us to sanity, main roads, and, half an hour later, +the “Grapnel Inn” at Horsham. +</p> + +<hr /> + +<p> +After a great meal we poured libations and made burnt-offerings in honour of +Kysh, who received our homage graciously, and, by the way, explained a few +things in the natural history line that had puzzled us. England is a most +marvellous country, but one is not, till one knows the eccentricities of large +land-owners, trained to accept kangaroos, zebras, or beavers as part of its +landscape. +</p> + +<p> +When we went to bed Pyecroft pressed my hand, his voice thick with emotion. +</p> + +<p> +“We owe it to you,” he said. “We owe it all to you. +Didn’t I say we never met in <i>pup-pup-puris naturalibus</i>, if I may +so put it, without a remarkably hectic day ahead of us?” +</p> + +<p> +“That’s all right,” I said. “Mind the candle.” He +was tracing smoke-patterns on the wall. +</p> + +<p> +“But what I want to know is whether we’ll succeed in +acclimatisin’ the blighter, or whether Sir William Gardner’s +keepers ’ll kill ’im before ’e gets accustomed to ’is +surroundin’s?” +</p> + +<p> +Some day, I think, we must go up the Linghurst Road and find out. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap15"></a>“WIRELESS”</h2> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap14"></a>KASPAR’S SONG IN VARDA</h2> + +<p class="center"> +(<i>From the Swedish of Stagnelius</i>.) +</p> + +<p class="poem"> + Eyes aloft, over dangerous places,<br/> + The children follow where Psyche flies,<br/> +And, in the sweat of their upturned faces,<br/> + Slash with a net at the empty skies.<br/> +<br/> +So it goes they fall amid brambles,<br/> + And sting their toes on the nettle-tops,<br/> +Till after a thousand scratches and scrambles<br/> + They wipe their brows, and the hunting stops.<br/> +<br/> +Then to quiet them comes their father<br/> + And stills the riot of pain and grief,<br/> +Saying, “Little ones, go and gather<br/> + Out of my garden a cabbage leaf.<br/> +<br/> +“You will find on it whorls and clots of<br/> + Dull grey eggs that, properly fed,<br/> +Turn, by way of the worm, to lots of<br/> + Radiant Psyches raised from the dead.” +</p> + +<hr /> + +<p class="poem"> +“Heaven is beautiful, Earth is ugly,”<br/> + The three-dimensioned preacher saith,<br/> +So we must not look where the snail and the slug lie<br/> + For Psyche’s birth … And that is our death! +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2>“WIRELESS”</h2> + +<p> +“It’s a funny thing, this Marconi business, isn’t it?” +said Mr. Shaynor, coughing heavily. “Nothing seems to make any +difference, by what they tell me—storms, hills, or anything; but if +that’s true we shall know before morning.” +</p> + +<p> +“Of course it’s true,” I answered, stepping behind the +counter. “Where’s old Mr. Cashell?” +</p> + +<p> +“He’s had to go to bed on account of his influenza. He said +you’d very likely drop in.” +</p> + +<p> +“Where’s his nephew?” +</p> + +<p> +“Inside, getting the things ready. He told me that the last time they +experimented they put the pole on the roof of one of the big hotels here, and +the batteries electrified all the water-supply, and”—he +giggled—“the ladies got shocks when they took their baths.” +</p> + +<p> +“I never heard of that.” +</p> + +<p> +“The hotel wouldn’t exactly advertise it, would it? Just now, by +what Mr. Cashell tells me, they’re trying to signal from here to Poole, +and they’re using stronger batteries than ever. But, you see, he being +the guvnor’s nephew and all that (and it will be in the papers too), it +doesn’t matter how they electrify things in this house. Are you going to +watch?” +</p> + +<p> +“Very much. I’ve never seen this game. Aren’t you going to +bed?” +</p> + +<p> +“We don’t close till ten on Saturdays. There’s a good deal of +influenza in town, too, and there’ll be a dozen prescriptions coming in +before morning. I generally sleep in the chair here. It’s warmer than +jumping out of bed every time. Bitter cold, isn’t it?” +</p> + +<p> +“Freezing hard. I’m sorry your cough’s worse.” +</p> + +<p> +“Thank you. I don’t mind cold so much. It’s this wind that +fair cuts me to pieces.” He coughed again hard and hackingly, as an old +lady came in for ammoniated quinine. “We’ve just run out of it in +bottles, madam,” said Mr. Shaynor, returning to the professional tone, +“but if you will wait two minutes, I’ll make it up for you, +madam.” +</p> + +<p> +I had used the shop for some time, and my acquaintance with the proprietor had +ripened into friendship. It was Mr. Cashell who revealed to me the purpose and +power of Apothecaries’ Hall what time a fellow-chemist had made an error +in a prescription of mine, had lied to cover his sloth, and when error and lie +were brought home to him had written vain letters. +</p> + +<p> +“A disgrace to our profession,” said the thin, mild-eyed man, +hotly, after studying the evidence. “You couldn’t do a better +service to the profession than report him to Apothecaries’ Hall.” +</p> + +<p> +I did so, not knowing what djinns I should evoke; and the result was such an +apology as one might make who had spent a night on the rack. I conceived great +respect for Apothecaries’ Hall, and esteem for Mr. Cashell, a zealous +craftsman who magnified his calling. Until Mr. Shaynor came down from the North +his assistants had by no means agreed with Mr. Cashell. “They +forget,” said he, “that, first and foremost, the compounder is a +medicine-man. On him depends the physician’s reputation. He holds it +literally in the hollow of his hand, Sir.” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Shaynor’s manners had not, perhaps, the polish of the grocery and +Italian warehouse next door, but he knew and loved his dispensary work in every +detail. For relaxation he seemed to go no farther afield than the romance of +drugs—their discovery, preparation packing, and export—but it led +him to the ends of the earth, and on this subject, and the Pharmaceutical +Formulary, and Nicholas Culpepper, most confident of physicians, we met. +</p> + +<p> +Little by little I grew to know something of his beginnings and his +hopes—of his mother, who had been a school-teacher in one of the northern +counties, and of his red-headed father, a small job-master at Kirby Moors, who +died when he was a child; of the examinations he had passed and of their +exceeding and increasing difficulty; of his dreams of a shop in London; of his +hate for the price-cutting Co-operative stores; and, most interesting, of his +mental attitude towards customers. +</p> + +<p> +“There’s a way you get into,” he told me, “of serving +them carefully, and I hope, politely, without stopping your own thinking. +I’ve been reading Christie’s <i>New Commercial Plants</i> all this +autumn, and that needs keeping your mind on it, I can tell you. So long as it +isn’t a prescription, of course, I can carry as much as half a page of +Christie in my head, and at the same time I could sell out all that window +twice over, and not a penny wrong at the end. As to prescriptions, I think I +could make up the general run of ’em in my sleep, almost.” +</p> + +<p> +For reasons of my own, I was deeply interested in Marconi experiments at their +outset in England; and it was of a piece with Mr. Cashell’s unvarying +thoughtfulness that, when his nephew the electrician appropriated the house for +a long-range installation, he should, as I have said, invite me to see the +result. +</p> + +<p> +The old lady went away with her medicine, and Mr. Shaynor and I stamped on the +tiled floor behind the counter to keep ourselves warm. The shop, by the light +of the many electrics, looked like a Paris-diamond mine, for Mr. Cashell +believed in all the ritual of his craft. Three superb glass jars—red, +green, and blue—of the sort that led Rosamund to parting with her +shoes—blazed in the broad plate-glass windows, and there was a confused +smell of orris, Kodak films, vulcanite, tooth-powder, sachets, and almond-cream +in the air. Mr. Shaynor fed the dispensary stove, and we sucked cayenne-pepper +jujubes and menthol lozenges. The brutal east wind had cleared the streets, and +the few passers-by were muffled to their puckered eyes. In the Italian +warehouse next door some gay feathered birds and game, hung upon hooks, sagged +to the wind across the left edge of our window-frame. +</p> + +<p> +“They ought to take these poultry in—all knocked about like +that,” said Mr. Shaynor. “Doesn’t it make you feel fair +perishing? See that old hare! The wind’s nearly blowing the fur off +him.” +</p> + +<p> +I saw the belly-fur of the dead beast blown apart in ridges and streaks as the +wind caught it, showing bluish skin underneath. “Bitter cold,” said +Mr. Shaynor, shuddering. “Fancy going out on a night like this! Oh, +here’s young Mr. Cashell.” +</p> + +<p> +The door of the inner office behind the dispensary opened, and an energetic, +spade-bearded man stepped forth, rubbing his hands. +</p> + +<p> +“I want a bit of tin-foil, Shaynor,” he said. “Good-evening. +My uncle told me you might be coming.” This to me, as I began the first +of a hundred questions. +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve everything in order,” he replied. “We’re +only waiting until Poole calls us up. Excuse me a minute. You can come in +whenever you like—but I’d better be with the instruments. Give me +that tin-foil. Thanks.” +</p> + +<p> +While we were talking, a girl—evidently no customer—had come into +the shop, and the face and bearing of Mr. Shaynor changed. She leaned +confidently across the counter. +</p> + +<p> +“But I can’t,” I heard him whisper uneasily—the flush +on his cheek was dull red, and his eyes shone like a drugged moth’s. +“I can’t. I tell you I’m alone in the place.” +</p> + +<p> +“No, you aren’t. Who’s <i>that</i>? Let him look after it for +half an hour. A brisk walk will do you good. Ah, come now, John.” +</p> + +<p> +“But he isn’t——” +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t care. I want you to; we’ll only go round by St. +Agnes. If you don’t——” +</p> + +<p> +He crossed to where I stood in the shadow of the dispensary counter, and began +some sort of broken apology about a lady-friend. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” she interrupted. “You take the shop for half an +hour—to oblige <i>me</i>, won’t you?” +</p> + +<p> +She had a singularly rich and promising voice that well matched her outline. +</p> + +<p> +“All right,” I said. “I’ll do it—but you’d +better wrap yourself up, Mr. Shaynor.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, a brisk walk ought to help me. We’re only going round by the +church.” I heard him cough grievously as they went out together. +</p> + +<p> +I refilled the stove, and, after reckless expenditure of Mr. Cashell’s +coal, drove some warmth into the shop. I explored many of the glass-knobbed +drawers that lined the walls, tasted some disconcerting drugs, and, by the aid +of a few cardamoms, ground ginger, chloric-ether, and dilute alcohol, +manufactured a new and wildish drink, of which I bore a glassful to young Mr. +Cashell, busy in the back office. He laughed shortly when I told him that Mr. +Shaynor had stepped out—but a frail coil of wire held all his attention, +and he had no word for me bewildered among the batteries and rods. The noise of +the sea on the beach began to make itself heard as the traffic in the street +ceased. Then briefly, but very lucidly, he gave me the names and uses of the +mechanism that crowded the tables and the floor. +</p> + +<p> +“When do you expect to get the message from Poole?” I demanded, +sipping my liquor out of a graduated glass. +</p> + +<p> +“About midnight, if everything is in order. We’ve got our +installation-pole fixed to the roof of the house. I shouldn’t advise you +to turn on a tap or anything tonight. We’ve connected up with the +plumbing, and all the water will be electrified.” He repeated to me the +history of the agitated ladies at the hotel at the time of the first +installation. +</p> + +<p> +“But what <i>is</i> it?” I asked. “Electricity is out of my +beat altogether.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah, if you knew <i>that</i> you’d know something nobody knows. +It’s just It—what we call Electricity, but the magic—the +manifestations—the Hertzian waves—are all revealed by <i>this</i>. +The coherer, we call it.” +</p> + +<p> +He picked up a glass tube not much thicker than a thermometer, in which, almost +touching, were two tiny silver plugs, and between them an infinitesimal pinch +of metallic dust. “That’s all,” he said, proudly, as though +himself responsible for the wonder. “That is the thing that will reveal +to us the Powers—whatever the Powers may be—at work—through +space—a long distance away.” +</p> + +<p> +Just then Mr. Shaynor returned alone and stood coughing his heart out on the +mat. +</p> + +<p> +“Serves you right for being such a fool,” said young Mr. Cashell, +as annoyed as myself at the interruption. “Never mind—we’ve +all the night before us to see wonders.” +</p> + +<p> +Shaynor clutched the counter, his handkerchief to his lips. When he brought it +away I saw two bright red stains. +</p> + +<p> +“I—I’ve got a bit of a rasped throat from smoking +cigarettes,” he panted. “I think I’ll try a cubeb.” +</p> + +<p> +“Better take some of this. I’ve been compounding while you’ve +been away.” I handed him the brew. +</p> + +<p> +“’Twon’t make me drunk, will it? I’m almost a +teetotaller. My word! That’s grateful and comforting.” +</p> + +<p> +He sat down the empty glass to cough afresh. +</p> + +<p> +“Brr! But it was cold out there! I shouldn’t care to be lying in my +grave a night like this. Don’t <i>you</i> ever have a sore throat from +smoking?” He pocketed the handkerchief after a furtive peep. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, yes, sometimes,” I replied, wondering, while I spoke, into +what agonies of terror I should fall if ever I saw those bright-red +danger-signals under my nose. Young Mr. Cashell among the batteries coughed +slightly to show that he was quite ready to continue his scientific +explanations, but I was thinking still of the girl with the rich voice and the +significantly cut mouth, at whose command I had taken charge of the shop. It +flashed across me that she distantly resembled the seductive shape on a +gold-framed toilet-water advertisement whose charms were unholily heightened by +the glare from the red bottle in the window. Turning to make sure, I saw Mr. +Shaynor’s eyes bent in the same direction, and by instinct recognised +that the flamboyant thing was to him a shrine. “What do you take for +your—cough?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I’m the wrong side of the counter to believe much in patent +medicines. But there are asthma cigarettes and there are pastilles. To tell you +the truth, if you don’t object to the smell, which is very like incense, +I believe, though I’m not a Roman Catholic, Blaudett’s Cathedral +Pastilles relieve me as much as anything.” +</p> + +<p> +“Let’s try.” I had never raided a chemist’s shop +before, so I was thorough. We unearthed the pastilles—brown, gummy cones +of benzoin—and set them alight under the toilet-water advertisement, +where they fumed in thin blue spirals. +</p> + +<p> +“Of course,” said Mr. Shaynor, to my question, “what one uses +in the shop for one’s self comes out of one’s pocket. Why, +stock-taking in our business is nearly the same as with jewellers—and I +can’t say more than that. But one gets them”—he pointed to +the pastille-box—“at trade prices.” Evidently the censing of +the gay, seven-tinted wench with the teeth was an established ritual which cost +something. +</p> + +<p> +“And when do we shut up shop?” +</p> + +<p> +“We stay like this all night. The gov—old Mr. +Cashell—doesn’t believe in locks and shutters as compared with +electric light. Besides it brings trade. I’ll just sit here in the chair +by the stove and write a letter, if you don’t mind. Electricity +isn’t my prescription.” +</p> + +<p> +The energetic young Mr. Cashell snorted within, and Shaynor settled himself up +in his chair over which he had thrown a staring red, black, and yellow Austrian +jute blanket, rather like a table-cover. I cast about, amid patent medicine +pamphlets, for something to read, but finding little, returned to the +manufacture of the new drink. The Italian warehouse took down its game and went +to bed. Across the street blank shutters flung back the gaslight in cold +smears; the dried pavement seemed to rough up in goose-flesh under the scouring +of the savage wind, and we could hear, long ere he passed, the policeman +flapping his arms to keep himself warm. Within, the flavours of cardamoms and +chloric-ether disputed those of the pastilles and a score of drugs and perfume +and soap scents. Our electric lights, set low down in the windows before the +tun-bellied Rosamund jars, flung inward three monstrous daubs of red, blue, and +green, that broke into kaleidoscopic lights on the facetted knobs of the +drug-drawers, the cut-glass scent flagons, and the bulbs of the sparklet +bottles. They flushed the white-tiled floor in gorgeous patches; splashed along +the nickel-silver counter-rails, and turned the polished mahogany +counter-panels to the likeness of intricate grained marbles—slabs of +porphyry and malachite. Mr. Shaynor unlocked a drawer, and ere he began to +write, took out a meagre bundle of letters. From my place by the stove, I could +see the scalloped edges of the paper with a flaring monogram in the corner and +could even smell the reek of chypre. At each page he turned toward the +toilet-water lady of the advertisement and devoured her with over-luminous +eyes. He had drawn the Austrian blanket over his shoulders, and among those +warring lights he looked more than ever the incarnation of a drugged +moth—a tiger-moth as I thought. +</p> + +<p> +He put his letter into an envelope, stamped it with stiff mechanical movements, +and dropped it in the drawer. Then I became aware of the silence of a great +city asleep—the silence that underlaid the even voice of the breakers +along the sea-front—a thick, tingling quiet of warm life stilled down for +its appointed time, and unconsciously I moved about the glittering shop as one +moves in a sick-room. Young Mr. Cashell was adjusting some wire that crackled +from time to time with the tense, knuckle-stretching sound of the electric +spark. Upstairs, where a door shut and opened swiftly, I could hear his uncle +coughing abed. +</p> + +<p> +“Here,” I said, when the drink was properly warmed, “take +some of this, Mr. Shaynor.” +</p> + +<p> +He jerked in his chair with a start and a wrench, and held out his hand for the +glass. The mixture, of a rich port-wine colour, frothed at the top. +</p> + +<p> +“It looks,” he said, suddenly, “it looks—those +bubbles—like a string of pearls winking at you—rather like the +pearls round that young lady’s neck.” He turned again to the +advertisement where the female in the dove-coloured corset had seen fit to put +on all her pearls before she cleaned her teeth. +</p> + +<p> +“Not bad, is it?” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“Eh?” +</p> + +<p> +He rolled his eyes heavily full on me, and, as I stared, I beheld all meaning +and consciousness die out of the swiftly dilating pupils. His figure lost its +stark rigidity, softened into the chair, and, chin on chest, hands dropped +before him, he rested open-eyed, absolutely still. +</p> + +<p> +“I’m afraid I’ve rather cooked Shaynor’s goose,” +I said, bearing the fresh drink to young Mr. Cashell. “Perhaps it was the +chloric-ether.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, he’s all right.” The spade-bearded man glanced at him +pityingly. “Consumptives go off in those sort of doses very often. +It’s exhaustion… I don’t wonder. I dare say the liquor will do him +good. It’s grand stuff,” he finished his share appreciatively. +“Well, as I was saying—before he interrupted—about this +little coherer. The pinch of dust, you see, is nickel-filings. The Hertzian +waves, you see, come out of space from the station that despatches ’em, +and all these little particles are attracted together—cohere, we call +it—for just so long as the current passes through them. Now, it’s +important to remember that the current is an induced current. There are a good +many kinds of induction——” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, but what <i>is</i> induction?” +</p> + +<p> +“That’s rather hard to explain untechnically. But the long and the +short of it is that when a current of electricity passes through a wire +there’s a lot of magnetism present round that wire; and if you put +another wire parallel to, and within what we call its magnetic field—why +then, the second wire will also become charged with electricity.” +</p> + +<p> +“On its own account?” +</p> + +<p> +“On its own account.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then let’s see if I’ve got it correctly. Miles off, at +Poole, or wherever it is——” +</p> + +<p> +“It will be anywhere in ten years.” +</p> + +<p> +“You’ve got a charged wire——” +</p> + +<p> +“Charged with Hertzian waves which vibrate, say, two hundred and thirty +million times a second.” Mr. Cashell snaked his forefinger rapidly +through the air. +</p> + +<p> +“All right—a charged wire at Poole, giving out these waves into +space. Then this wire of yours sticking out into space—on the roof of the +house—in some mysterious way gets charged with those waves from +Poole——” +</p> + +<p> +“Or anywhere—it only happens to be Poole tonight.” +</p> + +<p> +“And those waves set the coherer at work, just like an ordinary +telegraph-office ticker?” +</p> + +<p> +“No! That’s where so many people make the mistake. The Hertzian +waves wouldn’t be strong enough to work a great heavy Morse instrument +like ours. They can only just make that dust cohere, and while it coheres (a +little while for a dot and a longer while for a dash) the current from this +battery—the home battery”—he laid his hand on the +thing—“can get through to the Morse printing-machine to record the +dot or dash. Let me make it clearer. Do you know anything about steam?” +</p> + +<p> +“Very little. But go on.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, the coherer is like a steam-valve. Any child can open a valve and +start a steamer’s engines, because a turn of the hand lets in the main +steam, doesn’t it? Now, this home battery here ready to print is the main +steam. The coherer is the valve, always ready to be turned on. The Hertzian +wave is the child’s hand that turns it.” +</p> + +<p> +“I see. That’s marvellous.” +</p> + +<p> +“Marvellous, isn’t it? And, remember, we’re only at the +beginning. There’s nothing we sha’n’t be able to do in ten +years. I want to live—my God, how I want to live, and see it +develop!” He looked through the door at Shaynor breathing lightly in his +chair. “Poor beast! And he wants to keep company with Fanny Brand.” +</p> + +<p> +“Fanny <i>who</i>?” I said, for the name struck an obscurely +familiar chord in my brain—something connected with a stained +handkerchief, and the word “arterial.” +</p> + +<p> +“Fanny Brand—the girl you kept shop for.” He laughed, +“That’s all I know about her, and for the life of me I can’t +see what Shaynor sees in her, or she in him.” +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Can’t</i> you see what he sees in her?” I insisted. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, yes, if <i>that’s</i> what you mean. She’s a great, big, +fat lump of a girl, and so on. I suppose that’s why he’s so crazy +after her. She isn’t his sort. Well, it doesn’t matter. My uncle +says he’s bound to die before the year’s out. Your drink’s +given him a good sleep, at any rate.” Young Mr. Cashell could not catch +Mr. Shaynor’s face, which was half turned to the advertisement. +</p> + +<p> +I stoked the stove anew, for the room was growing cold, and lighted another +pastille. Mr. Shaynor in his chair, never moving, looked through and over me +with eyes as wide and lustreless as those of a dead hare. +</p> + +<p> +“Poole’s late,” said young Mr. Cashell, when I stepped back. +“I’ll just send them a call.” +</p> + +<p> +He pressed a key in the semi-darkness, and with a rending crackle there leaped +between two brass knobs a spark, streams of sparks, and sparks again. +</p> + +<p> +“Grand, isn’t it? <i>That’s</i> the Power—our unknown +Power—kicking and fighting to be let loose,” said young Mr. +Cashell. “There she goes—kick—kick—kick into space. I +never get over the strangeness of it when I work a sending-machine—waves +going into space, you know. T.R. is our call. Poole ought to answer with +L.L.L.” +</p> + +<p> +We waited two, three, five minutes. In that silence, of which the boom of the +tide was an orderly part, I caught the clear +“<i>kiss—kiss—kiss</i>” of the halliards on the roof, +as they were blown against the installation-pole. +</p> + +<p> +“Poole is not ready. I’ll stay here and call you when he is.” +</p> + +<p> +I returned to the shop, and set down my glass on a marble slab with a careless +clink. As I did so, Shaynor rose to his feet, his eyes fixed once more on the +advertisement, where the young woman bathed in the light from the red jar +simpered pinkly over her pearls. His lips moved without cessation. I stepped +nearer to listen. “And threw—and threw—and threw,” he +repeated, his face all sharp with some inexplicable agony. +</p> + +<p> +I moved forward astonished. But it was then he found words—delivered +roundly and clearly. These:— +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +And threw warm gules on Madeleine’s young breast. +</p> + +<p> +The trouble passed off his countenance, and he returned lightly to his place, +rubbing his hands. +</p> + +<p> +It had never occurred to me, though we had many times discussed reading and +prize-competitions as a diversion, that Mr. Shaynor ever read Keats, or could +quote him at all appositely. There was, after all, a certain stained-glass +effect of light on the high bosom of the highly-polished picture which might, +by stretch of fancy, suggest, as a vile chromo recalls some incomparable +canvas, the line he had spoken. Night, my drink, and solitude were evidently +turning Mr. Shaynor into a poet. He sat down again and wrote swiftly on his +villainous note-paper, his lips quivering. +</p> + +<p> +I shut the door into the inner office and moved up behind him. He made no sign +that he saw or heard. I looked over his shoulder, and read, amid half-formed +words, sentences, and wild scratches:— +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +—Very cold it was. Very cold<br/> +The hare—the hare—the hare—<br/> +The birds—— +</p> + +<p> +He raised his head sharply, and frowned toward the blank shutters of the +poulterer’s shop where they jutted out against our window. Then one clear +line came:— +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +The hare, in spite of fur, was very cold. +</p> + +<p> +The head, moving machine-like, turned right to the advertisement where the +Blaudett’s Cathedral pastille reeked abominably. He grunted, and went +on:— +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +Incense in a censer—<br/> +Before her darling picture framed in gold—<br/> +Maiden’s picture—angel’s portrait— +</p> + +<p> +“Hsh!” said Mr. Cashell guardedly from the inner office, as though +in the presence of spirits. “There’s something coming through from +somewhere; but it isn’t Poole.” I heard the crackle of sparks as he +depressed the keys of the transmitter. In my own brain, too, something +crackled, or it might have been the hair on my head. Then I heard my own voice, +in a harsh whisper: “Mr. Cashell, there is something coming through here, +too. Leave me alone till I tell you.” +</p> + +<p> +“But I thought you’d come to see this wonderful +thing—Sir,” indignantly at the end. +</p> + +<p> +“Leave me alone till I tell you. Be quiet.” +</p> + +<p> +I watched—I waited. Under the blue-veined hand—the dry hand of the +consumptive—came away clear, without erasure: +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +And my weak spirit fails<br/> +To think how the dead must freeze— +</p> + +<p class="noindent"> +he shivered as he wrote— +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +Beneath the churchyard mould. +</p> + +<p> +Then he stopped, laid the pen down, and leaned back. +</p> + +<p> +For an instant, that was half an eternity, the shop spun before me in a +rainbow-tinted whirl, in and through which my own soul most dispassionately +considered my own soul as that fought with an over-mastering fear. Then I smelt +the strong smell of cigarettes from Mr. Shaynor’s clothing, and heard, as +though it had been the rending of trumpets, the rattle of his breathing. I was +still in my place of observation, much as one would watch a rifle-shot at the +butts, half-bent, hands on my knees, and head within a few inches of the black, +red, and yellow blanket of his shoulder. I was whispering encouragement, +evidently to my other self, sounding sentences, such as men pronounce in +dreams. +</p> + +<p> +“If he has read Keats, it proves nothing. If he hasn’t—like +causes <i>must</i> beget like effects. There is no escape from this law. +<i>You</i> ought to be grateful that you know ‘St. Agnes Eve’ +without the book; because, given the circumstances, such as Fanny Brand, who is +the key of the enigma, and approximately represents the latitude and longitude +of Fanny Brawne; allowing also for the bright red colour of the arterial blood +upon the handkerchief, which was just what you were puzzling over in the shop +just now; and counting the effect of the professional environment, here almost +perfectly duplicated—the result is logical and inevitable. As inevitable +as induction.” +</p> + +<p> +Still, the other half of my soul refused to be comforted. It was cowering in +some minute and inadequate corner—at an immense distance. +</p> + +<p> +Hereafter, I found myself one person again, my hands still gripping my knees, +and my eyes glued on the page before Mr. Shaynor. As dreamers accept and +explain the upheaval of landscapes and the resurrection of the dead, with +excerpts from the evening hymn or the multiplication-table, so I had accepted +the facts, whatever they might be, that I should witness, and had devised a +theory, sane and plausible to my mind, that explained them all. Nay, I was even +in advance of my facts, walking hurriedly before them, assured that they would +fit my theory. And all that I now recall of that epoch-making theory are the +lofty words: “If he has read Keats it’s the chloric-ether. If he +hasn’t, it’s the identical bacillus, or Hertzian wave of +tuberculosis, <i>plus</i> Fanny Brand and the professional status which, in +conjunction with the main-stream of subconscious thought common to all mankind, +has thrown up temporarily an induced Keats.” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Shaynor returned to his work, erasing and rewriting as before with +swiftness. Two or three blank pages he tossed aside. Then he wrote, muttering: +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +The little smoke of a candle that goes out. +</p> + +<p> +“No,” he muttered. “Little smoke—little +smoke—little smoke. What else?” He thrust his chin forward toward +the advertisement, whereunder the last of the Blaudett’s Cathedral +pastilles fumed in its holder. “Ah!” Then with relief:— +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +The little smoke that dies in moonlight cold. +</p> + +<p> +Evidently he was snared by the rhymes of his first verse, for he wrote and +rewrote “gold—cold—mould” many times. Again he sought +inspiration from the advertisement, and set down, without erasure, the line I +had overheard: +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +And threw warm gules on Madeleine’s young breast. +</p> + +<p class="noindent"> +As I remembered the original it is “fair”—a trite +word—instead of “young,” and I found myself nodding approval, +though I admitted that the attempt to reproduce “its little smoke in +pallid moonlight died” was a failure. +</p> + +<p> +Followed without a break ten or fifteen lines of bald prose—the naked +soul’s confession of its physical yearning for its beloved—unclean +as we count uncleanliness; unwholesome, but human exceedingly; the raw +material, so it seemed to me in that hour and in that place, whence Keats wove +the twenty-sixth, seventh, and eighth stanzas of his poem. Shame I had none in +overseeing this revelation; and my fear had gone with the smoke of the +pastille. +</p> + +<p> +“That’s it,” I murmured. “That’s how it’s +blocked out. Go on! Ink it in, man. Ink it in!” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Shaynor returned to broken verse wherein “loveliness” was made +to rhyme with a desire to look upon “her empty dress.” He picked up +a fold of the gay, soft blanket, spread it over one hand, caressed it with +infinite tenderness, thought, muttered, traced some snatches which I could not +decipher, shut his eyes drowsily, shook his head, and dropped the stuff. Here I +found myself at fault, for I could not then see (as I do now) in what manner a +red, black, and yellow Austrian blanket coloured his dreams. +</p> + +<p> +In a few minutes he laid aside his pen, and, chin on hand, considered the shop +with thoughtful and intelligent eyes. He threw down the blanket, rose, passed +along a line of drug-drawers, and read the names on the labels aloud. +Returning, he took from his desk Christie’s <i>New Commercial Plants</i> +and the old Culpepper that I had given him, opened and laid them side by side +with a clerky air, all trace of passion gone from his face, read first in one +and then in the other, and paused with pen behind his ear. +</p> + +<p> +“What wonder of Heaven’s coming now?” I thought. +</p> + +<p> +“Manna—manna—manna,” he said at last, under wrinkled +brows. “That’s what I wanted. Good! Now then! Now then! Good! Good! +Oh, by God, that’s good!” His voice rose and he spoke rightly and +fully without a falter:— +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +Candied apple, quince and plum and gourd,<br/> +And jellies smoother than the creamy curd,<br/> +And lucent syrups tinct with cinnamon,<br/> +Manna and dates in Argosy transferred<br/> +From Fez; and spiced dainties, every one<br/> +From silken Samarcand to cedared Lebanon. +</p> + +<p> +He repeated it once more, using “blander” for +“smoother” in the second line; then wrote it down without erasure, +but this time (my set eyes missed no stroke of any word) he substituted +“soother” for his atrocious second thought, so that it came away +under his hand as it is written in the book—as it is written in the book. +</p> + +<p> +A wind went shouting down the street, and on the heels of the wind followed a +spurt and rattle of rain. +</p> + +<p> +After a smiling pause—and good right had he to smile—he began anew, +always tossing the last sheet over his shoulder:— +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +“The sharp rain falling on the window-pane,<br/> +Rattling sleet—the wind-blown sleet.” +</p> + +<p> +Then prose: “It is very cold of mornings when the wind brings rain and +sleet with it. I heard the sleet on the window-pane outside, and thought of +you, my darling. I am always thinking of you. I wish we could both run away +like two lovers into the storm and get that little cottage by the sea which we +are always thinking about, my own dear darling. We could sit and watch the sea +beneath our windows. It would be a fairyland all of our own—a fairy +sea—a fairy sea….” +</p> + +<p> +He stopped, raised his head, and listened. The steady drone of the Channel +along the sea-front that had borne us company so long leaped up a note to the +sudden fuller surge that signals the change from ebb to flood. It beat in like +the change of step throughout an army—this renewed pulse of the +sea—and filled our ears till they, accepting it, marked it no longer. +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +“A fairyland for you and me<br/> +Across the foam—beyond …<br/> +A magic foam, a perilous sea.” +</p> + +<p> +He grunted again with effort and bit his underlip. My throat dried, but I dared +not gulp to moisten it lest I should break the spell that was drawing him +nearer and nearer to the high-water mark but two of the sons of Adam have +reached. Remember that in all the millions permitted there are no more than +five—five little lines—of which one can say: “These are the +pure Magic. These are the clear Vision. The rest is only poetry.” And Mr. +Shaynor was playing hot and cold with two of them! +</p> + +<p> +I vowed no unconscious thought of mine should influence the blindfold soul, and +pinned myself desperately to the other three, repeating and re-repeating: +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +A savage spot as holy and enchanted<br/> +As e’er beneath a waning moon was haunted<br/> +By woman wailing for her demon lover. +</p> + +<p> +But though I believed my brain thus occupied, my every sense hung upon the +writing under the dry, bony hand, all brown-fingered with chemicals and +cigarette-smoke. +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +Our windows fronting on the dangerous foam, +</p> + +<p class="noindent"> +(he wrote, after long, irresolute snatches), and then— +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +“Our open casements facing desolate seas<br/> +Forlorn—forlorn—” +</p> + +<p> +Here again his face grew peaked and anxious with that sense of loss I had first +seen when the Power snatched him. But this time the agony was tenfold keener. +As I watched it mounted like mercury in the tube. It lighted his face from +within till I thought the visibly scourged soul must leap forth naked between +his jaws, unable to endure. A drop of sweat trickled from my forehead down my +nose and splashed on the back of my hand. +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +“Our windows facing on the desolate seas<br/> +And pearly foam of magic fairyland—” +</p> + +<p> +“Not yet—not yet,” he muttered, “wait a minute. +<i>Please</i> wait a minute. I shall get it then—” +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +Our magic windows fronting on the sea,<br/> +The dangerous foam of desolate seas …<br/> +For aye. +</p> + +<p class="noindent"> +<i>Ouh</i>, my God!” +</p> + +<p> +From head to heel he shook—shook from the marrow of his bones +outwards—then leaped to his feet with raised arms, and slid the chair +screeching across the tiled floor where it struck the drawers behind and fell +with a jar. Mechanically, I stooped to recover it. +</p> + +<p> +As I rose, Mr. Shaynor was stretching and yawning at leisure. +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve had a bit of a doze,” he said. “How did I come to +knock the chair over? You look rather—” +</p> + +<p> +“The chair startled me,” I answered. “It was so sudden in +this quiet.” +</p> + +<p> +Young Mr. Cashell behind his shut door was offendedly silent. +</p> + +<p> +“I suppose I must have been dreaming,” said Mr. Shaynor. +</p> + +<p> +“I suppose you must,” I said. “Talking of +dreams—I—I noticed you writing—before—” +</p> + +<p> +He flushed consciously. +</p> + +<p> +“I meant to ask you if you’ve ever read anything written by a man +called Keats.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh! I haven’t much time to read poetry, and I can’t say that +I remember the name exactly. Is he a popular writer?” +</p> + +<p> +“Middling. I thought you might know him because he’s the only poet +who was ever a druggist. And he’s rather what’s called the +lover’s poet.” +</p> + +<p> +“Indeed. I must dip into him. What did he write about?” +</p> + +<p> +“A lot of things. Here’s a sample that may interest you.” +</p> + +<p> +Then and there, carefully, I repeated the verse he had twice spoken and once +written not ten minutes ago. +</p> + +<p> +“Ah. Anybody could see he was a druggist from that line about the +tinctures and syrups. It’s a fine tribute to our profession.” +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t know,” said young Mr. Cashell, with icy politeness, +opening the door one half-inch, “if you still happen to be interested in +our trifling experiments. But, should such be the case——” +</p> + +<p> +I drew him aside, whispering, “Shaynor seemed going off into some sort of +fit when I spoke to you just now. I thought, even at the risk of being rude, it +wouldn’t do to take you off your instruments just as the call was coming +through. Don’t you see?” +</p> + +<p> +“Granted—granted as soon as asked,” he said unbending. +“I <i>did</i> think it a shade odd at the time. So that was why he +knocked the chair down?” +</p> + +<p> +“I hope I haven’t missed anything,” I said. “I’m +afraid I can’t say that, but you’re just in time for the end of a +rather curious performance. You can come in, too, Mr. Shaynor. Listen, while I +read it off.” +</p> + +<p> +The Morse instrument was ticking furiously. Mr. Cashell interpreted: +“‘<i>K.K.V. Can make nothing of your signals</i>.’” A +pause. “‘<i>M.M.V. M.M.V. Signals unintelligible. Purpose anchor +Sandown Bay. Examine instruments to-morrow.’</i> Do you know what that +means? It’s a couple of men-o’-war working Marconi signals off the +Isle of Wight. They are trying to talk to each other. Neither can read the +other’s messages, but all their messages are being taken in by our +receiver here. They’ve been going on for ever so long. I wish you could +have heard it.” +</p> + +<p> +“How wonderful!” I said. “Do you mean we’re overhearing +Portsmouth ships trying to talk to each other—that we’re +eavesdropping across half South England?” +</p> + +<p> +“Just that. Their transmitters are all right, but their receivers are out +of order, so they only get a dot here and a dash there. Nothing clear.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why is that?” +</p> + +<p> +“God knows—and Science will know to-morrow. Perhaps the induction +is faulty; perhaps the receivers aren’t tuned to receive just the number +of vibrations per second that the transmitter sends. Only a word here and +there. Just enough to tantalise.” +</p> + +<p> +Again the Morse sprang to life. +</p> + +<p> +“That’s one of ’em complaining now. Listen: +‘<i>Disheartening—most disheartening</i>.’ It’s quite +pathetic. Have you ever seen a spiritualistic seance? It reminds me of that +sometimes—odds and ends of messages coming out of nowhere—a word +here and there—no good at all.” +</p> + +<p> +“But mediums are all impostors,” said Mr. Shaynor, in the doorway, +lighting an asthma-cigarette. “They only do it for the money they can +make. I’ve seen ’em.” +</p> + +<p> +“Here’s Poole, at last—clear as a bell. L.L.L. <i>Now</i> we +sha’n’t be long.” Mr. Cashell rattled the keys merrily. +“Anything you’d like to tell ’em?” +</p> + +<p> +“No, I don’t think so,” I said. “I’ll go home and +get to bed. I’m feeling a little tired.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2>THE ARMY OF A DREAM</h2> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap16"></a>SONG OF THE OLD GUARD</h2> + +<p> +“And thou shalt make a candlestick of pure gold of beaten work shall the +candlestick be made: his shaft and its branches, his bowls, his knops, and his +flowers, shall be the same. +</p> + +<p> +“And there shall be a knop under two branches of the same, and a knop +under two branches of the same, and a knop under two branches of the same, +according to the six branches that proceed out of the candlestick. Their knops +and their branches shall be the same.”—<i>Exodus.</i> +</p> + +<p class="poem"> + “Know this, my brethren, Heaven is clear<br/> + And all the clouds are gone—<br/> +The Proper Sort shall flourish now,<br/> + Good times are coming on”—<br/> +The evil that was threatened late<br/> + To all of our degree,<br/> +Hath passed in discord and debate,<br/> + And, <i>Hey then up go we!</i><br/> +<br/> +A common people strove in vain<br/> + To shame us unto toil,<br/> +But they are spent and we remain,<br/> + And we shall share the spoil<br/> +According to our several needs<br/> + As Beauty shall decree,<br/> +As Age ordains or Birth concedes,<br/> + And, <i>Hey then up go we!</i><br/> +<br/> +And they that with accursed zeal<br/> + Our Service would amend,<br/> +Shall own the odds and come to heel<br/> + Ere worse befall their end<br/> +For though no naked word be wrote<br/> + Yet plainly shall they see<br/> +What pinneth Orders to their coat,<br/> + And, <i>Hey then up go we!</i><br/> +<br/> +Our doorways that, in time of fear,<br/> + We opened overwide<br/> +Shall softly close from year to year<br/> + Till all be purified;<br/> +For though no fluttering fan be heard<br/> + Nor chaff be seen to flee—<br/> +The Lord shall winnow the Lord’s Preferred—<br/> + And, <i>Hey then up go we!</i><br/> +<br/> +Our altars which the heathen brake<br/> + Shall rankly smoke anew,<br/> +And anise, mint, and cummin take<br/> + Their dread and sovereign due,<br/> +Whereby the buttons of our trade<br/> + Shall all restored be<br/> +With curious work in gilt and braid,<br/> + And, <i>Hey then up go we!</i><br/> +<br/> +Then come, my brethren, and prepare<br/> + The candlesticks and bells,<br/> +The scarlet, brass, and badger’s hair<br/> + Wherein our Honour dwells,<br/> +And straitly fence and strictly keep<br/> + The Ark’s integrity<br/> +Till Armageddon break our sleep …<br/> + And, <i>Hey then up go we!</i> +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap17"></a>THE ARMY OF A DREAM</h2> + +<h3>PART I</h3> + +<p> +I sat down in the club smoking-room to fill a pipe. +</p> + +<hr /> + +<p> +It was entirely natural that I should be talking to “Boy” Bayley. +We had met first, twenty odd years ago, at the Indian mess of the Tyneside +Tail-twisters. Our last meeting, I remembered, had been at the Mount Nelson +Hotel, which was by no means India, and there we had talked half the night. Boy +Bayley had gone up that week to the front, where I think he stayed a long, long +time. +</p> + +<p> +But now he had come back. +</p> + +<p> +“Are you still a Tynesider?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“I command the Imperial Guard Battalion of the old regiment, my +son,” he replied. +</p> + +<p> +“Guard which? They’ve been Fusiliers since Fontenoy. Don’t +pull my leg, Boy.” +</p> + +<p> +“I said Guard, not Guard-<i>s</i>. The I. G. Battalion of the +Tail-twisters. Does that make it any clearer?” +</p> + +<p> +“Not in the least.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then come over to the mess and see for yourself. We aren’t a step +from barracks. Keep on my right side. I’m—I’m a bit deaf on +the near.” +</p> + +<p> +We left the club together and crossed the street to a vast four-storied pile, +which more resembled a Rowton lodging-house than a barrack. I could see no +sentry at the gates. +</p> + +<p> +“There ain’t any,” said the Boy lightly. He led me into a +many-tabled restaurant full of civilians and grey-green uniforms. At one end of +the room, on a slightly raised dais, stood a big table. +</p> + +<p> +“Here we are! We usually lunch here and dine in mess by ourselves. These +are our chaps—but what am I thinking of? You must know most of ’em. +Devine’s my second in command now. There’s old +Luttrell—remember him at Cherat?—Burgard, Verschoyle (you were at +school with him), Harrison, Pigeon, and Kyd.” +</p> + +<p> +With the exception of this last I knew them all, but I could not remember that +they had all been Tynesiders. +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve never seen this sort of place,” I said, looking round. +“Half the men here are in plain clothes, and what are those women and +children doing?” +</p> + +<p> +“Eating, I hope,” Boy Bayley answered. “Our canteens would +never pay if it wasn’t for the Line and Militia trade. When they were +first started people looked on ’em rather as catsmeat-shops; but we got a +duchess or two to lunch in ’em, and they’ve been grossly +fashionable since.” +</p> + +<p> +“So I see,” I answered. A woman of the type that shops at the +Stores came up the room looking about her. A man in the dull-grey uniform of +the corps rose up to meet her, piloted her to a place between three other +uniforms, and there began a very merry little meal. +</p> + +<p> +“I give it up,” I said. “This is guilty splendour that I +don’t understand.” +</p> + +<p> +“Quite simple,” said Burgard across the table. “The barrack +supplies breakfast, dinner, and tea on the Army scale to the Imperial Guard +(which we call I. G.) when it’s in barracks as well as to the Line and +Militia. They can all invite their friends if they choose to pay for them. +That’s where we make our profits. Look!” +</p> + +<p> +Near one of the doors were four or five tables crowded with workmen in the +raiment of their callings. They ate steadily, but found time to jest with the +uniforms about them; and when one o’clock clanged from a big half-built +block of flats across the street, filed out. +</p> + +<p> +“Those,” Devine explained, “are either our Line or +Militiamen, as such entitled to the regulation whack at regulation cost. +It’s cheaper than they could buy it; an’ they meet their friends +too. A man’ll walk a mile in his dinner hour to mess with his own +lot.” +</p> + +<p> +“Wait a minute,” I pleaded. “Will you tell me what those +plumbers and plasterers and bricklayers that I saw go out just now have to do +with what I was taught to call the Line?” +</p> + +<p> +“Tell him,” said the Boy over his shoulder to Burgard. He was busy +talking with the large Verschoyle, my old schoolmate. +</p> + +<p> +“The Line comes next to the Guard. The Linesman’s generally a +town-bird who can’t afford to be a Volunteer. He has to go into camp in +an Area for two months his first year, six weeks his second, and a month the +third. He gets about five bob a week the year round for that and for being on +duty two days of the week, and for being liable to be ordered out to help the +Guard in a row. He needn’t live in barracks unless he wants to, and he +and his family can feed at the regimental canteen at usual rates. The women +like it.” +</p> + +<p> +“All this,” I said politely, but intensely, “is the raving of +delirium. Where may your precious recruit who needn’t live in barracks +learn his drill?” +</p> + +<p> +“At his precious school, my child, like the rest of us. The notion of +allowing a human being to reach his twentieth year before asking him to put his +feet in the first position <i>was</i> raving lunacy if you like!” Boy +Bayley dived back into the conversation. +</p> + +<p> +“Very good,” I said meekly. “I accept the virtuous plumber +who puts in two months of his valuable time at Aldershot——” +</p> + +<p> +“Aldershot!” The table exploded. I felt a little annoyed. +</p> + +<p> +“A camp in an Area is not exactly Aldershot,” said Burgard. +“The Line isn’t exactly what you fancy. Some of them even come to +<i>us</i>!” +</p> + +<p> +“You recruit from ’em?” +</p> + +<p> +“I beg your pardon,” said Devine with mock solemnity. “The +Guard doesn’t recruit. It selects.” +</p> + +<p> +“It would,” I said, “with a Spiers and Pond restaurant; +pretty girls to play with; and——” +</p> + +<p> +“A room apiece, four bob a day and all found,” said Verschoyle. +“Don’t forget that.” +</p> + +<p> +“Of course!” I said. “It probably beats off recruits with a +club.” +</p> + +<p> +“No, with the ballot-box,” said Verschoyle, laughing. “At +least in all R.C. companies.” +</p> + +<p> +“I didn’t know Roman Catholics were so particular,” I +ventured. +</p> + +<p> +They grinned. “R.C. companies,” said the Boy, “mean Right of +Choice. When a company has been very good and pious for a long time it may, if +the C.O. thinks fit, choose its own men—all same one-piecee club. All our +companies are R.C.’s, and as the battalion is making up a few vacancies +ere starting once more on the wild and trackless ‘heef’ into the +Areas, the Linesman is here in force to-day sucking up to our non-coms.” +</p> + +<p> +“Would some one mind explaining to me the meaning of every other word +you’ve used,” I said. “What’s a trackless +‘heef’? What’s an Area? What’s everything +generally?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, ‘heef’s’ part of the British Constitution,” +said the Boy. “It began long ago when they’d first mapped out the +big military manoeuvring grounds—we call ’em Areas for +short—where the I. G. spend two-thirds of their time and the other +regiments get their training. It was slang originally for beef on the hoof, +because in the Military Areas two-thirds of your meat-rations at least are +handed over to you on the hoof, and you make your own arrangements. The word +‘heef’ became a parable for camping in the Military Areas and all +its miseries. There are two Areas in Ireland, one in Wales for hill-work, a +couple in Scotland, and a sort of parade-ground in the Lake District; but the +real working Areas are in India, Africa, and Australia, and so on.” +</p> + +<p> +“And what do you do there?” +</p> + +<p> +“We ‘heef’ under service conditions, which are rather like +hard work. We ‘heef’ in an English Area for about a year, coming +into barracks for one month to make up wastage. Then we may ‘heef’ +foreign for another year or eighteen months. Then we do sea-time in the war +boats——” +</p> + +<p> +“<i>What-t?</i>” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“Sea-time,” Bayley repeated. “Just like Marines, to learn +about the big guns and how to embark and disembark quick. Then we come back to +our territorial headquarters for six months, to educate the Line and Volunteer +camps, to go to Hythe, to keep abreast of any new ideas, and then we fill up +vacancies. We call those six months ‘Schools.’ Then we begin all +over again, thus: Home ‘heef,’ foreign ‘heef,’ +sea-time, schools. ‘Heefing’ isn’t precisely luxurious, but +it’s on ‘heef’ that we make our head-money.” +</p> + +<p> +“Or lose it,” said the sallow Pigeon, and all laughed, as men will, +at regimental jokes. +</p> + +<p> +“The Dove never lets me forget that,” said Boy Bayley. “It +happened last March. We were out in the Second Northern Area at the top end of +Scotland where a lot of those silly deer forests used to be. I’d sooner +‘heef’ in the middle of Australia myself—or Athabasca, with +all respect to the Dove—he’s a native of those parts. We were +camped somewhere near Caithness, and the Armity (that’s the combined Navy +and Army board that runs our show) sent us about eight hundred raw remounts to +break in to keep us warm.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why horses for a foot regiment?” +</p> + +<p> +“I. G.’s don’t foot it unless they’re obliged to. No +have gee-gee how can move? I’ll show you later. Well, as I was saying, we +broke those beasts in on compressed forage and small box-spurs, and then we +started across Scotland to Applecross to hand ’em over to a horse-depot +there. It was snowing cruel, and we didn’t know the country overmuch. You +remember the 30th—the old East Lancashire—at Mian Mir? +</p> + +<p> +“Their Guard Battalion had been ‘heefing’ round those parts +for six months. We thought they’d be snowed up all quiet and comfy, but +Burden, their C. O., got wind of our coming, and sent spies in to +Eschol.” +</p> + +<p> +“Confound him,” said Luttrell, who was fat and well-liking. +“I entertained one of ’em—in a red worsted +comforter—under Bean Derig. He said he was a crofter. ‘Gave him a +drink too.” +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t mind admitting,” said the Boy, “that, what +with the cold and the remounts, we were moving rather base over apex. Burden +bottled us under Sghurr Mohr in a snowstorm. He stampeded half the horses, cut +off a lot of us in a snow-bank, and generally rubbed our noses in the +dirt.” +</p> + +<p> +“Was he allowed to do that?” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“There is no peace in a Military Area. If we’d beaten him off or +got away without losing anyone, we’d have been entitled to a day’s +pay from every man engaged against us. But we didn’t. He cut off fifty of +ours, held ’em as prisoners for the regulation three days, and then sent +in his bill—three days’ pay for each man taken. Fifty men at twelve +bob a head, plus five pounds for the Dove as a captured officer, and Kyd here, +his junior, three, made about forty quid to Burden & Co. They crowed over +us horrid.” +</p> + +<p> +“Couldn’t you have appealed to an umpire or—or +something?” +</p> + +<p> +“We could, but we talked it over with the men and decided to pay and look +happy. We were fairly had. The 30th knew every foot of Sghurr Mohr. I spent +three days huntin’ ’em in the snow, but they went off on our +remounts about twenty mile that night.” +</p> + +<p> +“Do you always do this sham-fight business?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Once inside an Area you must look after yourself; but I tell you that a +fight which means that every man-Jack of us may lose a week’s pay +isn’t so damn-sham after all. It keeps the men nippy. Still, in the long +run, it’s like whist on a P. & O. It comes out fairly level if you +play long enough. Now and again, though, one gets a present—say, when a +Line regiment’s out on the ‘heef,’ and signifies that +it’s ready to abide by the rules of the game. You mustn’t take +head-money from a Line regiment in an Area unless it says that it’ll play +you; but, after a week or two, those clever Linesmen always think they see a +chance of making a pot, and send in their compliments to the nearest I. G. Then +the fun begins. We caught a Line regiment single-handed about two years ago in +Ireland—caught it on the hop between a bog and a beach. It had just moved +in to join its brigade, and we made a forty-two mile march in fourteen hours, +and cut it off, lock, stock, and barrel. It went to ground like a +badger—I <i>will</i> say those Line regiments can dig—but we got +out privily by night and broke up the only road it could expect to get its +baggage and company-guns along. Then we blew up a bridge that some Sappers had +made for experimental purposes (<i>they</i> were rather stuffy about it) on its +line of retreat, while we lay up in the mountains and signalled for the A.C. of +those parts.” +</p> + +<p> +“Who’s an A.C.?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“The Adjustment Committee—the umpires of the Military Areas. +They’re a set of superannuated old aunts of colonels kept for the +purpose, but they occasionally combine to do justice. Our A.C. came, saw our +dispositions, and said it was a sanguinary massacre for the Line, and that we +were entitled to our full pound of flesh—head-money for one whole +regiment, with equipment, four company-guns, and all kit! At Line rates this +worked out as one fat cheque for two hundred and fifty. Not bad!” +</p> + +<p> +“But we had to pay the Sappers seventy-four quid for blowing their patent +bridge to pieces,” Devine interpolated. “That was a swindle.” +</p> + +<p> +“That’s true,” the Boy went on, “but the Adjustment +Committee gave our helpless victims a talking to that was worth another hundred +to hear.” +</p> + +<p> +“But isn’t there a lot of unfairness in this head-money +system?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Can’t have everything perfect,” said the Boy. +“Head-money is an attempt at payment by results, and it gives the men a +direct interest in their job. Three times out of five, of course, the A. C. +will disallow both sides’ claim, but there’s always the chance of +bringing off a coup.” +</p> + +<p> +“Do all regiments do it?” +</p> + +<p> +“Heavily. The Line pays a bob per prisoner and the Militia ninepence, not +to mention side-bets which are what really keep the men keen. It isn’t +supposed to be done by the Volunteers, but they gamble worse than anyone. Why, +the very kids do it when they go to First Camp at Aldershot or +Salisbury.” +</p> + +<p> +“Head-money’s a national institution—like betting,” +said Burgard. +</p> + +<p> +“I should say it was,” said Pigeon suddenly. “I was roped in +the other day as an Adjustment Committee by the Kemptown Board School. I was +riding under the Brighton racecourse, and I heard the whistle goin’ for +umpire—the regulation, two longs and two shorts. I didn’t take any +notice till an infant about a yard high jumped up from a furze-patch and +shouted: ‘Guard! Guard! Come ’ere! I want you +<i>per</i>fessionally. Alf says ’e ain’t outflanked. Ain’t +’e a liar? Come an’ look ’ow I’ve posted my men.’ +You bet I looked. The young demon trotted by my stirrup and showed me his whole +army (twenty of ’em) laid out under cover as nicely as you please round a +cowhouse in a hollow. He kept on shouting: ‘I’ve drew Alf into +there. ’Is persition ain’t tenable. Say it ain’t tenable, +Guard!’ I rode round the position, and Alf with his army came out of his +cowhouse an’ sat on the roof and protested like a—like a Militia +Colonel; but the facts were in favour of my friend and I umpired according. +Well, Alf abode by my decision. I explained it to him at length, and he +solemnly paid up his head-money—farthing points if you please.” +</p> + +<p> +“Did they pay you umpire’s fee?” said Kyd. “I umpired a +whole afternoon once for a village school at home, and they stood me a bottle +of hot ginger beer.” +</p> + +<p> +“I compromised on a halfpenny—a sticky one—or I’d have +hurt their feelings,” said Pigeon gravely. “But I gave ’em +sixpence back.” +</p> + +<p> +“How were they manoeuvring and what with?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, by whistle and hand-signal. They had the dummy Board School guns and +flags for positions, but they were rushing their attack much too quick for that +open country. I told ’em so, and they admitted it.” +</p> + +<p> +“But who taught ’em?” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“They had learned in their schools, of course, like the rest of us. They +were all of ’em over ten; and squad-drill begins when they’re +eight. They knew their company-drill a heap better than they knew their +King’s English.” +</p> + +<p> +“How much drill do the boys put in?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“All boys begin physical drill to music in the Board Schools when +they’re six; squad-drill, one hour a week, when they’re eight; +company-drill when they’re ten, for an hour and a half a week. Between +ten and twelve they get battalion drill of a sort. They take the rifle at +twelve and record their first target-score at thirteen. That’s what the +Code lays down. But it’s worked very loosely so long as a boy comes up to +the standard of his age.” +</p> + +<p> +“In Canada we don’t need your physical drill. We’re born +fit,” said Pigeon, “and our ten-year-olds could knock spots out of +your twelve-year-olds.” +</p> + +<p> +“I may as well explain,” said the Boy, “that the Dove is our +‘swop’ officer. He’s an untamed Huskie from Nootka Sound when +he’s at home. An I. G. Corps exchanges one officer every two years with a +Canadian or Australian or African Guard Corps. We’ve had a year of our +Dove, an’ we shall be sorry to lose him. He humbles our insular pride. +Meantime, Morten, our ‘swop’ in Canada, keeps the ferocious Canuck +humble. When Pij. goes we shall swop Kyd, who’s next on the roster, for a +Cornstalk or a Maori. But about the education-drill. A boy can’t attend +First Camp, as we call it, till he is a trained boy and holds his First +Musketry certificate. The Education Code says he must be fourteen, and the boys +usually go to First Camp at about that age. Of course, they’ve been to +their little private camps and Boys’ Fresh Air Camps and public school +picnics while they were at school, but First Camp is where the young drafts all +meet—generally at Aldershot in this part of the world. First Camp lasts a +week or ten days, and the boys are looked over for vaccination and worked +lightly in brigades with lots of blank cartridge. Second +Camp—that’s for the fifteen to eighteen-year-olds—lasts ten +days or a fortnight, and that includes a final medical examination. Men +don’t like to be chucked out on medical certificates much—nowadays. +I assure you Second Camp, at Salisbury, say, is an experience for a young I. G. +officer. We’re told off to ’em in rotation. A wilderness of monkeys +isn’t in it. The kids are apt to think ’emselves soldiers, and we +have to take the edge off ’em with lots of picquet-work and night +attacks.” +</p> + +<p> +“And what happens after Second Camp?” +</p> + +<p> +“It’s hard to explain. Our system is so illogical. Theoretically, +the boys needn’t show up for the next three or four years after Second +Camp. They are supposed to be making their way in life. Actually, the young +doctor or lawyer or engineer joins a Volunteer battalion that sticks to the +minimum of camp—ten days per annum. That gives him a holiday in the open +air, and now that men have taken to endowing their Volunteer drill-halls with +baths and libraries, he finds, if he can’t run to a club, that his own +drill-hall is an efficient substitute. He meets men there who’ll be +useful to him later, and he keeps himself in touch with what’s going on +while he’s studying for his profession. The town-birds—such as the +chemist’s assistant, clerk, plumber, mechanic, electrician, and so +forth—generally put in for their town Volunteer corps as soon as they +begin to walk out with the girls. They like takin’ their true-loves to +our restaurants. Look yonder!” I followed his gaze, and saw across the +room a man and a maid at a far table, forgetting in each other’s eyes the +good food on their plates. +</p> + +<p> +“So it is,” said I. “Go ahead.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then, too, we have some town Volunteer corps that lay themselves out to +attract promising youths of nineteen or twenty, and make much of ’em on +condition that they join their Line battalion and play for their county. Under +the new county qualifications—birth or three years’ +residence—that means a great deal in League matches, and the same in +County cricket.” +</p> + +<p> +“By Jove, that’s a good notion,” I cried. “Who invented +it?” +</p> + +<p> +“C. B. Fry—long ago. He said in his paper, that County cricket and +County volunteering ought to be on the same footing—unpaid and genuine. +‘No cricketer no corps. No corps no cricketer’ was his watchword. +There was a row among the pro’s at first, but C. B. won, and later the +League had to come in. They said at first it would ruin the gate; but when +County matches began to be <i>pukka</i> county, <i>plus</i> inter-regimental, +affairs the gate trebled, and as two-thirds of the gate goes to the regiments +supplying the teams some Volunteer corps fairly wallow in cash. It’s all +unofficial, of course, but League Corps, as they call ’em, can take their +pick of the Second Camper. Some corps ask ten guineas entrance-fee, and get it +too, from the young bloods that want to shine in the arena. I told you we +catered for all tastes. Now, as regards the Line proper, I believe the young +artisan and mechanic puts in for that before he marries. He likes the +two-months’ ‘heef’ in his first year, and five bob a week is +something to go on with between times.” +</p> + +<p> +“Do they follow their trade while they’re in the Line?” I +demanded. +</p> + +<p> +“Why not? How many well-paid artisans work more than four days a week +anyhow? Remember a Linesman hasn’t to be drilled in your sense of the +word. He must have had at least eight years’ grounding in that, as well +as two or three years in his Volunteer battalion. He can sleep where he +pleases. He can’t leave town-limits without reporting himself, of course, +but he can get leave if he wants it. He’s on duty two days in the week as +a rule, and he’s liable to be invited out for garrison duty down the +Mediterranean, but his benefit societies will insure him against that. +I’ll tell you about that later. If it’s a hard winter and +trade’s slack, a lot of the bachelors are taken into the I. G. barracks +(while the I. G. is out on the heef) for theoretical instruction. Oh, I assure +you the Line hasn’t half a bad time of it.” +</p> + +<p> +“Amazing!” I murmured. “And what about the others?” +</p> + +<p> +“The Volunteers? Observe the beauty of our system. We’re a free +people. We get up and slay the man who says we aren’t. But as a little +detail we never mention, if we don’t volunteer in some corps or +another—as combatants if we’re fit, as non-combatants, if we +ain’t—till we’re thirty-five we don’t vote, and we +don’t get poor-relief, and the women don’t love us.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, that’s the compulsion of it?” said I. +</p> + +<p> +Bayley inclined his head gravely. “That, Sir, is the compulsion. We voted +the legal part of it ourselves in a fit of panic, and we have not yet rescinded +our resolution. The women attend to the unofficial penalties. But being free +British citizens——” +</p> + +<p> +“<i>And</i> snobs,” put in Pigeon. “The point is well taken, +Pij———we have supplied ourselves with every sort and shape +and make of Volunteer corps that you can imagine, and we’ve mixed the +whole show up with our Odd Fellows and our I.O.G.T.’s and our Buffaloes, +and our Burkes and our Debretts, not to mention Leagues and Athletic Clubs, +till you can’t tell t’other from which. You remember the young pup +who used to look on soldiering as a favour done to his ungrateful +country—the gun-poking, ferret-pettin’, landed gentleman’s +offspring—the suckin’ Facey Romford? Well, he generally joins a +Foreign Service Corps when he leaves college.” +</p> + +<p> +“Can Volunteers go foreign, then?” +</p> + +<p> +“Can’t they just, if their C.O. <i>or</i> his wife has influence! +The Armity will always send a well-connected F.S. corps out to help a guard +battalion in a small campaign. Otherwise F.S. corps make their own arrangements +about camps. You see, the Military Areas are always open. They can +‘heef’ there (and gamble on head-money) as long as their finances +run to it; or they can apply to do sea-time in the ships. It’s a cheap +way for a young man to see the world, and if he’s any good he can try to +get into the Guard later.” +</p> + +<p> +“The main point,” said Pigeon, “is that F.S. corps are +‘swagger’—the correct thing. It ’ud never do to be +drawn for the Militia, don’t you know,” he drawled, trying to +render the English voice. +</p> + +<p> +“That’s what happens to a chap who doesn’t volunteer,” +said Bayley. “Well, after the F.S. corps (we’ve about forty of +’em) come our territorial Volunteer battalions, and a man who can’t +suit himself somewhere among ’em must be a shade difficult. We’ve +got those ‘League’ corps I was talking about; and those studious +corps that just scrape through their ten days’ camp; and we’ve +crack corps of highly-paid mechanics who can afford a two months’ +‘heef’ in an interesting Area every other year; and we’ve +senior and junior scientific corps of earnest boilermakers and fitters and +engineers who read papers on high explosives, and do their +‘heefing’ in a wet picket-boat—mine-droppin’—at +the ports. Then we’ve heavy artillery—recruited from the big +manufacturing towns and ship-building yards—and ferocious +hard-ridin’ Yeomanry (they <i>can</i> ride—now), genteel, +semi-genteel, and Hooligan corps, and so on and so forth till you come to the +Home Defence Establishment—the young chaps knocked out under medical +certificate at the Second Camp, but good enough to sit behind hedges or clean +up camp, and the old was-birds who’ve served their time but don’t +care to drop out of the fun of the yearly camps and the halls. They call +’emselves veterans and do fancy-shooting at Bisley, but, between you and +me, they’re mostly Fresh Air Benefit Clubs. They contribute to the +Volunteer journals and tell the Guard that it’s no good. But I like +’em. I shall be one of ’em some day—a copper-nosed was-bird! +… So you see we’re mixed to a degree on the Volunteer side.” +</p> + +<p> +“It sounds that way,” I ventured. +</p> + +<p> +“You’ve overdone it, Bayley,” said Devine. +“You’ve missed our one strong point.” He turned to me and +continued: “It’s embarkation. The Volunteers may be as mixed as the +Colonel says, but they <i>are</i> trained to go down to the sea in ships. You +ought to see a big Bank-Holiday roll-out. We suspend most of the usual railway +traffic and turn on the military time-table—say on Friday at midnight. By +4 <small>A.M</small>. the trains are running from every big centre in England +to the nearest port at two-minute intervals. As a rule, the Armity meets us at +the other end with shipping of sorts—fleet reserves or regular men of war +or hulks—anything you can stick a gang-plank to. We pile the men on to +the troop-decks, stack the rifles in the racks, send down the sea-kit, steam +about for a few hours, and land ’em somewhere. It’s a good notion, +because our army to be any use <i>must</i> be an army of embarkation. Why, last +Whit Monday we had—how many were down at the dock-edge in the first eight +hours? Kyd, you’re the Volunteer enthusiast last from school.” +</p> + +<p> +“In the first ten hours over a hundred and eighteen thousand,” said +Kyd across the table, “with thirty-six thousand actually put in and taken +out of ship. In the whole thirty-six hours we had close on ninety thousand men +on the water and a hundred and thirty-three thousand on the quays fallen in +with their sea-kit.” +</p> + +<p> +“That must have been a sight,” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“One didn’t notice it much. It was scattered between Chatham, +Dover, Portsmouth, Plymouth, Bristol, Liverpool, and so on, merely to give the +inland men a chance to get rid of their breakfasts. We don’t like to +concentrate and try a big embarkation at any one point. It makes the Continent +jumpy. Otherwise,” said Kyd, “I believe we could get two hundred +thousand men, with their kits, away on one tide.” +</p> + +<p> +“What d’you want with so many?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“<i>We</i> don’t want one of ’em; but the Continent used to +point out, every time relations were strained, that nothing would be easier +than to raid England if they got command of the sea for a week. After a few +years some genius discovered that it cut both ways, an’ there was no +reason why we, who are supposed to command the sea and own a few ships, should +not organise our little raids in case of need. The notion caught on among the +Volunteers—they were getting rather sick of manœuvres on dry +land—and since then we haven’t heard so much about raids from the +Continent,” said Bayley. +</p> + +<p> +“It’s the offensive-defensive,” said Verschoyle, “that +they talk so much about. We learned it <i>all</i> from the +Continent—bless ’em! They insisted on it so.” +</p> + +<p> +“No, we learned it from the Fleet,” said Devine. “The +Mediterranean Fleet landed ten thousand marines and sailors, with guns, in +twenty minutes once at manœuvres. That was long ago. I’ve seen the Fleet +Reserve and a few paddle-steamers, hired for the day, land twenty-five thousand +Volunteers at Bantry in four hours—half the men sea-sick too. +You’ve no notion what a difference that sort of manœuvre makes in the +calculations of our friends on the mainland. The Continent knows what invasion +means. It’s like dealing with a man whose nerve has been shaken. It +doesn’t cost much after all, and it makes us better friends with the +great European family. We’re now as thick as thieves.” +</p> + +<p> +“Where does the Imperial Guard come in in all this gorgeousness?” I +asked. “You’re unusual modest about yourselves.” +</p> + +<p> +“As a matter of fact, we’re supposed to go out and stay out. +We’re the permanently mobilised lot. I don’t think there are more +than eight I. G. battalions in England now. We’re a hundred battalions +all told. Mostly on the ‘heef’ in India, Africa and so +forth.” +</p> + +<p> +“A hundred thousand. Isn’t that small allowance?” I +suggested. +</p> + +<p> +“You think so? One hundred thousand <i>men</i>, without a single case of +venereal, and an average sick list of two per cent, permanently on a war +footing? Well, perhaps you’re right, but it’s a useful little force +to begin with while the others are getting ready. There’s the native +Indian Army also, which isn’t a broken reed, and, since ‘no +Volunteer no Vote’ is the rule throughout the Empire, you will find a few +men in Canada, Australia, and elsewhere, that are fairly hefty in their +class.” +</p> + +<p> +“But a hundred thousand isn’t enough for garrison duty,” I +persisted. +</p> + +<p> +“A hundred thousand <i>sound</i> men, not sick boys, go quite a +way,” said Pigeon. +</p> + +<p> +“We expect the Line to garrison the Mediterranean Ports and +thereabouts,” said Bayley. “Don’t sneer at the mechanic. +He’s deuced good stuff. He isn’t rudely ordered out, because this +ain’t a military despotism, and we have to consider people’s +feelings. The Armity usually brackets three Line regiments together, and calls +for men for six months or a year for Malta, Gib, or elsewhere, at a bob a day. +Three battalions will give you nearly a whole battalion of bachelors between +’em. You fill up deficiencies with a call on the territorial Volunteer +battalion, and away you go with what we call a Ports battalion. What’s +astonishing in that? Remember that in this country, where fifty per cent of the +able-bodied males have got a pretty fair notion of soldiering, and, which is +more, have all camped out in the open, you wake up the spirit of adventure in +the young.” +</p> + +<p> +“Not much adventure at Malta, Gib, or Cyprus,” I retorted. +“Don’t they get sick of it?” +</p> + +<p> +“But you don’t realise that we treat ’em rather differently +from the soldier of the past. You ought to go and see a Ports battalion drawn +from a manufacturing centre growin’ vines in Cyprus in its shirt sleeves; +and at Gib, and Malta, of course, the battalions are working with the Fleet +half the time.” +</p> + +<p> +“It seems to me,” I said angrily, “you are knocking <i>esprit +de corps</i> on the head with all this Army-Navy jumble. It’s as bad +as——” +</p> + +<p> +“I know what you’re going to say. As bad as what Kitchener used to +do when he believed that a thousand details picked up on the veldt were as good +as a column of two regiments. In the old days, when drill was a sort of holy +sacred art learned in old age, you’d be quite right. But remember +<i>our</i> chaps are broke to drill from childhood, and the theory we work on +is that a thousand trained Englishmen ought to be about as good as another +thousand trained Englishmen. We’ve enlarged our horizon, that’s +all. Some day the Army and the Navy will be interchangeable.” +</p> + +<p> +“You’ve enlarged it enough to fall out of, I think. Now where in +all this mess of compulsory Volunteers——?” +</p> + +<p> +“My dear boy, there’s no compulsion. You’ve <i>got</i> to be +drilled when you’re a child, same as you’ve got to learn to read, +and if you don’t pretend to serve in some corps or other till +you’re thirty-five or medically chucked you rank with lunatics, women, +and minors. That’s fair enough.” +</p> + +<p> +“Compulsory conscripts,” I continued. “Where, as I was going +to say, does the Militia come in?” +</p> + +<p> +“As I have said—for the men who can’t afford volunteering. +The Militia is recruited by ballot—pretty comprehensively too. Volunteers +are exempt, but most men not otherwise accounted for are bagged by the Militia. +They have to put in a minimum three weeks’ camp every other year, and +they get fifteen bob a week and their keep when they’re at it, and some +sort of a yearly fee, I’ve forgotten how much. ’Tisn’t a +showy service, but it’s very useful. It keeps the mass of the men between +twenty-five, say, and thirty-five moderately fit, and gives the Armity an +excuse for having more equipment ready—in case of emergencies.” +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t think you’re quite fair on the Militia,” +drawled Verschoyle. “They’re better than we give ’em credit +for. Don’t you remember the Middle Moor Collieries’ strike?” +</p> + +<p> +“Tell me,” I said quickly. Evidently the others knew. +</p> + +<p> +“We-ell, it was no end of a pitman’s strike about eight years ago. +There were twenty-five thousand men involved—Militia, of course. At the +end of the first month—October—when things were looking rather +blue, one of those clever Labour leaders got hold of the Militia Act and +discovered that any Militia regiment could, by a two-thirds vote, go on +‘heef’ in a Military Area in addition to its usual biennial camp. +Two-and-twenty battalions of Geordies solemnly applied, and they were turned +loose into the Irish and Scotch Areas under an I. G. Brigadier who had private +instructions to knock clinkers out of ’em. But the pitman is a strong and +agile bird. He throve on snowdrifts and entrenching and draggin’ guns +through heather. <i>He</i> was being fed and clothed for nothing, besides +having a chance of making head-money, and his strike-pay was going clear to his +wife and family. You see? Wily man. But wachtabittje! When that +‘heef’ finished in December the strike was still on. <i>Then</i> +that same Labour leader found out, from the same Act, that if at any time more +than thirty or forty men of a Militia regiment wished to volunteer to do +sea-time and study big guns in the Fleet they were in no wise to be +discouraged, but were to be taken on as opportunity offered and paid a bob a +day. Accordingly, about January, Geordie began volunteering for +sea-time—seven and eight hundred men out of each regiment. Anyhow, it +made up seventeen thousand men! It was a splendid chance and the Armity jumped +at it. The Home and Channel Fleets and the North Sea and Cruiser Squadrons were +strengthened with lame ducks from the Fleet Reserve, and between ’em with +a little stretching and pushing they accommodated all of that young +division.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, but you’ve forgotten how we lied to the Continent about it. +All Europe wanted to know what the dooce we were at,” said Boy Bayley, +“and the wretched Cabinet had to stump the country in the depths of +winter explaining our new system of poor-relief. I beg your pardon, +Verschoyle.” +</p> + +<p> +“The Armity improvised naval manœuvres between Gib and Land’s End, +with frequent coalings and landings; ending in a cruise round England that +fairly paralysed the pitmen. The first day out they wanted the fleet stopped +while they went ashore and killed their Labour leader, but they couldn’t +be obliged. Then they wanted to mutiny over the coaling—it was too like +their own job. Oh, they had a lordly time! They came back—the combined +Fleets anchored off Hull—with a nautical hitch to their breeches. +They’d had a free fight at Gib with the Ports battalion there; they +cleared out the town of Lagos; and they’d fought a pitched battle with +the dockyard-mateys at Devonport. So they’d done ’emselves well, +but they didn’t want any more military life for a bit.” +</p> + +<p> +“And the strike?” +</p> + +<p> +“That ended, all right enough, when the strike-money came to an end. The +pit-owners were furious. They said the Armity had wilfully prolonged the +strike, and asked questions in the House. The Armity said that they had taken +advantage of the crisis to put a six months’ polish on fifteen thousand +fine young men, and if the masters cared to come out on the same terms +they’d be happy to do the same by them.” +</p> + +<p> +“And then?” +</p> + +<p> +“Palaver done set,” said Bayley. “Everybody laughed.” +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t quite understand about this sea-time business,” I +said. “Is the Fleet open to take any regiment aboard?” +</p> + +<p> +“Rather. The I. G. must, the Line can, the Militia may, and the +Volunteers do put in sea-time. The Coast Volunteers began it, and the fashion +is spreading inland. Under certain circumstances, as Verschoyle told you, a +Volunteer or Militia regiment can vote whether it ‘heefs’ wet or +dry. If it votes wet and has influence (like some F.S. corps), it can sneak +into the Channel or the Home Fleet and do a cruise round England or to Madeira +or the North Sea. The regiment, of course, is distributed among the ships, and +the Fleet dry nurse ’em. It rather breaks up shore discipline, but it +gives the inland men a bit of experience, and, of course, it gives us a fairish +supply of men behind the gun, in event of any strain on the Fleet. Some coast +corps make a specialty of it, and compete for embarking and disembarking +records. I believe some of the Tyneside engineerin’ corps put ten per +cent of their men through the Fleet engine rooms. But there’s no need to +stay talking here all the afternoon. Come and see the I. G. in his +lair—the miserable conscript driven up to the colours at the point of the +bayonet.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3><a name="chap18"></a>PART II</h3> + +<p> +The great hall was emptying apace as the clocks struck two, and we passed out +through double doors into a huge reading and smoking room, blue with tobacco +and buzzing with voices. +</p> + +<p> +“We’re quieter as a rule,” said the Boy. “But +we’re filling up vacancies to-day. Hence the anxious faces of the Line +and Militia. Look!” There were four tables against the walls, and at each +stood a crowd of uniforms. The centres of disturbance were noncommissioned +officers who, seated, growled and wrote down names. +</p> + +<p> +“Come to my table,” said Burgard. “Well, Purvis, have you +ear-marked our little lot?” +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve been tellin’ ’em for the last hour we’ve +only twenty-three vacancies,” was the sergeant’s answer. +“I’ve taken nearly fifty for Trials, and this is what’s +left.” Burgard smiled. +</p> + +<p> +“I’m very sorry,” he said to the crowd, “but C +Company’s full.” +</p> + +<p> +“Excuse me, Sir,” said a man, “but wouldn’t sea-time +count in my favour? I’ve put in three months with the Fleet. Small +quick-firers, Sir? Company guns? Any sort of light machinery?” +</p> + +<p> +“Come away,” said a voice behind. “They’ve chucked the +best farrier between Hull and Dewsbury. Think they’ll take <i>you</i> +an’ your potty quick-firers?” +</p> + +<p> +The speaker turned on his heel and swore. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, damn the Guard, by all means!” said Sergeant Purvis, +collecting his papers. “D’you suppose it’s any pleasure to +<i>me</i> to reject chaps of your build and make? Vote us a second Guard +battalion and we’ll accommodate you. Now, you can come into Schools and +watch Trials if you like.” +</p> + +<p> +Most of the men accepted his invitation, but a few walked away angrily. I +followed from the smoking-room across a wide corridor into a riding-school, +under whose roof the voices of the few hundred assembled wandered in lost +echoes. +</p> + +<p> +“I’ll leave you, if you don’t mind,” said Burgard. +“Company officers aren’t supposed to assist at these games. Here, +Matthews!” He called to a private and put me in his charge. +</p> + +<p> +In the centre of the vast floor my astonished eyes beheld a group of stripped +men; the pink of their bodies startling the tan. +</p> + +<p> +“These are our crowd,” said Matthews. “They’ve been +vetted, an’ we’re putting ’em through their paces.” +</p> + +<p> +“They don’t look a bit like raw material,” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“No, we don’t use either raw men or raw meat for that matter in the +Guard,” Matthews replied. “Life’s too short.” +</p> + +<p> +Purvis stepped forward and barked in the professional manner. It was physical +drill of the most searching, checked only when he laid his hand over some +man’s heart. +</p> + +<p> +Six or seven, I noticed, were sent back at this stage of the game. Then a cry +went up from a group of privates standing near the line of contorted figures. +“White, Purvis, white! Number Nine is spitting white!” +</p> + +<p> +“I know it,” said Purvis. “Don’t you worry.” +</p> + +<p> +“Unfair!” murmured the man who understood quick-firers. “If I +couldn’t shape better than that I’d hire myself out to wheel a +perambulator. He’s cooked.” +</p> + +<p> +“Nah,” said the intent Matthews. “He’ll answer to a +month’s training like a horse. It’s only suet. <i>You’ve</i> +been training for this, haven’t you?” +</p> + +<p> +“Look at me,” said the man simply. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes. You’re overtrained,” was Matthews’ comment. +“The Guard isn’t a circus.” +</p> + +<p> +“Guns!” roared Purvis, as the men broke off and panted. +“Number off from the right. Fourteen is one, three is two, eleven’s +three, twenty and thirty-nine are four and five, and five is six.” He was +giving them their numbers at the guns as they struggled into their uniforms. In +like manner he told off three other guncrews, and the remainder left at the +double, to return through the further doors with four light quick-firers +jerking at the end of man-ropes. +</p> + +<p> +“Knock down and assemble against time!” Purvis called. +</p> + +<p> +The audience closed in a little as the crews flung themselves on the guns, +which melted, wheel by wheel, beneath their touch. +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve never seen anything like this,” I whispered. +</p> + +<p> +“Huh!” said Matthews scornfully. “They’re always +doin’ it in the Line and Militia drill-halls. It’s only +circus-work.” +</p> + +<p> +The guns were assembled again and some one called the time. Then followed ten +minutes of the quickest firing and feeding with dummy cartridges that was ever +given man to behold. +</p> + +<p> +“They look as if they might amount to something—this draft,” +said Matthews softly. +</p> + +<p> +“What might you teach ’em after this, then?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“To be Guard,” said Matthews. +</p> + +<p> +“Spurs,” cried Purvis, as the guns disappeared through the doors +into the stables. Each man plucked at his sleeve, and drew up first one heel +and then the other. +</p> + +<p> +“What the deuce are they doing?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“This,” said Matthews. He put his hand to a ticket-pocket inside +his regulation cuff, showed me two very small black box-spurs: drawing up a +gaitered foot, he snapped them into the box in the heel, and when I had +inspected snapped them out again. +</p> + +<p> +“That’s all the spur you really need,” he said. +</p> + +<p> +Then horses were trotted out into the school barebacked, and the neophytes were +told to ride. +</p> + +<p> +Evidently the beasts knew the game and enjoyed it, for they would not make it +easy for the men. +</p> + +<p> +A heap of saddlery was thrown in a corner, and from this each man, as he +captured his mount, made shift to draw proper equipment, while the audience +laughed, derided, or called the horses towards them. +</p> + +<p> +It was, most literally, wild horseplay, and by the time it was finished the +recruits and the company were weak with fatigue and laughter. +</p> + +<p> +“That’ll do,” said Purvis, while the men rocked in their +saddles. “I don’t see any particular odds between any of you. C +Company! Does anybody here know anything against any of these men?” +</p> + +<p> +“That’s a bit of the Regulations,” Matthews whispered. +“Just like forbiddin’ the banns in church. Really, it was all +settled long ago when the names first came up.” +</p> + +<p> +There was no answer. +</p> + +<p> +“You’ll take ’em as they stand?” +</p> + +<p> +There was a grunt of assent. +</p> + +<p> +“Very good. There’s forty men for twenty-three billets.” He +turned to the sweating horsemen. “I must put you into the Hat.” +</p> + +<p> +With great ceremony and a shower of company jokes that I did not follow, an +enormous Ally Sloper top-hat was produced, into which numbers and blanks were +dropped, and the whole was handed round to the riders by a private, evidently +the joker of C Company. +</p> + +<p> +Matthews gave me to understand that each company owned a cherished receptacle +(sometimes not a respectable one) for the papers of the final drawing. He was +telling me how his company had once stolen the Sacred Article used by D Company +for this purpose and of the riot that followed, when through the west door of +the schools entered a fresh detachment of stripped men, and the arena was +flooded with another company. +</p> + +<p> +Said Matthews as we withdrew, “Each company does Trials their own way. B +Company is all for teaching men how to cook and camp. D Company keeps ’em +to horse-work mostly. We call D the circus-riders and B the cooks. They call us +the Gunners.” +</p> + +<p> +“An’ you’ve rejected <i>me</i>,” said the man who had +done sea-time, pushing out before us. “The Army’s goin’ to +the dogs.” +</p> + +<p> +I stood in the corridor looking for Burgard. +</p> + +<p> +“Come up to my room and have a smoke,” said Matthews, private of +the Imperial Guard. +</p> + +<p> +We climbed two flights of stone stairs ere we reached an immense landing +flanked with numbered doors. +</p> + +<p> +Matthews pressed a spring-latch and led me into a little cabin-like room. The +cot was a standing bunk, with drawers beneath. On the bed lay a brilliant +blanket; by the bed head was an electric light and a shelf of books: a writing +table stood in the window, and I dropped into a low wicker chair. +</p> + +<p> +“This is a cut above subaltern’s quarters,” I said, surveying +the photos, the dhurri on the floor, the rifle in its rack, the field-kit hung +up behind the door, and the knicknacks on the walls. +</p> + +<p> +“The Line bachelors use ’em while we’re away; but +they’re nice to come back to after ‘heef.’” Matthews +passed me his cigarette-case. +</p> + +<p> +“Where have you ‘heefed’?” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“In Scotland, Central Australia, and North-Eastern Rhodesia and the +North-West Indian front.” +</p> + +<p> +“What’s your service?” +</p> + +<p> +“Four years. I’ll have to go in a year. I got in when I was +twenty-two—by a fluke—from the Militia direct—on +Trials.” +</p> + +<p> +“Trials like those we just saw?” +</p> + +<p> +“Not so severe. There was less competition then. I hoped to get my +stripes, but there’s no chance.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why?” +</p> + +<p> +“I haven’t the knack of handling men. Purvis let me have a +half-company for a month in Rhodesia—over towards Lake N’Garni. I +couldn’t work ’em properly. It’s a gift.” +</p> + +<p> +“Do colour-sergeants handle half-companies with you?” +</p> + +<p> +“They can command ’em on the ‘heef.’ We’ve only +four company officers—Burgard, Luttrell, Kyd, and Harrison. +Pigeon’s our swop, and he’s in charge of the ponies. Burgard got +his company on the ‘heef.’ You see Burgard had been a lieutenant in +the Line, but he came into the Guards on Trials like the men. <i>He</i> could +command. They tried him in India with a wing of the battalion for three months. +He did well so he got his company. That’s what made me hopeful. But +it’s a gift, you see—managing men—and so I’m only a +senior private. They let ten per cent of us stay on for two years extra after +our three are finished—to polish the others.” +</p> + +<p> +“Aren’t you even a corporal?” +</p> + +<p> +“We haven’t corporals, or lances for that matter, in the Guard. As +a senior private I’d take twenty men into action; but one Guard +don’t tell another how to clean himself. You’ve learned that before +you apply. … Come in!” +</p> + +<p> +There was a knock at the door, and Burgard entered, removing his cap. +</p> + +<p> +“I thought you’d be here,” he said, as Matthews vacated the +other chair and sat on the bed. “Well, has Matthews told you all about +it? How did our Trials go, Matthews?” +</p> + +<p> +“Forty names in the Hat, Sir, at the finish. They’ll make a fairish +lot. Their gun-tricks weren’t bad; but D company has taken the best +horsemen—as usual.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, I’ll attend to that on ‘heef.’ Give me a man who +can handle company-guns and I’ll engage to make him a horse-master. D +company will end by thinkin’ ’emselves Captain Pigeon’s +private cavalry some day.” +</p> + +<p> +I had never heard a private and a captain talking after this fashion, and my +face must have betrayed my astonishment, for Burgard said: +</p> + +<p> +“These are not our parade manners. In our rooms, as we say in the Guard, +all men are men. Outside we are officers and men.” +</p> + +<p> +“I begin to see,” I stammered. “Matthews was telling me that +sergeants handled half-companies and rose from the ranks—and I +don’t see that there are any lieutenants—and your companies appear +to be two hundred and fifty strong. It’s a shade confusing to the +layman.” +</p> + +<p> +Burgard leaned forward didactically. “The Regulations lay down that every +man’s capacity for command must be tested to the uttermost. We construe +that very literally when we’re on the ‘heef.’ F’r +instance, any man can apply to take the command next above him, and if a +man’s too shy to ask, his company officer must see that he gets his +chance. A sergeant is given a wing of the battalion to play with for three +weeks—a month, or six weeks—according to his capacity, and turned +adrift in an Area to make his own arrangements. That’s what Areas are +for—and to experiment in. A good gunner—a private very +often—has all four company-guns to handle through a week’s fight, +acting for the time as the major. Majors of Guard battalions +(Verschoyle’s our major) are supposed to be responsible for the guns, by +the way. There’s nothing to prevent any man who has the gift working his +way up to the experimental command of the battalion on ‘heef.’ +Purvis, my colour-sergeant, commanded the battalion for three months at the +back of Coolgardie, an’ very well he did it. Bayley ’verted to +company officer for the time being an’ took Harrison’s company, and +Harrison came over to me as my colour-sergeant. D’you see? Well, Purvis +is down for a commission when there’s a vacancy. He’s been +thoroughly tested, and we all like him. Two other sergeants have passed that +three months’ trial in the same way (just as second mates go up for extra +master’s certificate). They have E.C. after their names in the Army List. +That shows they’re capable of taking command in event of war. The result +of our system is that you could knock out every single officer of a Guard +battalion early in the day, and the wheels ’ud still go forward, +<i>not</i> merely round. We’re allowed to fill up half our commissioned +list from the ranks direct. <i>Now</i> d’you see why there’s such a +rush to get into a Guard battalion?” +</p> + +<p> +“Indeed I do. Have you commanded the regiment experimentally?” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, time and again,” Burgard laughed. “We’ve all had +our E.C. turn.” +</p> + +<p> +“Doesn’t the chopping and changing upset the men?” +</p> + +<p> +“It takes something to upset the Guard. Besides, they’re all in the +game together. They give each other a fair show you may be sure.” +</p> + +<p> +“That’s true,” said Matthews. “When I went to +N’Gami with my—with the half-company,” he sighed, “they +helped me all they knew. But it’s a gift—handling men. I found +<i>that</i> out.” +</p> + +<p> +“I know you did,” said Burgard softly. “But you found it out +in time, which is the great thing. You see,” he turned to me, “with +our limited strength we can’t afford to have a single man who isn’t +more than up to any duty—in reason. Don’t you be led away by what +you saw at Trials just now. The Volunteers and the Militia have all the +monkey-tricks of the trade—such as mounting and dismounting guns, and +making fancy scores and doing record marches; but they need a lot of working up +before they can pull their weight in the boat.” +</p> + +<p> +There was a knock at the door. A note was handed in. Burgard read it and +smiled. +</p> + +<p> +“Bayley wants to know if you’d care to come with us to the Park and +see the kids. It’s only a Saturday afternoon walk-round before the +taxpayer…. Very good. If you’ll press the button we’ll try to do +the rest.” +</p> + +<p> +He led me by two flights of stairs up an iron stairway that gave on a platform, +not unlike a ship’s bridge, immediately above the barrelled glass roof of +the riding-school. Through a ribbed ventilator I could see B Company far below +watching some men who chased sheep. Burgard unlocked a glass-fronted fire-alarm +arrangement flanked with dials and speaking-tubes, and bade me press the centre +button. +</p> + +<p> +Next moment I should have fallen through the riding-school roof if he had not +caught me; for the huge building below my feet thrilled to the multiplied +purring of electric bells. The men in the school vanished like minnows before a +shadow, and above the stamp of booted feet on staircases I heard the neighing +of many horses. +</p> + +<p> +“What in the world have I done?” I gasped. +</p> + +<p> +“Turned out the Guard—horse, foot, and guns!” +</p> + +<p> +A telephone bell rang imperiously. Burgard snatched up the receiver: +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, Sir…. <i>What</i>, Sir?… I never heard they said that,” he +laughed, “but it would be just like ’em. In an hour and a half? +Yes, Sir. Opposite the Statue? Yes, Sir.” +</p> + +<p> +He turned to me with a wink as he hung up. +</p> + +<p> +“Bayley’s playing up for you. Now you’ll see some fun.” +</p> + +<p> +“Who’s going to catch it?” I demanded. +</p> + +<p> +“Only our local Foreign Service Corps. Its C.O. has been boasting that +it’s <i>en état de partir</i>, and Bayley’s going to take him at +his word and have a kit-inspection this afternoon in the Park. I must tell +their drill-hall. Look over yonder between that brewery chimney and the mansard +roof!” +</p> + +<p> +He readdressed himself to the telephone, and I kept my eye on the building to +the southward. A Blue Peter climbed up to the top of the flagstaff that crowned +it and blew out in the summer breeze. A black storm-cone followed. +</p> + +<p> +“Inspection for F.S. corps acknowledged, Sir,” said Burgard down +the telephone. “Now we’d better go to the riding-school. The +battalion falls in there. I have to change, but you’re free of the corps. +Go anywhere. Ask anything. In another ten minutes we’re off.” +</p> + +<p> +I lingered for a little looking over the great city, its huddle of houses and +the great fringe of the Park, all framed between the open windows of this +dial-dotted eyrie. +</p> + +<p> +When I descended the halls and corridors were as hushed as they had been noisy, +and my feet echoed down the broad tiled staircases. On the third floor, +Matthews, gaitered and armed, overtook me smiling. +</p> + +<p> +“I thought you might want a guide,” said he. “We’ve +five minutes yet,” and piloted me to the sunsplashed gloom of the +riding-school. Three companies were in close order on the tan. They moved out +at a whistle, and as I followed in their rear I was overtaken by Pigeon on a +rough black mare. +</p> + +<p> +“Wait a bit,” he said, “till the horses are all out of +stables, and come with us. D Company is the only one mounted just now. We do it +to amuse the taxpayer,” he explained, above the noise of horses on the +tan. +</p> + +<p> +“Where are the guns?” I asked, as the mare lipped my coat-collar. +</p> + +<p> +“Gone ahead long ago. They come out of their own door at the back of +barracks. We don’t haul guns through traffic more than we can help…. If +Belinda breathes down your neck smack her. She’ll be quiet in the +streets. She loves lookin’ into the shop-windows.” +</p> + +<p> +The mounted company clattered through vaulted concrete corridors in the wake of +the main body, and filed out into the crowded streets. +</p> + +<p> +When I looked at the townsfolk on the pavement, or in the double-decked trams, +I saw that the bulk of them saluted, not grudgingly or of necessity, but in a +light-hearted, even flippant fashion. +</p> + +<p> +“Those are Line and Militia men,” said Pigeon. “That old chap +in the top-hat by the lamp-post is an ex-Guardee. That’s why he’s +saluting in slow-time. No, there’s no regulation governing these things, +but we’ve all fallen into the way of it somehow. Steady, mare!” +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t know whether I care about this aggressive +militarism,” I began, when the company halted, and Belinda almost knocked +me down. Looking forward I saw the badged cuff of a policeman upraised at a +crossing, his back towards us. +</p> + +<p> +“Horrid aggressive, ain’t we?” said Pigeon with a chuckle +when we moved on again and overtook the main body. Here I caught the strains of +the band, which Pigeon told me did not accompany the battalion on +‘heef,’ but lived in barracks and made much money by playing at +parties in town. +</p> + +<p> +“If we want anything more than drums and fifes on ‘heef’ we +sing,” said Pigeon. “Singin’ helps the wind.” +</p> + +<p> +I rejoiced to the marrow of my bones thus to be borne along on billows of +surging music among magnificent men, in sunlight, through a crowded town whose +people, I could feel, regarded us with comradeship, affection—and more. +</p> + +<p> +“By Jove,” I said at last, watching the eyes about us, “these +people are looking us over as if we were horses.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why not? They know the game.” +</p> + +<p> +The eyes on the pavement, in the trams, the cabs, at the upper windows, swept +our lines back and forth with a weighed intensity of regard which at first +seemed altogether new to me, till I recalled just such eyes, a thousand of +them, at manœuvres in the Channel when one crowded battleship drew past its +sister at biscuit-toss range. Then I stared at the ground, overborne by those +considering eyes. +</p> + +<p> +Suddenly the music changed to the wail of the Dead March in “Saul,” +and once more—we were crossing a large square—the regiment halted. +</p> + +<p> +“Damn!” said Pigeon, glancing behind him at the mounted company. +“I believe they save up their Saturday corpses on purpose.” +</p> + +<p> +“What is it?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“A dead Volunteer. We must play him through.” Again I looked +forward and saw the top of a hearse, followed by two mourning-coaches, boring +directly up the halted regiment, which opened out company by company to let it +through. +</p> + +<p> +“But they’ve got the whole blessed square to funeralise in!” +I exclaimed. “Why don’t they go round?” +</p> + +<p> +“Not so!” Pigeon replied. “In this city it’s the +Volunteer’s perquisite to be played through by any corps he happens to +meet on his way to the cemetery. And they make the most of it. You’ll +see.” +</p> + +<p> +I heard the order, “Rest on your arms,” run before the poor little +procession as the men opened out. The driver pulled the black Flanders beasts +into a more than funeral crawl, and in the first mourning-coach I saw the +tearful face of a fat woman (his mother, doubtless), a handkerchief pressed to +one eye, but the other rolling vigilantly, alight with proper pride. Last came +a knot of uniformed men—privates, I took it—of the dead one’s +corps. +</p> + +<p> +Said a man in the crowd beside us to the girl on his arm, “There, Jenny! +That’s what I’ll get if I ’ave the luck to meet ’em +when my time comes.” +</p> + +<p> +“You an’ your luck,” she snapped. “’Ow can you +talk such silly nonsense?” +</p> + +<p> +“Played through by the Guard,” he repeated slowly. “The +undertaker ’oo could guarantee <i>that</i>, mark you, for all his +customers—well, ’e’d monopolise the trade, is all I can say. +See the horses passagin’ sideways!” +</p> + +<p> +“She done it a purpose,” said the woman with a sniff. +</p> + +<p> +“An’ I only hope you’ll follow her example. Just as long as +you think I’ll keep, too.” +</p> + +<p> +We reclosed when the funeral had left us twenty paces behind. A small boy stuck +his head out of a carriage and watched us jealously. +</p> + +<p> +“Amazing! Amazing!” I murmured. “Is it regulation?” +</p> + +<p> +“No. Town-custom. It varies a little in different cities, but the people +value being played through more than most things, I imagine. Duddell, the big +Ipswich manufacturer—he’s a Quaker—tried to bring in a bill +to suppress it as unchristian.” Pigeon laughed. +</p> + +<p> +“And?” +</p> + +<p> +“It cost him his seat next election. You see, we’re all in the +game.” +</p> + +<p> +We reached the Park without further adventure, and found the four company-guns +with their spike teams and single drivers waiting for us. Many people were +gathered here, and we were halted, so far as I could see, that they might talk +with the men in the ranks. The officers broke into groups. +</p> + +<p> +“Why on earth didn’t you come along with me?” said Boy Bayley +at my side. “I was expecting you.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I had a delicacy about brigading myself with a colonel at the head +of his regiment, so I stayed with the rear company and the horses. It’s +all too wonderful for any words. What’s going to happen next?” +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve handed over to Verschoyle, who will amuse and edify the +school children while I take you round our kindergarten. Don’t kill any +one, Vee. Are you goin’ to charge ’em?” +</p> + +<p> +Old Verschoyle hitched his big shoulder and nodded precisely as he used to do +at school. He was a boy of few words grown into a kindly taciturn man. +</p> + +<p> +“Now!” Bayley slid his arm through mine and led me across a riding +road towards a stretch of rough common (singularly out of place in a park) +perhaps three-quarters of a mile long and half as wide. On the encircling rails +leaned an almost unbroken line of men and women—the women outnumbering +the men. I saw the Guard battalion move up the road flanking the common and +disappear behind the trees. +</p> + +<p> +As far as the eye could range through the mellow English haze the ground inside +the railings was dotted with boys in and out of uniform, armed and unarmed. I +saw squads here, half-companies there; then three companies in an open space, +wheeling with stately steps; a knot of drums and fifes near the railings +unconcernedly slashing their way across popular airs; and a batch of gamins +labouring through some extended attack destined to be swept aside by a corps +crossing the ground at the double. They broke out of furze bushes, ducked over +hollows and bunkers, held or fell away from hillocks and rough sandbanks till +the eye wearied of their busy legs. +</p> + +<p> +Bayley took me through the railings, and gravely returned the salute of a +freckled twelve-year-old near by. +</p> + +<p> +“What’s your corps?” said the Colonel of that Imperial Guard +battalion to that child. +</p> + +<p> +“Eighth District Board School, fourth standard, Sir. We aren’t out +to-day.” Then, with a twinkle, “I go to First Camp next +year.” +</p> + +<p> +“What are those boys yonder—that squad at the double?” +</p> + +<p> +“Jewboys, Sir. Jewish Voluntary Schools, Sir.” +</p> + +<p> +“And that full company extending behind the three elms to the +south-west?” +</p> + +<p> +“Private day-schools, Sir, I think. Judging distance, Sir.” +</p> + +<p> +“Can you come with us?” +</p> + +<p> +“Certainly, Sir.” +</p> + +<p> +“Here’s the raw material at the beginning of the process,” +said Bayley to me. +</p> + +<p> +We strolled on towards the strains of “A Bicycle Built for Two,” +breathed jerkily into a mouth-organ by a slim maid of fourteen. Some dozen +infants with clenched fists and earnest legs were swinging through the +extension movements which that tune calls for. A stunted hawthorn overhung the +little group, and from a branch a dirty white handkerchief flapped in the +breeze. The girl blushed, scowled, and wiped the mouth-organ on her sleeve as +we came up. +</p> + +<p> +“We’re all waiting for our big bruvvers,” piped up one bold +person in blue breeches—seven if he was a day. +</p> + +<p> +“It keeps ’em quieter, Sir,” the maiden lisped. “The +others are with the regiments.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yeth, and they’ve all lots of blank for <i>you</i>,” said +the gentleman in blue breeches ferociously. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, Artie! ’Ush!” the girl cried. +</p> + +<p> +“But why have they lots of blank for <i>us</i>?” Bayley asked. Blue +Breeches stood firm. +</p> + +<p> +“’Cause—’cause the Guard’s goin’ to fight +the Schools this afternoon; but my big bruvver says they’ll be dam-well +surprised.” +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Artie!</i>” The girl leaped towards him. “You know your +ma said I was to smack——” +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t. Please don’t,” said Bayley, pink with +suppressed mirth. “It was all my fault. I must tell old Verschoyle this. +I’ve surprised his plan out of the mouths of babes and sucklings.” +</p> + +<p> +“What plan?” +</p> + +<p> +“Old Vee has taken the battalion up to the top of the common, and he told +me he meant to charge down through the kids, but they’re on to him +already. He’ll be scuppered. The Guard will be scuppered!” +</p> + +<p> +Here Blue Breeches, overcome by the reproof of his fellows, began to weep. +</p> + +<p> +“I didn’t tell,” he roared. “My big bruvver <i>he</i> +knew when he saw them go up the road…” +</p> + +<p> +“Never mind! Never mind, old man,” said Bayley soothingly. +“I’m not fighting to-day. It’s all right.” +</p> + +<p> +He rightened it yet further with sixpence, and left that band loudly at feud +over the spoil. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, Vee! Vee the strategist,” he chuckled. “We’ll pull +Vee’s leg to-night.” +</p> + +<p> +Our freckled friend of the barriers doubled up behind us. +</p> + +<p> +“So you know that my battalion is charging down the ground,” Bayley +demanded. +</p> + +<p> +“Not for certain, Sir, but we’re preparin’ for the +worst,” he answered with a cheerful grin. “They allow the Schools a +little blank ammunition after we’ve passed the third standard; and we +nearly always bring it on to the ground of Saturdays.” +</p> + +<p> +“The deuce you do! Why?” +</p> + +<p> +“On account of these amateur Volunteer corps, Sir. They’re always +experimentin’ upon us, Sir, comin’ over from their ground an’ +developin’ attacks on our flanks. Oh, it’s chronic ’ere of a +Saturday sometimes, unless you flag yourself.” +</p> + +<p> +I followed his eye and saw white flags fluttering before a drum and fife band +and a knot of youths in sweaters gathered round the dummy breech of a four-inch +gun which they were feeding at express rates. +</p> + +<p> +“The attacks don’t interfere with you if you flag yourself, +Sir,” the boy explained. “That’s a Second Camp team from the +Technical Schools loading against time for a bet.” +</p> + +<p> +We picked our way deviously through the busy groups. Apparently it was not +etiquette to notice a Guard officer, and the youths at the twenty-five pounder +were far too busy to look up. I watched the cleanly finished hoist and +shove-home of the full-weight shell from a safe distance, when I became aware +of a change among the scattered boys on the common, who disappeared among the +hillocks to an accompaniment of querulous whistles. A boy or two on bicycles +dashed from corps to corps, and on their arrival each corps seemed to fade +away. +</p> + +<p> +The youths at loading practice did not pause for the growing hush round them, +nor did the drum and fife band drop a single note. Bayley exploded afresh. +“The Schools are preparing for our attack, by Jove! I wonder who’s +directin’ ’em. Do <i>you</i> know?” +</p> + +<p> +The warrior of the Eighth District looked up shrewdly. +</p> + +<p> +“I saw Mr. Cameron speaking to Mr. Levitt just as the Guard went up the +road. ’E’s our ’ead-master, Mr. Cameron, but Mr. Levitt, of +the Sixth District, is actin’ as senior officer on the ground this +Saturday. Most likely Mr. Levitt is commandin’.” +</p> + +<p> +“How many corps are there here?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, bits of lots of ’em—thirty or forty, +p’r’aps, Sir. But the whistles says they’ve all got to rally +on the Board Schools. ’Ark! There’s the whistle for the Private +Schools! They’ve been called up the ground at the double.” +</p> + +<p> +“Stop!” cried a bearded man with a watch, and the crews dropped +beside the breech wiping their brows and panting. +</p> + +<p> +“Hullo! there’s some attack on the Schools,” said one. +“Well, Marden, you owe me three half-crowns. I’ve beaten your +record. Pay up.” +</p> + +<p> +The boy beside us tapped his foot fretfully as he eyed his companions melting +among the hillocks, but the gun-team adjusted their bets without once looking +up. +</p> + +<p> +The ground rose a little to a furze-crowned ridge in the centre so that I could +not see the full length of it, but I heard a faint bubble of blank in the +distance. +</p> + +<p> +“The Saturday allowance,” murmured Bayley. “War’s +begun, but it wouldn’t be etiquette for us to interfere. What are you +saying, my child?” +</p> + +<p> +“Nothin’, Sir, only—only I don’t think the Guard will +be able to come through on so narrer a front, Sir. They’ll all be jammed +up be’ind the ridge if <i>we</i>’ve got there in time. It’s +awful sticky for guns at the end of our ground, Sir.” +</p> + +<p> +“I’m inclined to think you’re right, Moltke. The Guard is +hung up: distinctly so. Old Vee will have to cut his way through. What a +pernicious amount of blank the kids seem to have!” +</p> + +<p> +It was quite a respectable roar of battle that rolled among the hillocks for +ten minutes, always out of our sight. Then we heard the “Cease +Fire” over the ridge. +</p> + +<p> +“They’ve sent for the Umpires,” the Board School boy +squeaked, dancing on one foot. “You’ve been hung up, Sir. I—I +thought the sand-pits ’ud stop you.” +</p> + +<p> +Said one of the jerseyed hobbledehoys at the gun, slipping on his coat: +“Well, that’s enough for this afternoon. I’m off,” and +moved to the railings without even glancing towards the fray. +</p> + +<p> +“I anticipate the worst,” said Bayley with gravity after a few +minutes. “Hullo! Here comes my disgraced corps!” +</p> + +<p> +The Guard was pouring over the ridge—a disorderly mob—horse, foot, +and guns mixed, while from every hollow of the ground about rose small boys +cheering shrilly. The outcry was taken up by the parents at the railings, and +spread to a complete circle of cheers, handclappings, and waved handkerchiefs. +</p> + +<p> +Our Eighth District private cast away restraint and openly capered. “We +got ’em! We got ’em!” he squealed. +</p> + +<p> +The grey-green flood paused a fraction of a minute and drew itself into shape, +coming to rest before Bayley. Verschoyle saluted. +</p> + +<p> +“Vee, Vee,” said Bayley. “Give me back my legions. Well, I +hope you’re proud of yourself?” +</p> + +<p> +“The little beasts were ready for us. Deuced well posted too,” +Verschoyle replied. “I wish you’d seen that first attack on our +flank. Rather impressive. Who warned ’em?” +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t know. I got my information from a baby in blue plush +breeches. Did they do well?” +</p> + +<p> +“Very decently indeed. I’ve complimented their C.O. and buttered +the whole boiling.” He lowered his voice. “As a matter o’ +fact, I halted five good minutes to give ’em time to get into +position.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, now we can inspect our Foreign Service corps. We +sha’n’t need the men for an hour, Vee.” +</p> + +<p> +“Very good, Sir. Colour-sergeants!” cried Verschoyle, raising his +voice, and the cry ran from company to company. Whereupon the officers left +their men, people began to climb over the railings, and the regiment dissolved +among the spectators and the school corps of the city. +</p> + +<p> +“No sense keeping men standing when you don’t need +’em,” said Bayley. “Besides, the Schools learn more from our +chaps in an afternoon than they can pick up in a month’s drill. Look at +those Board-schoolmaster captains buttonholing old Purvis on the art of +war!” +</p> + +<p> +“Wonder what the evening papers’ll say about this,” said +Pigeon. +</p> + +<p> +“You’ll know in half an hour,” Burgard laughed. “What +possessed you to take your ponies across the sand-pits, Pij?” +</p> + +<p> +“Pride. Silly pride,” said the Canadian. +</p> + +<p> +We crossed the common to a very regulation paradeground overlooked by a statue +of our Queen. Here were carriages, many and elegant, filled with pretty women, +and the railings were lined with frockcoats and top hats. “This is +distinctly social,” I suggested to Kyd. +</p> + +<p> +“Ra-ather. Our F.S. corps is nothing if not correct, but Bayley’ll +sweat ’em all the same.” +</p> + +<p> +I saw six companies drawn up for inspection behind lines of long sausage-shaped +kit-bags. A band welcomed us with “A Life on the Ocean Wave.” +</p> + +<p> +“What cheek!” muttered Verschoyle. “Give ’em beans, +Bayley.” +</p> + +<p> +“I intend to,” said the Colonel, grimly. “Will each of you +fellows take a company, please, and inspect ’em faithfully. ‘<i>En +état de partir</i>’ is their little boast, remember. When you’ve +finished you can give ’em a little pillow-fighting.” +</p> + +<p> +“What does the single cannon on those men’s sleeves mean?” I +asked. +</p> + +<p> +“That they’re big gun-men, who’ve done time with the +Fleet,” Bayley returned. “Any F.S. corps that has over twenty per +cent big-gun men thinks itself entitled to play ‘A Life on the Ocean +Wave’—when it’s out of hearing of the Navy.” +</p> + +<p> +“What beautiful stuff they are! What’s their regimental +average?” +</p> + +<p> +“It ought to be five eight, height, thirty-eight, chest, and twenty-four +years, age. What is it?” Bayley asked of a Private. +</p> + +<p> +“Five nine and half, Sir, thirty-nine, twenty-four and a half,” was +the reply, and he added insolently, “<i>En état de partir</i>.” +Evidently that F.S. corps was on its mettle ready for the worst. +</p> + +<p> +“What about their musketry average?” I went on. +</p> + +<p> +“Not my pidgin,” said Bayley. “But they wouldn’t be in +the corps a day if they couldn’t shoot; I know <i>that</i> much. Now +I’m going to go through ’em for socks and slippers.” +</p> + +<p> +The kit-inspection exceeded anything I had ever dreamed. I drifted from company +to company while the Guard officers oppressed them. Twenty per cent, at least, +of the kits were shovelled out on the grass and gone through in detail. +</p> + +<p> +“What have they got jumpers and ducks for?” I asked of Harrison. +</p> + +<p> +“For Fleet work, of course. <i>En état de partir</i> with an F. S. corps +means they are amphibious.” +</p> + +<p> +“Who gives ’em their kit—Government?” +</p> + +<p> +“There is a Government allowance, but no C. O. sticks to it. It’s +the same as paint and gold-leaf in the Navy. It comes out of some one’s +pockets. How much does your kit cost you?”—this to the private in +front of us. +</p> + +<p> +“About ten or fifteen quid every other year, I suppose,” was the +answer. +</p> + +<p> +“Very good. Pack your bag—quick.” +</p> + +<p> +The man knelt, and with supremely deft hands returned all to the bag, lashed +and tied it, and fell back. +</p> + +<p> +“Arms,” said Harrison. “Strip and show ammunition.” +</p> + +<p> +The man divested himself of his rolled greatcoat and haversack with one +wriggle, as it seemed to me; a twist of a screw removed the side plate of the +rifle breech (it was not a bolt action). He handed it to Harrison with one +hand, and with the other loosed his clip-studded belt. +</p> + +<p> +“What baby cartridges!” I exclaimed. “No bigger than +bulletted breech-caps.” +</p> + +<p> +“They’re the regulation .256,” said Harrison. “No one +has complained of ’em yet. They expand a bit when they arrive…. Empty +your bottle, please, and show your rations.” +</p> + +<p> +The man poured out his water-bottle and showed the two-inch emergency tin. +</p> + +<p> +Harrison passed on to the next, but I was fascinated by the way in which the +man re-established himself amid his straps and buckles, asking no help from +either side. +</p> + +<p> +“How long does it take you to prepare for inspection?” I asked him. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I got ready this afternoon in twelve minutes,” he smiled. +“I didn’t see the storm-cone till half-past three. I was at the +Club.” +</p> + +<p> +“Weren’t a good many of you out of town?” +</p> + +<p> +“Not <i>this</i> Saturday. We knew what was coming. You see, if we pull +through the inspection we may move up one place on the roster for foreign +service…. You’d better stand back. We’re going to +pillow-fight.” +</p> + +<p> +The companies stooped to the stuffed kit-bags, doubled with them variously, +piled them in squares and mounds, passed them from shoulder to shoulder like +buckets at a fire, and repeated the evolution. +</p> + +<p> +“What’s the idea?” I asked of Verschoyle, who, arms folded +behind him, was controlling the display. Many women had descended from the +carriages, and were pressing in about us admiringly. +</p> + +<p> +“For one thing, it’s a fair test of wind and muscle, and for +another it saves time at the docks. We’ll suppose this first company to +be drawn up on the dock-head and those five others still in the troop-train. +How would you get their kit into the ship?” +</p> + +<p> +“Fall ’em all in on the platform, march ’em to the +gangways,” I answered, “and trust to Heaven and a fatigue party to +gather the baggage and drunks in later.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ye-es, and have half of it sent by the wrong trooper. I know <i>that</i> +game,” Verschoyle drawled. “We don’t play it any more. +Look!” +</p> + +<p> +He raised his voice, and five companies, glistening a little and breathing +hard, formed at right angles to the sixth, each man embracing his sixty-pound +bag. +</p> + +<p> +“Pack away,” cried Verschoyle, and the great bean-bag game (I can +compare it to nothing else) began. In five minutes every bag was passed along +either arm of the T and forward down the sixth company, who passed, stacked, +and piled them in a great heap. These were followed by the rifles, belts, +greatcoats, and knapsacks, so that in another five minutes the regiment stood, +as it were, stripped clean. +</p> + +<p> +“Of course on a trooper there’d be a company below stacking the kit +away,” said Verschoyle, “but that wasn’t so bad.” +</p> + +<p> +“Bad!” I cried. “It was miraculous!” +</p> + +<p> +“Circus-work—all circus-work!” said Pigeon. “It +won’t prevent ’em bein’ sick as dogs when the ship +rolls.” The crowd round us applauded, while the men looked meekly down +their self-conscious noses. +</p> + +<p> +A little grey-whiskered man trotted up to the Boy. +</p> + +<p> +“Have we made good, Bayley?” he said. “Are we <i>en état de +partir</i>?” +</p> + +<p> +“That’s what I shall report,” said Bayley, smiling. +</p> + +<p> +“I thought my bit o’ French ’ud draw you,” said the +little man, rubbing his hands. +</p> + +<p> +“Who is he?” I whispered to Pigeon. +</p> + +<p> +“Ramsay—their C.O. An old Guard captain. A keen little devil. They +say he spends six hundred a year on the show. He used to be in the Lincolns +till he came into his property.” +</p> + +<p> +“Take ’em home an’ make ’em drunk,” I heard +Bayley say. “I suppose you’ll have a dinner to celebrate. But you +may as well tell the officers of E company that I don’t think much of +them. I sha’n’t report it, but their men were all over the +shop.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, they’re young, you see,” Colonel Ramsay began. +</p> + +<p> +“You’re quite right. Send ’em to me and I’ll talk to +’em. Youth is the time to learn.” +</p> + +<p> +“Six hundred a year,” I repeated to Pigeon. “That must be an +awful tax on a man. Worse than in the old volunteering days.” +</p> + +<p> +“That’s where you make your mistake,” said Verschoyle. +“In the old days a man had to spend his money to coax his men to drill +because they weren’t the genuine article. You know what I mean. They made +a favour of putting in drills, didn’t they? And they were, most of +’em, the children we have to take over at Second Camp, weren’t +they? Well, now that a C. O. is sure of his <i>men</i>, now that he +hasn’t to waste himself in conciliating an’ bribin’, +an’ beerin’ <i>kids</i>, he doesn’t care what he spends on +his corps, because every pound tells. Do you understand?” +</p> + +<p> +“I see what you mean, Vee. Having the male material +guaranteed——” +</p> + +<p> +“And trained material at that,” Pigeon put in. “Eight years +in the schools, remember, as well as——” +</p> + +<p> +“Precisely. A man rejoices in working them up. That’s as it should +be,” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“Bayly’s saying the very same to those F. S. pups,” said +Verschoyle. +</p> + +<p> +The Boy was behind us, between two young F. S. officers, a hand on the shoulder +of each. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, that’s all doocid interesting,” he growled paternally. +“But you forget, my sons, now that your men are bound to serve, +you’re trebly bound to put a polish on ’em. You’ve let your +company simply go to seed. Don’t try and explain. I’ve told all +those lies myself in my time. It’s only idleness. <i>I</i> know. Come and +lunch with me to-morrow and I’ll give you a wrinkle or two in +barracks.” He turned to me. +</p> + +<p> +“Suppose we pick up Vee’s defeated legion and go home. You’ll +dine with us to-night. Good-bye, Ramsay. Yes, you’re <i>en état de +partir</i>, right enough. You’d better get Lady Gertrude to talk to the +Armity if you want the corps sent foreign. I’m no politician.” +</p> + +<p> +We strolled away from the great white statue of the Widow, with sceptre, orb, +and crown, that looked toward the city, and regained the common, where the +Guard battalion walked with the female of its species and the children of all +its relatives. At sight of the officers the uniforms began to detach themselves +and gather in companies. A Board School corps was moving off the ground, headed +by its drums and fifes, which it assisted with song. As we drew nearer we +caught the words, for they were launched with intention:— +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +’Oo is it mashes the country nurse?<br/> + The Guardsman!<br/> +’Oo is it takes the lydy’s purse?<br/> + The Guardsman!<br/> +Calls for a drink, and a mild cigar,<br/> +Batters a sovereign down on the bar,<br/> +Collars the change and says “Ta-ta!”<br/> + The Guardsman! +</p> + +<p> +“Why, that’s one of old Jemmy Fawne’s songs. I haven’t +heard it in ages,” I began. +</p> + +<p> +“Little devils!” said Pigeon. “Speshul! Extra speshul! Sports +Edition!” a newsboy cried. “’Ere y’are, Captain. Defeat +o’ the Guard!” +</p> + +<p> +“I’ll buy a copy,” said the Boy, as Pigeon blushed +wrathfully. “I must, to see how the Dove lost his mounted company.” +He unfolded the flapping sheet and we crowded round it. +</p> + +<p> +“‘<i>Complete Rout of the Guard,</i>’” he read. +“‘<i>Too Narrow a Front.</i>’ That’s one for you, Vee! +‘<i>Attack Anticipated by Mr. Levitt, B. A.</i>’ Aha! ‘<i>The +Schools Stand Fast.</i>’” +</p> + +<p> +“Here’s another version,” said Kyd, waving a tinted sheet. +“‘<i>To your tents, O Israel! The Hebrew Schools stop the Mounted +Troops.</i>’ Pij, were you scuppered by Jewboys?” +</p> + +<p> +“‘<i>Umpires Decide all Four Guns Lost,</i>’” Bayley +went on. “By Jove, there’ll have to be an inquiry into this +regrettable incident, Vee!” +</p> + +<p> +“I’ll never try to amuse the kids again,” said the baited +Verschoyle. “Children and newspapers are low things…. And I was hit on +the nose by a wad, too! They oughtn’t to be allowed blank +ammunition!” +</p> + +<p> +So we leaned against the railings in the warm twilight haze while the +battalion, silently as a shadow, formed up behind us ready to be taken over. +The heat, the hum of the great city, as it might have been the hum of a camped +army, the creaking of the belts, and the well-known faces bent above them, +brought back to me the memory of another evening, years ago, when Verschoyle +and I waited for news of guns missing in no sham fight. +</p> + +<p> +“A regular Sanna’s Post, isn’t it?” I said at last. +“D’you remember, Vee—by the market-square—that night +when the wagons went out?” +</p> + +<p> +Then it came upon me, with no horror, but a certain mild wonder, that we had +waited, Vee and I, that night for the body of Boy Bayley; and that Vee himself +had died of typhoid in the spring of 1902. The rustling of the papers +continued, but Bayley, shifting slightly, revealed to me the three-day old +wound on his left side that had soaked the ground about him. I saw Pigeon fling +up a helpless arm as to guard himself against a spatter of shrapnel, and +Luttrell with a foolish tight-lipped smile lurched over all in one jointless +piece. Only old Vee’s honest face held steady for awhile against the +darkness that had swallowed up the battalion behind us. Then his jaw dropped +and the face stiffened, so that a fly made bold to explore the puffed and +scornful nostril. +</p> + +<hr /> + +<p> +I waked brushing a fly from my nose, and saw the Club waiter set out the +evening papers on the table. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap20"></a>“THEY”</h2> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap19"></a>THE RETURN OF THE CHILDREN</h2> + +<p class="poem"> +Neither the harps nor the crowns amused, nor the cherubs’ dove-winged races—<br/> +Holding hands forlornly the Children wandered beneath the Dome;<br/> +Plucking the radiant robes of the passers by, and with pitiful faces<br/> +Begging what Princes and Powers refused:—“Ah, please will you let us go home?”<br/> +<br/> +Over the jewelled floor, nigh weeping, ran to them Mary the Mother,<br/> +Kneeled and caressed and made promise with kisses, and drew them along to the gateway—<br/> +Yea, the all-iron unbribable Door which Peter must guard and none other.<br/> +Straightway She took the Keys from his keeping, and opened and freed them straightway.<br/> +<br/> +Then to Her Son, Who had seen and smiled, She said: “On the night that I bore Thee<br/> +What didst Thou care for a love beyond mine or a heaven that was not my arm?<br/> +Didst Thou push from the nipple, O Child, to hear the angels adore Thee?<br/> +When we two lay in the breath of the kine?” And He said:—“Thou hast done no harm.”<br/> +<br/> +So through the Void the Children ran homeward merrily hand in hand,<br/> +Looking neither to left nor right where the breathless Heavens stood still;<br/> +And the Guards of the Void resheathed their swords, for they heard the Command.<br/> +“Shall I that have suffered the children to come to me hold them against their will?” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2>“THEY”</h2> + +<p> +One view called me to another; one hill top to its fellow, half across the +county, and since I could answer at no more trouble than the snapping forward +of a lever, I let the country flow under my wheels. The orchid-studded flats of +the East gave way to the thyme, ilex, and grey grass of the Downs; these again +to the rich cornland and fig-trees of the lower coast, where you carry the beat +of the tide on your left hand for fifteen level miles; and when at last I +turned inland through a huddle of rounded hills and woods I had run myself +clean out of my known marks. Beyond that precise hamlet which stands godmother +to the capital of the United States, I found hidden villages where bees, the +only things awake, boomed in eighty-foot lindens that overhung grey Norman +churches; miraculous brooks diving under stone bridges built for heavier +traffic than would ever vex them again; tithe-barns larger than their churches, +and an old smithy that cried out aloud how it had once been a hall of the +Knights of the Temple. Gipsies I found on a common where the gorse, bracken, +and heath fought it out together up a mile of Roman road; and a little farther +on I disturbed a red fox rolling dog-fashion in the naked sunlight. +</p> + +<p> +As the wooded hills closed about me I stood up in the car to take the bearings +of that great Down whose ringed head is a landmark for fifty miles across the +low countries. I judged that the lie of the country would bring me across some +westward running road that went to his feet, but I did not allow for the +confusing veils of the woods. A quick turn plunged me first into a green +cutting brimful of liquid sunshine, next into a gloomy tunnel where last +year’s dead leaves whispered and scuffled about my tyres. The strong +hazel stuff meeting overhead had not been cut for a couple of generations at +least, nor had any axe helped the moss-cankered oak and beech to spring above +them. Here the road changed frankly into a carpetted ride on whose brown velvet +spent primrose-clumps showed like jade, and a few sickly, white-stalked +bluebells nodded together. As the slope favoured I shut off the power and slid +over the whirled leaves, expecting every moment to meet a keeper; but I only +heard a jay, far off, arguing against the silence under the twilight of the +trees. +</p> + +<p> +Still the track descended. I was on the point of reversing and working my way +back on the second speed ere I ended in some swamp, when I saw sunshine through +the tangle ahead and lifted the brake. +</p> + +<p> +It was down again at once. As the light beat across my face my fore-wheels took +the turf of a great still lawn from which sprang horsemen ten feet high with +levelled lances, monstrous peacocks, and sleek round-headed maids of +honour—blue, black, and glistening—all of clipped yew. Across the +lawn—the marshalled woods besieged it on three sides—stood an +ancient house of lichened and weather-worn stone, with mullioned windows and +roofs of rose-red tile. It was flanked by semi-circular walls, also rose-red, +that closed the lawn on the fourth side, and at their feet a box hedge grew +man-high. There were doves on the roof about the slim brick chimneys, and I +caught a glimpse of an octagonal dove-house behind the screening wall. +</p> + +<p> +Here, then, I stayed; a horseman’s green spear laid at my breast; held by +the exceeding beauty of that jewel in that setting. +</p> + +<p> +“If I am not packed off for a trespasser, or if this knight does not ride +a wallop at me,” thought I, “Shakespeare and Queen Elizabeth at +least must come out of that half-open garden door and ask me to tea.” +</p> + +<p> +A child appeared at an upper window, and I thought the little thing waved a +friendly hand. But it was to call a companion, for presently another bright +head showed. Then I heard a laugh among the yew-peacocks, and turning to make +sure (till then I had been watching the house only) I saw the silver of a +fountain behind a hedge thrown up against the sun. The doves on the roof cooed +to the cooing water; but between the two notes I caught the utterly happy +chuckle of a child absorbed in some light mischief. +</p> + +<p> +The garden door—heavy oak sunk deep in the thickness of the +wall—opened further: a woman in a big garden hat set her foot slowly on +the time-hollowed stone step and as slowly walked across the turf. I was +forming some apology when she lifted up her head and I saw that she was blind. +</p> + +<p> +“I heard you,” she said. “Isn’t that a motor +car?” +</p> + +<p> +“I’m afraid I’ve made a mistake in my road. I should have +turned off up above—I never dreamed”—I began. +</p> + +<p> +“But I’m very glad. Fancy a motor car coming into the garden! It +will be such a treat——” She turned and made as though looking +about her. “You—you haven’t seen any one have +you—perhaps?” +</p> + +<p> +“No one to speak to, but the children seemed interested at a +distance.” +</p> + +<p> +“Which?” +</p> + +<p> +“I saw a couple up at the window just now, and I think I heard a little +chap in the grounds.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, lucky you!” she cried, and her face brightened. “I hear +them, of course, but that’s all. You’ve seen them and heard +them?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” I answered. “And if I know anything of children one of +them’s having a beautiful time by the fountain yonder. Escaped, I should +imagine.” +</p> + +<p> +“You’re fond of children?” +</p> + +<p> +I gave her one or two reasons why I did not altogether hate them. +</p> + +<p> +“Of course, of course,” she said. “Then you understand. Then +you won’t think it foolish if I ask you to take your car through the +gardens, once or twice—quite slowly. I’m sure they’d like to +see it. They see so little, poor things. One tries to make their life pleasant, +but——” she threw out her hands towards the woods. +“We’re so out of the world here.” +</p> + +<p> +“That will be splendid,” I said. “But I can’t cut up +your grass.” +</p> + +<p> +She faced to the right. “Wait a minute,” she said. +“We’re at the South gate, aren’t we? Behind those peacocks +there’s a flagged path. We call it the Peacock’s Walk. You +can’t see it from here, they tell me, but if you squeeze along by the +edge of the wood you can turn at the first peacock and get on to the +flags.” +</p> + +<p> +It was sacrilege to wake that dreaming house-front with the clatter of +machinery, but I swung the car to clear the turf, brushed along the edge of the +wood and turned in on the broad stone path where the fountain-basin lay like +one star-sapphire. +</p> + +<p> +“May I come too?” she cried. “No, please don’t help me. +They’ll like it better if they see me.” +</p> + +<p> +She felt her way lightly to the front of the car, and with one foot on the step +she called: “Children, oh, children! Look and see what’s going to +happen!” +</p> + +<p> +The voice would have drawn lost souls from the Pit, for the yearning that +underlay its sweetness, and I was not surprised to hear an answering shout +behind the yews. It must have been the child by the fountain, but he fled at +our approach, leaving a little toy boat in the water. I saw the glint of his +blue blouse among the still horsemen. +</p> + +<p> +Very disposedly we paraded the length of the walk and at her request backed +again. This time the child had got the better of his panic, but stood far off +and doubting. +</p> + +<p> +“The little fellow’s watching us,” I said. “I wonder if +he’d like a ride.” +</p> + +<p> +“They’re very shy still. Very shy. But, oh, lucky you to be able to +see them! Let’s listen.” +</p> + +<p> +I stopped the machine at once, and the humid stillness, heavy with the scent of +box, cloaked us deep. Shears I could hear where some gardener was clipping; a +mumble of bees and broken voices that might have been the doves. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, unkind!” she said weariedly. +</p> + +<p> +“Perhaps they’re only shy of the motor. The little maid at the +window looks tremendously interested.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes?” She raised her head. “It was wrong of me to say that. +They are really fond of me. It’s the only thing that makes life worth +living—when they’re fond of you, isn’t it? I daren’t +think what the place would be without them. By the way, is it beautiful?” +</p> + +<p> +“I think it is the most beautiful place I have ever seen.” +</p> + +<p> +“So they all tell me. I can feel it, of course, but that isn’t +quite the same thing.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then have you never—-?” I began, but stopped abashed. +</p> + +<p> +“Not since I can remember. It happened when I was only a few months old, +they tell me. And yet I must remember something, else how could I dream about +colours. I see light in my dreams, and colours, but I never see <i>them</i>. I +only hear them just as I do when I’m awake.” +</p> + +<p> +“It’s difficult to see faces in dreams. Some people can, but most +of us haven’t the gift,” I went on, looking up at the window where +the child stood all but hidden. +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve heard that too,” she said. “And they tell me that +one never sees a dead person’s face in a dream. Is that true?” +</p> + +<p> +“I believe it is—now I come to think of it.” +</p> + +<p> +“But how is it with yourself—yourself?” The blind eyes turned +towards me. +</p> + +<p> +“I have never seen the faces of my dead in any dream,” I answered. +</p> + +<p> +“Then it must be as bad as being blind.” +</p> + +<p> +The sun had dipped behind the woods and the long shades were possessing the +insolent horsemen one by one. I saw the light die from off the top of a +glossy-leaved lance and all the brave hard green turn to soft black. The house, +accepting another day at end, as it had accepted an hundred thousand gone, +seemed to settle deeper into its rest among the shadows. +</p> + +<p> +“Have you ever wanted to?” she said after the silence. +</p> + +<p> +“Very much sometimes,” I replied. The child had left the window as +the shadows closed upon it. +</p> + +<p> +“Ah! So’ve I, but I don’t suppose it’s allowed. … Where +d’you live?” +</p> + +<p> +“Quite the other side of the county—sixty miles and more, and I +must be going back. I’ve come without my big lamp.” +</p> + +<p> +“But it’s not dark yet. I can feel it.” +</p> + +<p> +“I’m afraid it will be by the time I get home. Could you lend me +someone to set me on my road at first? I’ve utterly lost myself.” +</p> + +<p> +“I’ll send Madden with you to the cross-roads. We are so out of the +world, I don’t wonder you were lost! I’ll guide you round to the +front of the house; but you will go slowly, won’t you, till you’re +out of the grounds? It isn’t foolish, do you think?” +</p> + +<p> +“I promise you I’ll go like this,” I said, and let the car +start herself down the flagged path. +</p> + +<p> +We skirted the left wing of the house, whose elaborately cast lead guttering +alone was worth a day’s journey; passed under a great rose-grown gate in +the red wall, and so round to the high front of the house which in beauty and +stateliness as much excelled the back as that all others I had seen. +</p> + +<p> +“Is it so very beautiful?” she said wistfully when she heard my +raptures. “And you like the lead-figures too? There’s the old +azalea garden behind. They say that this place must have been made for +children. Will you help me out, please? I should like to come with you as far +as the cross-roads, but I mustn’t leave them. Is that you, Madden? I want +you to show this gentleman the way to the cross-roads. He has lost his way +but—he has seen them.” +</p> + +<p> +A butler appeared noiselessly at the miracle of old oak that must be called the +front door, and slipped aside to put on his hat. She stood looking at me with +open blue eyes in which no sight lay, and I saw for the first time that she was +beautiful. +</p> + +<p> +“Remember,” she said quietly, “if you are fond of them you +will come again,” and disappeared within the house. +</p> + +<p> +The butler in the car said nothing till we were nearly at the lodge gates, +where catching a glimpse of a blue blouse in a shrubbery I swerved amply lest +the devil that leads little boys to play should drag me into child-murder. +</p> + +<p> +“Excuse me,” he asked of a sudden, “but why did you do that, +Sir?” +</p> + +<p> +“The child yonder.” +</p> + +<p> +“Our young gentleman in blue?” +</p> + +<p> +“Of course.” +</p> + +<p> +“He runs about a good deal. Did you see him by the fountain, Sir?” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, yes, several times. Do we turn here?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, Sir. And did you ’appen to see them upstairs too?” +</p> + +<p> +“At the upper window? Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +“Was that before the mistress come out to speak to you, Sir?” +</p> + +<p> +“A little before that. Why d’you want to know?” +</p> + +<p> +He paused a little. “Only to make sure that—that they had seen the +car, Sir, because with children running about, though I’m sure +you’re driving particularly careful, there might be an accident. That was +all, Sir. Here are the cross-roads. You can’t miss your way from now on. +Thank you, Sir, but that isn’t <i>our</i> custom, not +with——” +</p> + +<p> +“I beg your pardon,” I said, and thrust away the British silver. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, it’s quite right with the rest of ’em as a rule. +Goodbye, Sir.” +</p> + +<p> +He retired into the armour-plated conning tower of his caste and walked away. +Evidently a butler solicitous for the honour of his house, and interested, +probably through a maid, in the nursery. +</p> + +<p> +Once beyond the signposts at the cross-roads I looked back, but the crumpled +hills interlaced so jealously that I could not see where the house had lain. +When I asked its name at a cottage along the road, the fat woman who sold +sweetmeats there gave me to understand that people with motor cars had small +right to live—much less to “go about talking like carriage +folk.” They were not a pleasant-mannered community. +</p> + +<p> +When I retraced my route on the map that evening I was little wiser. +Hawkin’s Old Farm appeared to be the survey title of the place, and the +old County Gazetteer, generally so ample, did not allude to it. The big house +of those parts was Hodnington Hall, Georgian with early Victorian +embellishments, as an atrocious steel engraving attested. I carried my +difficulty to a neighbour—a deep-rooted tree of that soil—and he +gave me a name of a family which conveyed no meaning. +</p> + +<p> +A month or so later—I went again, or it may have been that my car took +the road of her own volition. She over-ran the fruitless Downs, threaded every +turn of the maze of lanes below the hills, drew through the high-walled woods, +impenetrable in their full leaf, came out at the cross roads where the butler +had left me, and a little further on developed an internal trouble which forced +me to turn her in on a grass way-waste that cut into a summer-silent hazel +wood. So far as I could make sure by the sun and a six-inch Ordnance map, this +should be the road flank of that wood which I had first explored from the +heights above. I made a mighty serious business of my repairs and a glittering +shop of my repair kit, spanners, pump, and the like, which I spread out orderly +upon a rug. It was a trap to catch all childhood, for on such a day, I argued, +the children would not be far off. When I paused in my work I listened, but the +wood was so full of the noises of summer (though the birds had mated) that I +could not at first distinguish these from the tread of small cautious feet +stealing across the dead leaves. I rang my bell in an alluring manner, but the +feet fled, and I repented, for to a child a sudden noise is very real terror. I +must have been at work half an hour when I heard in the wood the voice of the +blind woman crying: “Children, oh children, where are you?” and the +stillness made slow to close on the perfection of that cry. She came towards +me, half feeling her way between the tree boles, and though a child it seemed +clung to her skirt, it swerved into the leafage like a rabbit as she drew +nearer. +</p> + +<p> +“Is that you?” she said, “from the other side of the +county?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, it’s me from the other side of the county.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then why didn’t you come through the upper woods? They were there +just now.” +</p> + +<p> +“They were here a few minutes ago. I expect they knew my car had broken +down, and came to see the fun.” +</p> + +<p> +“Nothing serious, I hope? How do cars break down?” +</p> + +<p> +“In fifty different ways. Only mine has chosen the fifty first.” +</p> + +<p> +She laughed merrily at the tiny joke, cooed with delicious laughter, and pushed +her hat back. +</p> + +<p> +“Let me hear,” she said. +</p> + +<p> +“Wait a moment,” I cried, “and I’ll get you a +cushion.” +</p> + +<p> +She set her foot on the rug all covered with spare parts, and stooped above it +eagerly. “What delightful things!” The hands through which she saw +glanced in the chequered sunlight. “A box here—another box! Why +you’ve arranged them like playing shop!” +</p> + +<p> +“I confess now that I put it out to attract them. I don’t need half +those things really.” +</p> + +<p> +“How nice of you! I heard your bell in the upper wood. You say they were +here before that?” +</p> + +<p> +“I’m sure of it. Why are they so shy? That little fellow in blue +who was with you just now ought to have got over his fright. He’s been +watching me like a Red Indian.” +</p> + +<p> +“It must have been your bell,” she said. “I heard one of them +go past me in trouble when I was coming down. They’re shy—so shy +even with me.” She turned her face over her shoulder and cried again: +“Children! Oh, children! Look and see!” +</p> + +<p> +“They must have gone off together on their own affairs,” I +suggested, for there was a murmur behind us of lowered voices broken by the +sudden squeaking giggles of childhood. I returned to my tinkerings and she +leaned forward, her chin on her hand, listening interestedly. +</p> + +<p> +“How many are they?” I said at last. The work was finished, but I +saw no reason to go. +</p> + +<p> +Her forehead puckered a little in thought. “I don’t quite +know,” she said simply. “Sometimes more—sometimes less. They +come and stay with me because I love them, you see.” +</p> + +<p> +“That must be very jolly,” I said, replacing a drawer, and as I +spoke I heard the inanity of my answer. +</p> + +<p> +“You—you aren’t laughing at me,” she cried. +“I—I haven’t any of my own. I never married. People laugh at +me sometimes about them because—because———” +</p> + +<p> +“Because they’re savages,” I returned. “It’s +nothing to fret for. That sort laugh at everything that isn’t in their +own fat lives.” +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t know. How should I? I only don’t like being laughed +at about <i>them</i>. It hurts; and when one can’t see…. I don’t +want to seem silly,” her chin quivered like a child’s as she spoke, +“but we blindies have only one skin, I think. Everything outside hits +straight at our souls. It’s different with you. You’ve such good +defences in your eyes—looking out—before anyone can really pain you +in your soul. People forget that with us.” +</p> + +<p> +I was silent reviewing that inexhaustible matter—the more than inherited +(since it is also carefully taught) brutality of the Christian peoples, beside +which the mere heathendom of the West Coast nigger is clean and restrained. It +led me a long distance into myself. +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t do that!” she said of a sudden, putting her hands +before her eyes. +</p> + +<p> +“What?” +</p> + +<p> +She made a gesture with her hand. +</p> + +<p> +“That! It’s—it’s all purple and black. Don’t! +That colour hurts.” +</p> + +<p> +“But, how in the world do you know about colours?” I exclaimed, for +here was a revelation indeed. +</p> + +<p> +“Colours as colours?” she asked. +</p> + +<p> +“No. <i>Those</i> Colours which you saw just now.” +</p> + +<p> +“You know as well as I do,” she laughed, “else you +wouldn’t have asked that question. They aren’t in the world at all. +They’re in <i>you</i>—when you went so angry.” +</p> + +<p> +“D’you mean a dull purplish patch, like port-wine mixed with +ink?” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve never seen ink or port-wine, but the colours aren’t +mixed. They are separate—all separate.” +</p> + +<p> +“Do you mean black streaks and jags across the purple?” +</p> + +<p> +She nodded. “Yes—if they are like this,” and zigzagged her +finger again, “but it’s more red than purple—that bad +colour.” +</p> + +<p> +“And what are the colours at the top of the—whatever you +see?” +</p> + +<p> +Slowly she leaned forward and traced on the rug the figure of the Egg itself. +</p> + +<p> +“I see them so,” she said, pointing with a grass stem, +“white, green, yellow, red, purple, and when people are angry or bad, +black across the red—as you were just now.” +</p> + +<p> +“Who told you anything about it—in the beginning?” I +demanded. +</p> + +<p> +“About the colours? No one. I used to ask what colours were when I was +little—in table-covers and curtains and carpets, you see—because +some colours hurt me and some made me happy. People told me; and when I got +older that was how I saw people.” Again she traced the outline of the Egg +which it is given to very few of us to see. +</p> + +<p> +“All by yourself?” I repeated. +</p> + +<p> +“All by myself. There wasn’t anyone else. I only found out +afterwards that other people did not see the Colours.” +</p> + +<p> +She leaned against the tree-hole plaiting and unplaiting chance-plucked grass +stems. The children in the wood had drawn nearer. I could see them with the +tail of my eye frolicking like squirrels. +</p> + +<p> +“Now I am sure you will never laugh at me,” she went on after a +long silence. “Nor at <i>them</i>.” +</p> + +<p> +“Goodness! No!” I cried, jolted out of my train of thought. +“A man who laughs at a child—unless the child is laughing +too—is a heathen!” +</p> + +<p> +“I didn’t mean that of course. You’d never laugh <i>at</i> +children, but I thought—I used to think—that perhaps you might +laugh about <i>them</i>. So now I beg your pardon…. What are you going to laugh +at?” +</p> + +<p> +I had made no sound, but she knew. +</p> + +<p> +“At the notion of your begging my pardon. If you had done your duty as a +pillar of the state and a landed proprietress you ought to have summoned me for +trespass when I barged through your woods the other day. It was disgraceful of +me—inexcusable.” +</p> + +<p> +She looked at me, her head against the tree trunk—long and +steadfastly—this woman who could see the naked soul. +</p> + +<p> +“How curious,” she half whispered. “How very curious.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why, what have I done?” +</p> + +<p> +“You don’t understand … and yet you understood about the Colours. +Don’t you understand?” +</p> + +<p> +She spoke with a passion that nothing had justified, and I faced her +bewilderedly as she rose. The children had gathered themselves in a roundel +behind a bramble bush. One sleek head bent over something smaller, and the set +of the little shoulders told me that fingers were on lips. They, too, had some +child’s tremendous secret. I alone was hopelessly astray there in the +broad sunlight. +</p> + +<p> +“No,” I said, and shook my head as though the dead eyes could note. +“Whatever it is, I don’t understand yet. Perhaps I shall +later—if you’ll let me come again.” +</p> + +<p> +“You will come again,” she answered. “You will surely come +again and walk in the wood.” +</p> + +<p> +“Perhaps the children will know me well enough by that time to let me +play with them—as a favour. You know what children are like.” +</p> + +<p> +“It isn’t a matter of favour but of right,” she replied, and +while I wondered what she meant, a dishevelled woman plunged round the bend of +the road, loose-haired, purple, almost lowing with agony as she ran. It was my +rude, fat friend of the sweetmeat shop. The blind woman heard and stepped +forward. “What is it, Mrs. Madehurst?” she asked. +</p> + +<p> +The woman flung her apron over her head and literally grovelled in the dust, +crying that her grandchild was sick to death, that the local doctor was away +fishing, that Jenny the mother was at her wits end, and so forth, with +repetitions and bellowings. +</p> + +<p> +“Where’s the next nearest doctor?” I asked between paroxysms. +</p> + +<p> +“Madden will tell you. Go round to the house and take him with you. +I’ll attend to this. Be quick!” She half-supported the fat woman +into the shade. In two minutes I was blowing all the horns of Jericho under the +front of the House Beautiful, and Madden, in the pantry, rose to the crisis +like a butler and a man. +</p> + +<p> +A quarter of an hour at illegal speeds caught us a doctor five miles away. +Within the half-hour we had decanted him, much interested in motors, at the +door of the sweetmeat shop, and drew up the road to await the verdict. +</p> + +<p> +“Useful things cars,” said Madden, all man and no butler. “If +I’d had one when mine took sick she wouldn’t have died.” +</p> + +<p> +“How was it?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Croup. Mrs. Madden was away. No one knew what to do. I drove eight miles +in a tax cart for the doctor. She was choked when we came back. This car +’d ha’ saved her. She’d have been close on ten now.” +</p> + +<p> +“I’m sorry,” I said. “I thought you were rather fond of +children from what you told me going to the cross-roads the other day.” +</p> + +<p> +“Have you seen ’em again, Sir—this mornin’?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, but they’re well broke to cars. I couldn’t get any of +them within twenty yards of it.” +</p> + +<p> +He looked at me carefully as a scout considers a stranger—not as a menial +should lift his eyes to his divinely appointed superior. +</p> + +<p> +“I wonder why,” he said just above the breath that he drew. +</p> + +<p> +We waited on. A light wind from the sea wandered up and down the long lines of +the woods, and the wayside grasses, whitened already with summer dust, rose and +bowed in sallow waves. +</p> + +<p> +A woman, wiping the suds off her arms, came out of the cottage next the +sweetmeat shop. +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve be’n listenin’ in de back-yard,” she said +cheerily. “He says Arthur’s unaccountable bad. Did ye hear him +shruck just now? Unaccountable bad. I reckon t’will come Jenny’s +turn to walk in de wood nex’ week along, Mr. Madden.” +</p> + +<p> +“Excuse me, Sir, but your lap-robe is slipping,” said Madden +deferentially. The woman started, dropped a curtsey, and hurried away. +</p> + +<p> +“What does she mean by ‘walking in the wood’?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“It must be some saying they use hereabouts. I’m from Norfolk +myself,” said Madden. “They’re an independent lot in this +county. She took you for a chauffeur, Sir.” +</p> + +<p> +I saw the Doctor come out of the cottage followed by a draggle-tailed wench who +clung to his arm as though he could make treaty for her with Death. “Dat +sort,” she wailed—“dey’re just as much to us dat has +’em as if dey was lawful born. Just as much—just as much! An’ +God he’d be just as pleased if you saved ’un, Doctor. Don’t +take it from me. Miss Florence will tell ye de very same. Don’t leave +’im, Doctor!” +</p> + +<p> +“I know. I know,” said the man, “but he’ll be quiet for +a while now. We’ll get the nurse and the medicine as fast as we +can.” He signalled me to come forward with the car, and I strove not to +be privy to what followed; but I saw the girl’s face, blotched and frozen +with grief, and I felt the hand without a ring clutching at my knees when we +moved away. +</p> + +<p> +The Doctor was a man of some humour, for I remember he claimed my car under the +Oath of Æsculapius, and used it and me without mercy. First we convoyed Mrs. +Madehurst and the blind woman to wait by the sick bed till the nurse should +come. Next we invaded a neat county town for prescriptions (the Doctor said the +trouble was cerebro-spinal meningitis), and when the County Institute, banked +and flanked with scared market cattle, reported itself out of nurses for the +moment we literally flung ourselves loose upon the county. We conferred with +the owners of great houses—magnates at the ends of overarching avenues +whose big-boned womenfolk strode away from their tea-tables to listen to the +imperious Doctor. At last a white-haired lady sitting under a cedar of Lebanon +and surrounded by a court of magnificent Borzois—all hostile to +motors—gave the Doctor, who received them as from a princess, written +orders which we bore many miles at top speed, through a park, to a French +nunnery, where we took over in exchange a pallid-faced and trembling Sister. +She knelt at the bottom of the tonneau telling her beads without pause till, by +short cuts of the Doctor’s invention, we had her to the sweetmeat shop +once more. It was a long afternoon crowded with mad episodes that rose and +dissolved like the dust of our wheels; cross-sections of remote and +incomprehensible lives through which we raced at right angles; and I went home +in the dusk, wearied out, to dream of the clashing horns of cattle; round-eyed +nuns walking in a garden of graves; pleasant tea-parties beneath shaded trees; +the carbolic-scented, grey-painted corridors of the County Institute; the steps +of shy children in the wood, and the hands that clung to my knees as the motor +began to move. +</p> + +<hr /> + +<p> +I had intended to return in a day or two, but it pleased Fate to hold me from +that side of the county, on many pretexts, till the elder and the wild rose had +fruited. There came at last a brilliant day, swept clear from the south-west, +that brought the hills within hand’s reach—a day of unstable airs +and high filmy clouds. Through no merit of my own I was free, and set the car +for the third time on that known road. As I reached the crest of the Downs I +felt the soft air change, saw it glaze under the sun; and, looking down at the +sea, in that instant beheld the blue of the Channel turn through polished +silver and dulled steel to dingy pewter. A laden collier hugging the coast +steered outward for deeper water and, across copper-coloured haze, I saw sails +rise one by one on the anchored fishing-fleet. In a deep dene behind me an eddy +of sudden wind drummed through sheltered oaks, and spun aloft the first day +sample of autumn leaves. When I reached the beach road the sea-fog fumed over +the brickfields, and the tide was telling all the groins of the gale beyond +Ushant. In less than an hour summer England vanished in chill grey. We were +again the shut island of the North, all the ships of the world bellowing at our +perilous gates; and between their outcries ran the piping of bewildered gulls. +My cap dripped moisture, the folds of the rug held it in pools or sluiced it +away in runnels, and the salt-rime stuck to my lips. +</p> + +<p> +Inland the smell of autumn loaded the thickened fog among the trees, and the +drip became a continuous shower. Yet the late flowers—mallow of the +wayside, scabious of the field, and dahlia of the garden—showed gay in +the mist, and beyond the sea’s breath there was little sign of decay in +the leaf. Yet in the villages the house doors were all open, and bare-legged, +bare-headed children sat at ease on the damp doorsteps to shout +“pip-pip” at the stranger. +</p> + +<p> +I made bold to call at the sweetmeat shop, where Mrs. Madehurst met me with a +fat woman’s hospitable tears. Jenny’s child, she said, had died two +days after the nun had come. It was, she felt, best out of the way, even though +insurance offices, for reasons which she did not pretend to follow, would not +willingly insure such stray lives. “Not but what Jenny didn’t tend +to Arthur as though he’d come all proper at de end of de first +year—like Jenny herself.” Thanks to Miss Florence, the child had +been buried with a pomp which, in Mrs. Madehurst’s opinion, more than +covered the small irregularity of its birth. She described the coffin, within +and without, the glass hearse, and the evergreen lining of the grave. +</p> + +<p> +“But how’s the mother?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Jenny? Oh, she’ll get over it. I’ve felt dat way with one or +two o’ my own. She’ll get over. She’s walkin’ in de +wood now.” +</p> + +<p> +“In this weather?” +</p> + +<p> +Mrs. Madehurst looked at me with narrowed eyes across the counter. +</p> + +<p> +“I dunno but it opens de ’eart like. Yes, it opens de ’eart. +Dat’s where losin’ and bearin’ comes so alike in de long run, +we do say.” +</p> + +<p> +Now the wisdom of the old wives is greater than that of all the Fathers, and +this last oracle sent me thinking so extendedly as I went up the road, that I +nearly ran over a woman and a child at the wooded corner by the lodge gates of +the House Beautiful. +</p> + +<p> +“Awful weather!” I cried, as I slowed dead for the turn. +</p> + +<p> +“Not so bad,” she answered placidly out of the fog. +“Mine’s used to ’un. You’ll find yours indoors, I +reckon.” +</p> + +<p> +Indoors, Madden received me with professional courtesy, and kind inquiries for +the health of the motor, which he would put under cover. +</p> + +<p> +I waited in a still, nut-brown hall, pleasant with late flowers and warmed with +a delicious wood fire—a place of good influence and great peace. (Men and +women may sometimes, after great effort, achieve a creditable lie; but the +house, which is their temple, cannot say anything save the truth of those who +have lived in it.) A child’s cart and a doll lay on the black-and-white +floor, where a rug had been kicked back. I felt that the children had only just +hurried away—to hide themselves, most like—in the many turns of the +great adzed staircase that climbed statelily out of the hall, or to crouch at +gaze behind the lions and roses of the carven gallery above. Then I heard her +voice above me, singing as the blind sing—from the soul:— +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +In the pleasant orchard-closes. +</p> + +<p class="noindent"> +And all my early summer came back at the call. +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +In the pleasant orchard-closes,<br/> +God bless all our gains say we—<br/> +But may God bless all our losses,<br/> +Better suits with our degree, +</p> + +<p class="noindent"> +She dropped the marring fifth line, and repeated— +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +Better suits with our degree! +</p> + +<p> +I saw her lean over the gallery, her linked hands white as pearl against the +oak. +</p> + +<p> +“Is that you—from the other side of the county?” she called. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, me—from the other side of the county,” I answered +laughing. +</p> + +<p> +“What a long time before you had to come here again.” She ran down +the stairs, one hand lightly touching the broad rail. “It’s two +months and four days. Summer’s gone!” +</p> + +<p> +“I meant to come before, but Fate prevented.” +</p> + +<p> +“I knew it. Please do something to that fire. They won’t let me +play with it, but I can feel it’s behaving badly. Hit it!” +</p> + +<p> +I looked on either side of the deep fireplace, and found but a half-charred +hedge-stake with which I punched a black log into flame. +</p> + +<p> +“It never goes out, day or night,” she said, as though explaining. +“In case any one comes in with cold toes, you see.” +</p> + +<p> +“It’s even lovelier inside than it was out,” I murmured. The +red light poured itself along the age-polished dusky panels till the Tudor +roses and lions of the gallery took colour and motion. An old eagle-topped +convex mirror gathered the picture into its mysterious heart, distorting afresh +the distorted shadows, and curving the gallery lines into the curves of a ship. +The day was shutting down in half a gale as the fog turned to stringy scud. +Through the uncurtained mullions of the broad window I could see valiant +horsemen of the lawn rear and recover against the wind that taunted them with +legions of dead leaves. “Yes, it must be beautiful,” she said. +“Would you like to go over it? There’s still light enough +upstairs.” +</p> + +<p> +I followed her up the unflinching, wagon-wide staircase to the gallery whence +opened the thin fluted Elizabethan doors. +</p> + +<p> +“Feel how they put the latch low down for the sake of the +children.” She swung a light door inward. +</p> + +<p> +“By the way, where are they?” I asked. “I haven’t even +heard them to-day.” +</p> + +<p> +She did not answer at once. Then, “I can only hear them,” she +replied softly. “This is one of their rooms—everything ready, you +see.” +</p> + +<p> +She pointed into a heavily-timbered room. There were little low gate tables and +children’s chairs. A doll’s house, its hooked front half open, +faced a great dappled rocking-horse, from whose padded saddle it was but a +child’s scramble to the broad window-seat overlooking the lawn. A toy gun +lay in a corner beside a gilt wooden cannon. +</p> + +<p> +“Surely they’ve only just gone,” I whispered. In the failing +light a door creaked cautiously. I heard the rustle of a frock and the patter +of feet—quick feet through a room beyond. +</p> + +<p> +“I heard that,” she cried triumphantly. “Did you? Children, O +children, where are you?” +</p> + +<p> +The voice filled the walls that held it lovingly to the last perfect note, but +there came no answering shout such as I had heard in the garden. We hurried on +from room to oak-floored room; up a step here, down three steps there; among a +maze of passages; always mocked by our quarry. One might as well have tried to +work an unstopped warren with a single ferret. There were bolt-holes +innumerable—recesses in walls, embrasures of deep slitten windows now +darkened, whence they could start up behind us; and abandoned fireplaces, six +feet deep in the masonry, as well as the tangle of communicating doors. Above +all, they had the twilight for their helper in our game. I had caught one or +two joyous chuckles of evasion, and once or twice had seen the silhouette of a +child’s frock against some darkening window at the end of a passage; but +we returned empty-handed to the gallery, just as a middle-aged woman was +setting a lamp in its niche. +</p> + +<p> +“No, I haven’t seen her either this evening, Miss Florence,” +I heard her say, “but that Turpin he says he wants to see you about his +shed.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, Mr. Turpin must want to see me very badly. Tell him to come to the +hall, Mrs. Madden.” +</p> + +<p> +I looked down into the hall whose only light was the dulled fire, and deep in +the shadow I saw them at last. They must have slipped down while we were in the +passages, and now thought themselves perfectly hidden behind an old gilt +leather screen. By child’s law, my fruitless chase was as good as an +introduction, but since I had taken so much trouble I resolved to force them to +come forward later by the simple trick, which children detest, of pretending +not to notice them. They lay close, in a little huddle, no more than shadows +except when a quick flame betrayed an outline. +</p> + +<p> +“And now we’ll have some tea,” she said. “I believe I +ought to have offered it you at first, but one doesn’t arrive at manners +somehow when one lives alone and is +considered—h’m—peculiar.” Then with very pretty scorn, +“would you like a lamp to see to eat by?” +</p> + +<p> +“The firelight’s much pleasanter, I think.” We descended into +that delicious gloom and Madden brought tea. +</p> + +<p> +I took my chair in the direction of the screen ready to surprise or be +surprised as the game should go, and at her permission, since a hearth is +always sacred, bent forward to play with the fire. +</p> + +<p> +“Where do you get these beautiful short faggots from?” I asked +idly. “Why, they are tallies!” +</p> + +<p> +“Of course,” she said. “As I can’t read or write +I’m driven back on the early English tally for my accounts. Give me one +and I’ll tell you what it meant.” +</p> + +<p> +I passed her an unburned hazel-tally, about a foot long, and she ran her thumb +down the nicks. +</p> + +<p> +“This is the milk-record for the home farm for the month of April last +year, in gallons,” said she. “I don’t know what I should have +done without tallies. An old forester of mine taught me the system. It’s +out of date now for every one else; but my tenants respect it. One of +them’s coming now to see me. Oh, it doesn’t matter. He has no +business here out of office hours. He’s a greedy, ignorant man—very +greedy or—he wouldn’t come here after dark.” +</p> + +<p> +“Have you much land then?” +</p> + +<p> +“Only a couple of hundred acres in hand, thank goodness. The other six +hundred are nearly all let to folk who knew my folk before me, but this Turpin +is quite a new man—and a highway robber.” +</p> + +<p> +“But are you sure I sha’n’t be——?” +</p> + +<p> +“Certainly not. You have the right. He hasn’t any children.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah, the children!” I said, and slid my low chair back till it +nearly touched the screen that hid them. “I wonder whether they’ll +come out for me.” +</p> + +<p> +There was a murmur of voices—Madden’s and a deeper note—at +the low, dark side door, and a ginger-headed, canvas-gaitered giant of the +unmistakable tenant farmer type stumbled or was pushed in. +</p> + +<p> +“Come to the fire, Mr. Turpin,” she said. +</p> + +<p> +“If—if you please, Miss, I’ll—I’ll be quite as +well by the door.” He clung to the latch as he spoke like a frightened +child. Of a sudden I realised that he was in the grip of some almost +overpowering fear. +</p> + +<p> +“Well?” +</p> + +<p> +“About that new shed for the young stock—that was all. These first +autumn storms settin’ in … but I’ll come again, Miss.” His +teeth did not chatter much more than the door latch. +</p> + +<p> +“I think not,” she answered levelly. “The new +shed—m’m. What did my agent write you on the 15th?” +</p> + +<p> +“I—fancied p’raps that if I came to see +you—ma—man to man like, Miss. But——” +</p> + +<p> +His eyes rolled into every corner of the room wide with horror. He half opened +the door through which he had entered, but I noticed it shut again—from +without and firmly. +</p> + +<p> +“He wrote what I told him,” she went on. “You are overstocked +already. Dunnett’s Farm never carried more than fifty bullocks—even +in Mr. Wright’s time. And <i>he</i> used cake. You’ve sixty-seven +and you don’t cake. You’ve broken the lease in that respect. +You’re dragging the heart out of the farm.” +</p> + +<p> +“I’m—I’m getting some +minerals—superphosphates—next week. I’ve as good as ordered a +truck-load already. I’ll go down to the station to-morrow about +’em. Then I can come and see you man to man like, Miss, in the daylight…. +That gentleman’s not going away, is he?” He almost shrieked. +</p> + +<p> +I had only slid the chair a little further back, reaching behind me to tap on +the leather of the screen, but he jumped like a rat. +</p> + +<p> +“No. Please attend to me, Mr. Turpin.” She turned in her chair and +faced him with his back to the door. It was an old and sordid little piece of +scheming that she forced from him—his plea for the new cowshed at his +landlady’s expense, that he might with the covered manure pay his next +year’s rent out of the valuation after, as she made clear, he had bled +the enriched pastures to the bone. I could not but admire the intensity of his +greed, when I saw him out-facing for its sake whatever terror it was that ran +wet on his forehead. +</p> + +<p> +I ceased to tap the leather—was, indeed, calculating the cost of the +shed—when I felt my relaxed hand taken and turned softly between the soft +hands of a child. So at last I had triumphed. In a moment I would turn and +acquaint myself with those quick-footed wanderers…. +</p> + +<p> +The little brushing kiss fell in the centre of my palm—as a gift on which +the fingers were, once, expected to close: as the all faithful half-reproachful +signal of a waiting child not used to neglect even when grown-ups were +busiest—a fragment of the mute code devised very long ago. +</p> + +<p> +Then I knew. And it was as though I had known from the first day when I looked +across the lawn at the high window. +</p> + +<p> +I heard the door shut. The woman turned to me in silence, and I felt that she +knew. +</p> + +<p> +What time passed after this I cannot say. I was roused by the fall of a log, +and mechanically rose to put it back. Then I returned to my place in the chair +very close to the screen. +</p> + +<p> +“Now you understand,” she whispered, across the packed shadows. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, I understand—now. Thank you.” +</p> + +<p> +“I—I only hear them.” She bowed her head in her hands. +“I have no right, you know—no other right. I have neither borne nor +lost—neither borne nor lost!” +</p> + +<p> +“Be very glad then,” said I, for my soul was torn open within me. +</p> + +<p> +“Forgive me!” +</p> + +<p> +She was still, and I went back to my sorrow and my joy. +</p> + +<p> +“It was because I loved them so,” she said at last, brokenly. +“<i>That</i> was why it was, even from the first—even before I knew +that they—they were all I should ever have. And I loved them so!” +</p> + +<p> +She stretched out her arms to the shadows and the shadows within the shadow. +</p> + +<p> +“They came because I loved them—because I needed them. I—I +must have made them come. Was that wrong, think you?” +</p> + +<p> +“No—no.” +</p> + +<p> +“I—I grant you that the toys and—and all that sort of thing +were nonsense, but—but I used to so hate empty rooms myself when I was +little.” She pointed to the gallery. “And the passages all empty. … +And how could I ever bear the garden door shut? Suppose——” +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t! For pity’s sake, don’t!” I cried. The +twilight had brought a cold rain with gusty squalls that plucked at the leaded +windows. +</p> + +<p> +“And the same thing with keeping the fire in all night. <i>I</i> +don’t think it so foolish—do you?” +</p> + +<p> +I looked at the broad brick hearth, saw, through tears I believe, that there +was no unpassable iron on or near it, and bowed my head. +</p> + +<p> +“I did all that and lots of other things—just to make believe. Then +they came. I heard them, but I didn’t know that they were not mine by +right till Mrs. Madden told me——” +</p> + +<p> +“The butler’s wife? What?” +</p> + +<p> +“One of them—I heard—she saw. And knew. Hers! <i>Not</i> for +me. I didn’t know at first. Perhaps I was jealous. Afterwards, I began to +understand that it was only because I loved them, not because——… +Oh, you <i>must</i> bear or lose,” she said piteously. “There is no +other way—and yet they love me. They must! Don’t they?” +</p> + +<p> +There was no sound in the room except the lapping voices of the fire, but we +two listened intently, and she at least took comfort from what she heard. She +recovered herself and half rose. I sat still in my chair by the screen. +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t think me a wretch to whine about myself like this, +but—but I’m all in the dark, you know, and <i>you</i> can +see.” +</p> + +<p> +In truth I could see, and my vision confirmed me in my resolve, though that was +like the very parting of spirit and flesh. Yet a little longer I would stay +since it was the last time. +</p> + +<p> +“You think it is wrong, then?” she cried sharply, though I had said +nothing. +</p> + +<p> +“Not for you. A thousand times no. For you it is right…. I am grateful to +you beyond words. For me it would be wrong. For me only….” +</p> + +<p> +“Why?” she said, but passed her hand before her face as she had +done at our second meeting in the wood. “Oh, I see,” she went on +simply as a child. “For you it would be wrong.” Then with a little +indrawn laugh, “and, d’you remember, I called you +lucky—once—at first. You who must never come here again!” +</p> + +<p> +She left me to sit a little longer by the screen, and I heard the sound of her +feet die out along the gallery above. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2>MRS. BATHURST</h2> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap21"></a>FROM LYDEN’S “IRENIUS”</h2> + +<p class="center"> +ACT III. Sc. II. +</p> + +<p> +GOW.—Had it been your Prince instead of a groom caught in this noose +there’s not an astrologer of the city—— +</p> + +<p> +PRINCE.—Sacked! Sacked! We were a city yesterday. +</p> + +<p> +GOW.—So be it, but I was not governor. Not an astrologer, but would +ha’ sworn he’d foreseen it at the last versary of Venus, when +Vulcan caught her with Mars in the house of stinking Capricorn. But since +’tis Jack of the Straw that hangs, the forgetful stars had it not on +their tablets. +</p> + +<p> +PRINCE.—Another life! Were there any left to die? How did the poor fool +come by it? +</p> + +<p> +GOW.—<i>Simpliciter</i> thus. She that damned him to death knew not that +she did it, or would have died ere she had done it. For she loved him. He that +hangs him does so in obedience to the Duke, and asks no more than “Where +is the rope?” The Duke, very exactly he hath told us, works God’s +will, in which holy employ he’s not to be questioned. We have then left +upon this finger, only Jack whose soul now plucks the left sleeve of Destiny in +Hell to overtake why she clapped him up like a fly on a sunny wall. Whuff! Soh! +</p> + +<p> +PRINCE.—Your cloak, Ferdinand. I’ll sleep now. +</p> + +<p> +FERDINAND.—Sleep, then… He too, loved his life? +</p> + +<p> +GOW.—He was born of woman … but at the end threw life from him, like your +Prince, for a little sleep … “Have I any look of a King?” said he, +clanking his chain—“to be so baited on all sides by Fortune, that I +must e’en die now to live with myself one day longer?” I left him +railing at Fortune and woman’s love. +</p> + +<p> +FERDINAND.—Ah, woman’s love! +</p> + +<p> +<i>(Aside)</i> Who knows not Fortune, glutted on easy thrones, Stealing from +feasts as rare to coneycatch, Privily in the hedgerows for a clown With that +same cruel-lustful hand and eye, Those nails and wedges, that one hammer and +lead, And the very gerb of long-stored lightnings loosed Yesterday +’gainst some King. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap22"></a>MRS. BATHURST</h2> + +<p> +The day that I chose to visit H.M.S. <i>Peridot</i> in Simon’s Bay was +the day that the Admiral had chosen to send her up the coast. She was just +steaming out to sea as my train came in, and since the rest of the Fleet were +either coaling or busy at the rifle-ranges a thousand feet up the hill, I found +myself stranded, lunchless, on the sea-front with no hope of return to Cape +Town before five <small>P.M</small>. At this crisis I had the luck to come +across my friend Inspector Hooper, Cape Government Railways, in command of an +engine and a brake-van chalked for repair. +</p> + +<p> +“If you get something to eat,” he said, “I’ll run you +down to Glengariff siding till the goods comes along. It’s cooler there +than here, you see.” +</p> + +<p> +I got food and drink from the Greeks who sell all things at a price, and the +engine trotted us a couple of miles up the line to a bay of drifted sand and a +plank-platform half buried in sand not a hundred yards from the edge of the +surf. Moulded dunes, whiter than any snow, rolled far inland up a brown and +purple valley of splintered rocks and dry scrub. A crowd of Malays hauled at a +net beside two blue and green boats on the beach; a picnic party danced and +shouted barefoot where a tiny river trickled across the flat, and a circle of +dry hills, whose feet were set in sands of silver, locked us in against a +seven-coloured sea. At either horn of the bay the railway line, cut just above +high water-mark, ran round a shoulder of piled rocks, and disappeared. +</p> + +<p> +“You see there’s always a breeze here,” said Hooper, opening +the door as the engine left us in the siding on the sand, and the strong +south-easter buffeting under Elsie’s Peak dusted sand into our tickey +beer. Presently he sat down to a file full of spiked documents. He had returned +from a long trip up-country, where he had been reporting on damaged +rolling-stock, as far away as Rhodesia. The weight of the bland wind on my +eyelids; the song of it under the car roof, and high up among the rocks; the +drift of fine grains chasing each other musically ashore; the tramp of the +surf; the voices of the picnickers; the rustle of Hooper’s file, and the +presence of the assured sun, joined with the beer to cast me into magical +slumber. The hills of False Bay were just dissolving into those of fairyland +when I heard footsteps on the sand outside, and the clink of our couplings. +</p> + +<p> +“Stop that!” snapped Hooper, without raising his head from his +work. “It’s those dirty little Malay boys, you see: they’re +always playing with the trucks….” +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t be hard on ’em. The railway’s a general refuge +in Africa,” I replied. +</p> + +<p> +“’Tis—up-country at any rate. That reminds me,” he felt +in his waistcoat-pocket, “I’ve got a curiosity for you from +Wankies—beyond Buluwayo. It’s more of a souvenir perhaps +than——” +</p> + +<p> +“The old hotel’s inhabited,” cried a voice. “White men +from the language. Marines to the front! Come on, Pritch. Here’s your +Belmont. Wha—i—i!” +</p> + +<p> +The last word dragged like a rope as Mr. Pyecroft ran round to the open door, +and stood looking up into my face. Behind him an enormous Sergeant of Marines +trailed a stalk of dried seaweed, and dusted the sand nervously from his +fingers. +</p> + +<p> +“What are you doing here?” I asked. “I thought the +<i>Hierophant</i> was down the coast?” +</p> + +<p> +“We came in last Tuesday—from Tristan D’Acunha—for +overhaul, and we shall be in dockyard ’ands for two months, with +boiler-seatings.” +</p> + +<p> +“Come and sit down,” Hooper put away the file. +</p> + +<p> +“This is Mr. Hooper of the Railway,” I exclaimed, as Pyecroft +turned to haul up the black-moustached sergeant. +</p> + +<p> +“This is Sergeant Pritchard, of the <i>Agaric</i>, an old +shipmate,” said he. “We were strollin’ on the beach.” +The monster blushed and nodded. He filled up one side of the van when he sat +down. +</p> + +<p> +“And this is my friend, Mr. Pyecroft,” I added to Hooper, already +busy with the extra beer which my prophetic soul had bought from the Greeks. +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Moi aussi</i>” quoth Pyecroft, and drew out beneath his coat a +labelled quart bottle. +</p> + +<p> +“Why, it’s Bass,” cried Hooper. +</p> + +<p> +“It was Pritchard,” said Pyecroft. “They can’t resist +him.” +</p> + +<p> +“That’s not so,” said Pritchard, mildly. +</p> + +<p> +“Not <i>verbatim</i> per’aps, but the look in the eye came to the +same thing.” +</p> + +<p> +“Where was it?” I demanded. +</p> + +<p> +“Just on beyond here—at Kalk Bay. She was slappin’ a rug in a +back verandah. Pritch hadn’t more than brought his batteries to bear, +before she stepped indoors an’ sent it flyin’ over the wall.” +</p> + +<p> +Pyecroft patted the warm bottle. +</p> + +<p> +“It was all a mistake,” said Pritchard. “I shouldn’t +wonder if she mistook me for Maclean. We’re about of a size.” +</p> + +<p> +I had heard householders of Muizenburg, St. James’s, and Kalk Bay +complain of the difficulty of keeping beer or good servants at the seaside, and +I began to see the reason. None the less, it was excellent Bass, and I too +drank to the health of that large-minded maid. +</p> + +<p> +“It’s the uniform that fetches ’em, an’ they fetch +it,” said Pyecroft. “My simple navy blue is respectable, but not +fascinatin’. Now Pritch in ’is Number One rig is always ‘purr +Mary, on the terrace’—<i>ex officio</i> as you might say.” +</p> + +<p> +“She took me for Maclean, I tell you,” Pritchard insisted. +“Why—why—to listen to him you wouldn’t think that only +yesterday——” +</p> + +<p> +“Pritch,” said Pyecroft, “be warned in time. If we begin +tellin’ what we know about each other we’ll be turned out of the +pub. Not to mention aggravated desertion on several +occasions——” +</p> + +<p> +“Never anything more than absence without leaf—I defy you to prove +it,” said the Sergeant hotly. “An’ if it comes to that how +about Vancouver in ’87?” +</p> + +<p> +“How about it? Who pulled bow in the gig going ashore? Who told Boy +Niven…?” +</p> + +<p> +“Surely you were court martialled for that?” I said. The story of +Boy Niven who lured seven or eight able-bodied seamen and marines into the +woods of British Columbia used to be a legend of the Fleet. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, we were court-martialled to rights,” said Pritchard, +“but we should have been tried for murder if Boy Niven ’adn’t +been unusually tough. He told us he had an uncle ’oo’d give us land +to farm. ’E said he was born at the back o’ Vancouver Island, and +<i>all</i> the time the beggar was a balmy Barnado Orphan!” +</p> + +<p> +“<i>But</i> we believed him,” said Pyecroft. “I did—you +did—Paterson did—an’ ’oo was the Marine that married +the cocoanut-woman afterwards—him with the mouth?” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, Jones, Spit-Kid Jones. I ’aven’t thought of ’im in +years,” said Pritchard. “Yes, Spit-Kid believed it, an’ +George Anstey and Moon. We were very young an’ very curious.” +</p> + +<p> +“<i>But</i> lovin’ an’ trustful to a degree,” said +Pyecroft. +</p> + +<p> +“Remember when ’e told us to walk in single file for fear o’ +bears? ‘Remember, Pye, when ’e ’opped about in that bog full +o’ ferns an’ sniffed an’ said ’e could smell the smoke +of ’is uncle’s farm? An’ <i>all</i> the time it was a dirty +little out-lyin’ uninhabited island. We walked round it in a day, +an’ come back to our boat lyin’ on the beach. A whole day Boy Niven +kept us walkin’ in circles lookin’ for ’is uncle’s +farm! He said his uncle was compelled by the law of the land to give us a +farm!” +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t get hot, Pritch. We believed,” said Pyecroft. +</p> + +<p> +“He’d been readin’ books. He only did it to get a run ashore +an’ have himself talked of. A day an’ a night—eight of +us—followin’ Boy Niven round an uninhabited island in the Vancouver +archipelago! Then the picket came for us an’ a nice pack o’ idiots +we looked!” +</p> + +<p> +“What did you get for it?” Hooper asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Heavy thunder with continuous lightning for two hours. Thereafter +sleet-squalls, a confused sea, and cold, unfriendly weather till conclusion +o’ cruise,” said Pyecroft. “It was only what we expected, but +what we felt, an’ I assure you, Mr. Hooper, even a sailor-man has a heart +to break, was bein’ told that we able seamen an’ promisin’ +marines ’ad misled Boy Niven. Yes, we poor back-to-the-landers was +supposed to ’ave misled him! He rounded on us, o’ course, an’ +got off easy.” +</p> + +<p> +“Excep’ for what we gave him in the steerin’-flat when we +came out o’ cells. ’Eard anything of ’im lately, Pye?” +</p> + +<p> +“Signal Boatswain in the Channel Fleet, I believe—Mr. L.L. Niven +is.” +</p> + +<p> +“An’ Anstey died o’ fever in Benin,” Pritchard mused. +“What come to Moon? Spit-Kid we know about.” +</p> + +<p> +“Moon—Moon! Now where did I last…? Oh yes, when I was in the +<i>Palladium</i>! I met Quigley at Buncrana Station. He told me Moon ’ad +run when the <i>Astrild</i> sloop was cruising among the South Seas three years +back. He always showed signs o’ bein’ a Mormonastic beggar. Yes, he +slipped off quietly an’ they ’adn’t time to chase ’im +round the islands even if the navigatin’ officer ’ad been equal to +the job.” +</p> + +<p> +“Wasn’t he?” said Hooper. +</p> + +<p> +“Not so. Accordin’ to Quigley the <i>Astrild</i> spent half her +commission rompin’ up the beach like a she-turtle, an’ the other +half hatching turtles’ eggs on the top o’ numerous reefs. When she +was docked at Sydney her copper looked like Aunt Maria’s washing on the +line—an’ her ’midship frames was sprung. The commander swore +the dockyard ’ad done it haulin’ the pore thing on to the slips. +They <i>do</i> do strange things at sea, Mr. Hooper.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah! I’m not a tax-payer,” said Hooper, and opened a fresh +bottle. The Sergeant seemed to be one who had a difficulty in dropping +subjects. +</p> + +<p> +“How it all comes back, don’t it?” he said. “Why Moon +must ’ave ’ad sixteen years’ service before he ran.” +</p> + +<p> +“It takes ’em at all ages. Look at—you know,” said +Pyecroft. +</p> + +<p> +“Who?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“A service man within eighteen months of his pension, is the party +you’re thinkin’ of,” said Pritchard. “A warrant +’oose name begins with a V., isn’t it?” +</p> + +<p> +“But, in a way o’ puttin’ it, we can’t say that he +actually did desert,” Pyecroft suggested. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, no,” said Pritchard. “It was only permanent absence up +country without leaf. That was all.” +</p> + +<p> +“Up country?” said Hooper. “Did they circulate his +description?” +</p> + +<p> +“What for?” said Pritchard, most impolitely. +</p> + +<p> +“Because deserters are like columns in the war. They don’t move +away from the line, you see. I’ve known a chap caught at Salisbury that +way tryin’ to get to Nyassa. They tell me, but o’ course I +don’t know, that they don’t ask questions on the Nyassa Lake +Flotilla up there. I’ve heard of a P. and O. quartermaster in full +command of an armed launch there.” +</p> + +<p> +“Do you think Click ’ud ha’ gone up that way?” +Pritchard asked. +</p> + +<p> +“There’s no saying. He was sent up to Bloemfontein to take over +some Navy ammunition left in the fort. We know he took it over and saw it into +the trucks. Then there was no more Click—then or thereafter. Four months +ago it transpired, and thus the <i>casus belli</i> stands at present,” +said Pyecroft. +</p> + +<p> +“What were his marks?” said Hooper again. +</p> + +<p> +“Does the Railway get a reward for returnin’ ’em, +then?” said Pritchard. +</p> + +<p> +“If I did d’you suppose I’d talk about it?” Hooper +retorted angrily. +</p> + +<p> +“You seemed so very interested,” said Pritchard with equal +crispness. +</p> + +<p> +“Why was he called Click?” I asked to tide over an uneasy little +break in the conversation. The two men were staring at each other very fixedly. +</p> + +<p> +“Because of an ammunition hoist carryin’ away,” said +Pyecroft. “And it carried away four of ’is teeth—on the lower +port side, wasn’t it, Pritch? The substitutes which he bought +weren’t screwed home in a manner o’ sayin’. When he talked +fast they used to lift a little on the bed plate. ’Ence, +‘Click.’ They called ’im a superior man which is what +we’d call a long, black-’aired, genteely speakin’, +’alf-bred beggar on the lower deck.” +</p> + +<p> +“Four false teeth on the lower left jaw,” said Hooper, his hand in +his waistcoat pocket. “What tattoo marks?” +</p> + +<p> +“Look here,” began Pritchard, half rising. “I’m sure +we’re very grateful to you as a gentleman for your ’orspitality, +but per’aps we may ’ave made an error in—” +</p> + +<p> +I looked at Pyecroft for aid, Hooper was crimsoning rapidly. +</p> + +<p> +“If the fat marine now occupying the foc’sle will kindly bring +’is <i>status quo</i> to an anchor yet once more, we may be able to talk +like gentlemen—not to say friends,” said Pyecroft. “He +regards you, Mr. Hooper, as a emissary of the Law.” +</p> + +<p> +“I only wish to observe that when a gentleman exhibits such a peculiar, +or I should rather say, such a <i>bloomin’</i> curiosity in +identification marks as our friend here——” +</p> + +<p> +“Mr. Pritchard,” I interposed, “I’ll take all the +responsibility for Mr. Hooper.” +</p> + +<p> +“An’ <i>you</i>’ll apologise all round,” said Pyecroft. +“You’re a rude little man, Pritch.” +</p> + +<p> +“But how was I——” he began, wavering. +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t know an’ I don’t care. Apologise!” +</p> + +<p> +The giant looked round bewildered and took our little hands into his vast grip, +one by one. “I was wrong,” he said meekly as a sheep. “My +suspicions was unfounded. Mr. Hooper, I apologise.” +</p> + +<p> +“You did quite right to look out for your own end o’ the +line,” said Hooper. “I’d ha’ done the same with a +gentleman I didn’t know, you see. If you don’t mind I’d like +to hear a little more o’ your Mr. Vickery. It’s safe with me, you +see.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why did Vickery run,” I began, but Pyecroft’s smile made me +turn my question to “Who was she?” +</p> + +<p> +“She kep’ a little hotel at Hauraki—near Auckland,” +said Pyecroft. +</p> + +<p> +“By Gawd!” roared Pritchard, slapping his hand on his leg. +“Not Mrs. Bathurst!” +</p> + +<p> +Pyecroft nodded slowly, and the Sergeant called all the powers of darkness to +witness his bewilderment. +</p> + +<p> +“So far as I could get at it Mrs. B. was the lady in question.” +</p> + +<p> +“But Click was married,” cried Pritchard. +</p> + +<p> +“An’ ’ad a fifteen year old daughter. ’E’s shown +me her photograph. Settin’ that aside, so to say, ’ave you ever +found these little things make much difference? Because I haven’t.” +</p> + +<p> +“Good Lord Alive an’ Watchin’!… Mrs. Bathurst….” Then +with another roar: “You can say what you please, Pye, but you don’t +make me believe it was any of ’er fault. She wasn’t +<i>that!</i>” +</p> + +<p> +“If I was going to say what I please, I’d begin by callin’ +you a silly ox an’ work up to the higher pressures at leisure. I’m +trying to say solely what transpired. M’rover, for once you’re +right. It wasn’t her fault.” +</p> + +<p> +“You couldn’t ’aven’t made me believe it if it +’ad been,” was the answer. +</p> + +<p> +Such faith in a Sergeant of Marines interested me greatly. “Never mind +about that,” I cried. “Tell me what she was like.” +</p> + +<p> +“She was a widow,” said Pyecroft. “Left so very young and +never re-spliced. She kep’ a little hotel for warrants and non-coms close +to Auckland, an’ she always wore black silk, and ’er +neck—” +</p> + +<p> +“You ask what she was like,” Pritchard broke in. “Let me give +you an instance. I was at Auckland first in ’97, at the end o’ the +<i>Marroquin’s</i> commission, an’ as I’d been promoted I +went up with the others. She used to look after us all, an’ she never +lost by it—not a penny! ‘Pay me now,’ she’d say, +‘or settle later. I know you won’t let me suffer. Send the money +from home if you like,’ Why, gentlemen all, I tell you I’ve seen +that lady take her own gold watch an’ chain off her neck in the bar +an’ pass it to a bosun ’oo’d come ashore without ’is +ticker an’ ’ad to catch the last boat. ‘I don’t know +your name,’ she said, ‘but when you’ve done with it, +you’ll find plenty that know me on the front. Send it back by one +o’ them.’ And it was worth thirty pounds if it was worth ’arf +a crown. The little gold watch, Pye, with the blue monogram at the back. But, +as I was sayin’, in those days she kep’ a beer that agreed with +me—Slits it was called. One way an’ another I must ’ave +punished a good few bottles of it while we was in the bay—comin’ +ashore every night or so. Chaffin across the bar like, once when we were alone, +‘Mrs. B.,’ I said, ‘when next I call I want you to remember +that this is my particular—just as you’re my particular?’ +(She’d let you go <i>that</i> far!) ‘Just as you’re my +particular,’ I said. ‘Oh, thank you, Sergeant Pritchard,’ she +says, an’ put ’er hand up to the curl be’ind ’er ear. +Remember that way she had, Pye?” +</p> + +<p> +“I think so,” said the sailor. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, ‘Thank you, Sergeant Pritchard,’ she says. ‘The +least I can do is to mark it for you in case you change your mind. +There’s no great demand for it in the Fleet,’ she says, ‘but +to make sure I’ll put it at the back o’ the shelf,’ an’ +she snipped off a piece of her hair ribbon with that old dolphin cigar cutter +on the bar—remember it, Pye?—an’ she tied a bow round what +was left—just four bottles. That was ’97—no, ’96. In +’98 I was in the <i>Resiliant</i>—China station—full +commission. In Nineteen One, mark you, I was in the <i>Carthusian</i>, back in +Auckland Bay again. Of course I went up to Mrs. B.’s with the rest of us +to see how things were goin’. They were the same as ever. (Remember the +big tree on the pavement by the side-bar, Pye?) I never said anythin’ in +special (there was too many of us talkin’ to her), but she saw me at +once.” +</p> + +<p> +“That wasn’t difficult?” I ventured. +</p> + +<p> +“Ah, but wait. I was comin’ up to the bar, when, ‘Ada,’ +she says to her niece, ‘get me Sergeant Pritchard’s +particular,’ and, gentlemen all, I tell you before I could shake +’ands with the lady, there were those four bottles o’ Slits, with +’er ’air ribbon in a bow round each o’ their necks, set down +in front o’ me, an’ as she drew the cork she looked at me under her +eyebrows in that blindish way she had o’ lookin’, an’, +‘Sergeant Pritchard,’ she says, ‘I do ’ope you +’aven’t changed your mind about your particulars.’ +That’s the kind o’ woman she was—after five years!” +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t <i>see</i> her yet somehow,” said Hooper, but with +sympathy. +</p> + +<p> +“She—she never scrupled to feed a lame duck or set ’er foot +on a scorpion at any time of ’er life,” Pritchard added valiantly. +</p> + +<p> +“That don’t help me either. My mother’s like that for +one.” +</p> + +<p> +The giant heaved inside his uniform and rolled his eyes at the car-roof. Said +Pyecroft suddenly:— +</p> + +<p> +“How many women have you been intimate with all over the world, +Pritch?” +</p> + +<p> +Pritchard blushed plum colour to the short hairs of his seventeen-inch neck. +</p> + +<p> +“’Undreds,” said Pyecroft. “So’ve I. How many of +’em can you remember in your own mind, settin’ aside the +first—an’ per’aps the last—<i>and one more</i>?” +</p> + +<p> +“Few, wonderful few, now I tax myself,” said Sergeant Pritchard, +relievedly. +</p> + +<p> +“An’ how many times might you ’ave been at Aukland?” +</p> + +<p> +“One—two,” he began. “Why, I can’t make it more +than three times in ten years. But I can remember every time that I ever saw +Mrs. B.” +</p> + +<p> +“So can I—an’ I’ve only been to Auckland +twice—how she stood an’ what she was sayin’ an’ what +she looked like. That’s the secret. ’Tisn’t beauty, so to +speak, nor good talk necessarily. It’s just It. Some women’ll stay +in a man’s memory if they once walked down a street, but most of +’em you can live with a month on end, an’ next commission +you’d be put to it to certify whether they talked in their sleep or not, +as one might say.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah,” said Hooper. “That’s more the idea. I’ve +known just two women of that nature.” +</p> + +<p> +“An’ it was no fault o’ theirs?” asked Pritchard. +</p> + +<p> +“None whatever. I know that!” +</p> + +<p> +“An’ if a man gets struck with that kind o’ woman, Mr. +Hooper?” Pritchard went on. +</p> + +<p> +“He goes crazy—or just saves himself,” was the slow answer. +</p> + +<p> +“You’ve hit it,” said the Sergeant. “You’ve seen +an’ known somethin’ in the course o’ your life, Mr. Hooper. +I’m lookin’ at you!” He set down his bottle. +</p> + +<p> +“And how often had Vickery seen her?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“That’s the dark an’ bloody mystery,” Pyecroft +answered. “I’d never come across him till I come out in the +<i>Hierophant</i> just now, an’ there wasn’t any one in the ship +who knew much about him. You see, he was what you call a superior man. ’E +spoke to me once or twice about Auckland and Mrs. B. on the voyage out. I +called that to mind subsequently. There must ’ave been a good deal +between ’em, to my way o’ thinkin’. Mind you I’m only +giving you my <i>sum</i> of it all, because all I know is second-hand so to +speak, or rather I should say more than second-’and.” +</p> + +<p> +“How?” said Hooper peremptorily. “You must have seen it or +heard it.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” said Pyecroft. “I used to think seein’ and +hearin’ was the only regulation aids to ascertainin’ facts, but as +we get older we get more accommodatin’. The cylinders work easier, I +suppose…. Were you in Cape Town last December when Phyllis’s Circus +came?” +</p> + +<p> +“No—up country,” said Hooper, a little nettled at the change +of venue. +</p> + +<p> +“I ask because they had a new turn of a scientific nature called +‘Home and Friends for a Tickey.’” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, you mean the cinematograph—the pictures of prize-fights and +steamers. I’ve seen ’em up country.” +</p> + +<p> +“Biograph or cinematograph was what I was alludin’ to. London +Bridge with the omnibuses—a troopship goin’ to the +war—marines on parade at Portsmouth an’ the Plymouth Express +arrivin’ at Paddin’ton.” +</p> + +<p> +“Seen ’em all. Seen ’em all,” said Hooper impatiently. +</p> + +<p> +“We <i>Hierophants</i> came in just before Christmas week an’ leaf +was easy.” +</p> + +<p> +“I think a man gets fed up with Cape Town quicker than anywhere else on +the station. Why, even Durban’s more like Nature. We was there for +Christmas,” Pritchard put in. +</p> + +<p> +“Not bein’ a devotee of Indian <i>peeris</i>, as our Doctor said to +the Pusser, I can’t exactly say. Phyllis’s was good enough after +musketry practice at Mozambique. I couldn’t get off the first two or +three nights on account of what you might call an imbroglio with our Torpedo +Lieutenant in the submerged flat, where some pride of the West country had +sugared up a gyroscope; but I remember Vickery went ashore with our Carpenter +Rigdon—old Crocus we called him. As a general rule Crocus never left +’is ship unless an’ until he was ’oisted out with a winch, +but <i>when</i> ’e went ’e would return noddin’ like a lily +gemmed with dew. We smothered him down below that night, but the things +’e said about Vickery as a fittin’ playmate for a Warrant Officer +of ’is cubic capacity, before we got him quiet, was what I should call +pointed.” +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve been with Crocus—in the <i>Redoubtable</i>,” said +the Sergeant. “He’s a character if there is one.” +</p> + +<p> +“Next night I went into Cape Town with Dawson and Pratt; but just at the +door of the Circus I came across Vickery. ‘Oh!’ he says, +‘you’re the man I’m looking for. Come and sit next me. This +way to the shillin’ places!’ I went astern at once, +protestin’ because tickey seats better suited my so-called finances. +‘Come on,’ says Vickery, ‘I’m payin’.’ +Naturally I abandoned Pratt and Dawson in anticipation o’ drinks to match +the seats. ‘No,’ he says, when this was +’inted—‘not now. Not now. As many as you please afterwards, +but I want you sober for the occasion.’ I caught ’is face under a +lamp just then, an’ the appearance of it quite cured me of my thirsts. +Don’t mistake. It didn’t frighten me. It made me anxious. I +can’t tell you what it was like, but that was the effect which it +’ad on me. If you want to know, it reminded me of those things in bottles +in those herbalistic shops at Plymouth—preserved in spirits of wine. +White an’ crumply things—previous to birth as you might say.” +</p> + +<p> +“You ’ave a beastial mind, Pye,” said the Sergeant, +relighting his pipe. +</p> + +<p> +“Perhaps. We were in the front row, an’ ‘Home an’ +Friends’ came on early. Vickery touched me on the knee when the number +went up. ‘If you see anything that strikes you,’ he says, +‘drop me a hint’; then he went on clicking. We saw London Bridge +an’ so forth an’ so on, an’ it was most interestin’. +I’d never seen it before. You ’eard a little dynamo like +buzzin’, but the pictures were the real thing—alive an’ +movin’.” +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve seen ’em,” said Hooper. “Of course they are +taken from the very thing itself—you see.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then the Western Mail came in to Paddin’ton on the big magic +lantern sheet. First we saw the platform empty an’ the porters +standin’ by. Then the engine come in, head on, an’ the women in the +front row jumped: she headed so straight. Then the doors opened and the +passengers came out and the porters got the luggage—just like life. +Only—only when any one came down too far towards us that was +watchin’, they walked right out o’ the picture, so to speak. I was +’ighly interested, I can tell you. So were all of us. I watched an old +man with a rug ’oo’d dropped a book an’ was tryin’ to +pick it up, when quite slowly, from be’ind two +porters—carryin’ a little reticule an’ lookin’ from +side to side—comes out Mrs. Bathurst. There was no mistakin’ the +walk in a hundred thousand. She come forward—right forward—she +looked out straight at us with that blindish look which Pritch alluded to. She +walked on and on till she melted out of the picture—like—like a +shadow jumpin’ over a candle, an’ as she went I ’eard Dawson +in the ticky seats be’ind sing out: ‘Christ! There’s Mrs. +B.!’” +</p> + +<p> +Hooper swallowed his spittle and leaned forward intently. +</p> + +<p> +“Vickery touched me on the knee again. He was clickin’ his four +false teeth with his jaw down like an enteric at the last kick. ‘Are you +sure?’ says he. ‘Sure,’ I says, ‘didn’t you +’ear Dawson give tongue? Why, it’s the woman herself.’ +‘I was sure before,’ he says, ‘but I brought you to make +sure. Will you come again with me to-morrow?’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Willingly,’ I says, ‘it’s like meetin’ +old friends.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Yes,’ he says, openin’ his watch, ‘very like. +It will be four-and-twenty hours less four minutes before I see her again. Come +and have a drink,’ he says. ‘It may amuse you, but it’s no +sort of earthly use to me.’ He went out shaking his head an’ +stumblin’ over people’s feet as if he was drunk already. I +anticipated a swift drink an’ a speedy return, because I wanted to see +the performin’ elephants. Instead o’ which Vickery began to +navigate the town at the rate o’ knots, lookin’ in at a bar every +three minutes approximate Greenwich time. I’m not a drinkin’ man, +though there are those present”—he cocked his unforgetable eye at +me—“who may have seen me more or less imbued with the fragrant +spirit. None the less, when I drink I like to do it at anchor an’ not at +an average speed of eighteen knots on the measured mile. There’s a tank +as you might say at the back o’ that big hotel up the hill—what do +they call it?” +</p> + +<p> +“The Molteno Reservoir,” I suggested, and Hooper nodded. +</p> + +<p> +“That was his limit o’ drift. We walked there an’ we come +down through the Gardens—there was a South-Easter +blowin’—an’ we finished up by the Docks. Then we bore up the +road to Salt River, and wherever there was a pub Vickery put in sweatin’. +He didn’t look at what he drunk—he didn’t look at the change. +He walked an’ he drunk an’ he perspired in rivers. I understood why +old Crocus ’ad come back in the condition ’e did, because Vickery +an’ I ’ad two an’ a half hours o’ this gipsy manœuvre +an’ when we got back to the station there wasn’t a dry atom on or +in me.” +</p> + +<p> +“Did he say anything?” Pritchard asked. +</p> + +<p> +“The sum total of ’is conversation from 7.45 <small>P.M</small>. +till 11.15 <small>P.M</small>. was ‘Let’s have another.’ Thus +the mornin’ an’ the evenin’ were the first day, as Scripture +says…. To abbreviate a lengthy narrative, I went into Cape Town for five +consecutive nights with Master Vickery, and in that time I must ’ave +logged about fifty knots over the ground an’ taken in two gallon o’ +all the worst spirits south the Equator. The evolution never varied. Two +shilling seats for us two; five minutes o’ the pictures, an’ +perhaps forty-five seconds o’ Mrs. B. walking down towards us with that +blindish look in her eyes an’ the reticule in her hand. Then out +walk—and drink till train time.” +</p> + +<p> +“What did you think?” said Hooper, his hand fingering his waistcoat +pocket. +</p> + +<p> +“Several things,” said Pyecroft. “To tell you the truth, I +aren’t quite done thinkin’ about it yet. Mad? The man was a dumb +lunatic—must ’ave been for months—years p’raps. I know +somethin’ o’ maniacs, as every man in the Service must. I’ve +been shipmates with a mad skipper—an’ a lunatic Number One, but +never both together I thank ’Eaven. I could give you the names o’ +three captains now ’oo ought to be in an asylum, but you don’t find +me interferin’ with the mentally afflicted till they begin to lay about +’em with rammers an’ winch-handles. Only once I crept up a little +into the wind towards Master Vickery. ‘I wonder what she’s +doin’ in England,’ I says. ‘Don’t it seem to you +she’s lookin’ for somebody?’ That was in the Gardens again, +with the South-Easter blowin’ as we were makin’ our desperate +round. ‘She’s lookin’ for me,’ he says, stoppin’ +dead under a lamp an’ clickin’. When he wasn’t +drinkin’, in which case all ’is teeth clicked on the glass, +’e was clickin’ ’is four false teeth like a Marconi ticker. +‘Yes! lookin’ for me,’ he said, an’ he went on very +softly an’ as you might say affectionately. ‘<i>But</i>, he went +on, ‘in future, Mr. Pyecroft, I should take it kindly of you if +you’d confine your remarks to the drinks set before you. +Otherwise,’ he says, ‘with the best will in the world towards you, +I may find myself guilty of murder! Do you understand?’ he says. +‘Perfectly,’ I says, ‘but would it at all soothe you to know +that in such a case the chances o’ your being killed are precisely +equivalent to the chances o’ me being outed.’ ‘Why, +no,’ he says, ‘I’m almost afraid that ’ud be a +temptation,’ +</p> + +<p> +“Then I said—we was right under the lamp by that arch at the end +o’ the Gardens where the trams came round—‘Assumin’ +murder was done—or attempted murder—I put it to you that you would +still be left so badly crippled, as one might say, that your subsequent capture +by the police—to ’oom you would ’ave to explain—would +be largely inevitable.’ ‘That’s better,’ ’e says, +passin’ ’is hands over his forehead. ‘That’s much +better, because,’ he says, ‘do you know, as I am now, Pye, +I’m not so sure if I could explain anything much.’ Those were the +only particular words I had with ’im in our walks as I remember.” +</p> + +<p> +“What walks!” said Hooper. “Oh my soul, what walks!” +</p> + +<p> +“They were chronic,” said Pyecroft gravely, “but I +didn’t anticipate any danger till the Circus left. Then I anticipated +that, bein’ deprived of ’is stimulant, he might react on me, so to +say, with a hatchet. Consequently, after the final performance an’ the +ensuin’ wet walk, I kep’ myself aloof from my superior officer on +board in the execution of ’is duty as you might put it. Consequently, I +was interested when the sentry informs me while I was passin’ on my +lawful occasions that Click had asked to see the captain. As a general rule +warrant officers don’t dissipate much of the owner’s time, but +Click put in an hour and more be’ind that door. My duties kep’ me +within eyeshot of it. Vickery came out first, an’ ’e actually +nodded at me an’ smiled. This knocked me out o’ the boat, because, +havin’ seen ’is face for five consecutive nights, I didn’t +anticipate any change there more than a condenser in hell, so to speak. The +owner emerged later. His face didn’t read off at all, so I fell back on +his cox, ’oo’d been eight years with him and knew him better than +boat signals. Lamson—that was the cox’s name—crossed +’is bows once or twice at low speeds an’ dropped down to me visibly +concerned. ‘He’s shipped ’is court-martial face,’ says +Lamson. ‘Some one’s goin’ to be ’ung. I’ve never +seen that look but once before when they chucked the gun-sights overboard in +the <i>Fantastic</i>.’ Throwin’ gun-sights overboard, Mr. Hooper, +is the equivalent for mutiny in these degenerate days. It’s done to +attract the notice of the authorities an’ the <i>Western Mornin’ +News</i>—generally by a stoker. Naturally, word went round the lower deck +an’ we had a private over’aul of our little consciences. But, +barrin’ a shirt which a second-class stoker said ’ad walked into +’is bag from the marines flat by itself, nothin’ vital transpired. +The owner went about flyin’ the signal for ‘attend public +execution,’ so to say, but there was no corpse at the yardarm. ’E +lunched on the beach an’ ’e returned with ’is regulation +harbour-routine face about 3 <small>P.M</small>. Thus Lamson lost prestige for +raising false alarms. The only person ’oo might ’ave connected the +epicycloidal gears correctly was one Pyecroft, when he was told that Mr. +Vickery would go up country that same evening to take over certain naval +ammunition left after the war in Bloemfontein Fort. No details was ordered to +accompany Master Vickery. He was told off first person singular—as a +unit—-by himself.” +</p> + +<p> +The marine whistled penetratingly. +</p> + +<p> +“That’s what I thought,” said Pyecroft. “I went ashore +with him in the cutter an’ ’e asked me to walk through the station. +He was clickin’ audibly, but otherwise seemed happy-ish. +</p> + +<p> +“‘You might like to know,’ he says, stoppin’ just +opposite the Admiral’s front gate, ‘that Phyllis’s Circus +will be performin’ at Worcester to-morrow night. So I shall see ’er +yet once again. You’ve been very patient with me,’ he says. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Look here, Vickery,’ I said, ‘this thing’s come +to be just as much as I can stand. Consume your own smoke. I don’t want +to know any more.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘You!’ he said. ‘What have you got to complain +of?—you’ve only ’ad to watch. I’m <i>it</i>,’ he +says, ‘but that’s neither here nor there,’ he says. +‘I’ve one thing to say before shakin’ ’ands. +Remember,’ ’e says—we were just by the Admiral’s +garden-gate then—‘remember, that I am <i>not</i> a murderer, +because my lawful wife died in childbed six weeks after I came out. That much +at least I am clear of,’ ’e says. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Then what have you done that signifies?’ I said. +‘What’s the rest of it?’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘The rest,’ ’e says, ‘is silence,’ +an’ he shook ’ands and went clickin’ into Simons Town +station.” +</p> + +<p> +“Did he stop to see Mrs. Bathurst at Worcester?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“It’s not known. He reported at Bloemfontein, saw the ammunition +into the trucks, and then ’e disappeared. Went out—deserted, if you +care to put it so—within eighteen months of his pension, an’ if +what ’e said about ’is wife was true he was a free man as ’e +then stood. How do you read it off?” +</p> + +<p> +“Poor devil!” said Hooper. “To see her that way every night! +I wonder what it was.” +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve made my ’ead ache in that direction many a long +night.” +</p> + +<p> +“But I’ll swear Mrs. B. ’ad no ’and in it,” said +the Sergeant unshaken. +</p> + +<p> +“No. Whatever the wrong or deceit was, he did it, I’m sure o’ +that. I ’ad to look at ’is face for five consecutive nights. +I’m not so fond o’ navigatin’ about Cape Town with a +South-Easter blowin’ these days. I can hear those teeth click, so to +say.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah, those teeth,” said Hooper, and his hand went to his waistcoat +pocket once more. “Permanent things false teeth are. You read about +’em in all the murder trials.” +</p> + +<p> +“What d’you suppose the captain knew—or did?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“I never turned my searchlight that way,” Pyecroft answered +unblushingly. +</p> + +<p> +We all reflected together, and drummed on empty beer bottles as the +picnic-party, sunburned, wet, and sandy, passed our door singing “The +Honeysuckle and the Bee.” +</p> + +<p> +“Pretty girl under that kapje,” said Pyecroft. +</p> + +<p> +“They never circulated his description?” said Pritchard. +</p> + +<p> +“I was askin’ you before these gentlemen came,” said Hooper +to me, “whether you knew Wankies—on the way to the +Zambesi—beyond Buluwayo?” +</p> + +<p> +“Would he pass there—tryin’ to get to that Lake what’s +’is name?” said Pritchard. +</p> + +<p> +Hooper shook his head and went on: “There’s a curious bit o’ +line there, you see. It runs through solid teak forest—a sort o’ +mahogany really—seventy-two miles without a curve. I’ve had a train +derailed there twenty-three times in forty miles. I was up there a month ago +relievin’ a sick inspector, you see. He told me to look out for a couple +of tramps in the teak.” +</p> + +<p> +“Two?” Pyecroft said. “I don’t envy that other man +if——” +</p> + +<p> +“We get heaps of tramps up there since the war. The inspector told me +I’d find ’em at M’Bindwe siding waiting to go North. +He’d given ’em some grub and quinine, you see. I went up on a +construction train. I looked out for ’em. I saw them miles ahead along +the straight, waiting in the teak. One of ’em was standin’ up by +the dead-end of the siding an’ the other was squattin’ down +lookin’ up at ’im, you see.” +</p> + +<p> +“What did you do for ’em?” said Pritchard. +</p> + +<p> +“There wasn’t much I could do, except bury ’em. There’d +been a bit of a thunderstorm in the teak, you see, and they were both stone +dead and as black as charcoal. That’s what they really were, you +see—charcoal. They fell to bits when we tried to shift ’em. The man +who was standin’ up had the false teeth. I saw ’em shinin’ +against the black. Fell to bits he did too, like his mate squatting down +an’ watchin’ him, both of ’em all wet in the rain. Both +burned to charcoal, you see. And—that’s what made me ask about +marks just now—the false-toother was tattooed on the arms and +chest—a crown and foul anchor with M.V. above.” +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve seen that,” said Pyecroft quickly. “It was +so.” +</p> + +<p> +“But if he was all charcoal-like?” said Pritchard, shuddering. +</p> + +<p> +“You know how writing shows up white on a burned letter? Well, it was +like that, you see. We buried ’em in the teak and I kept… But he was a +friend of you two gentlemen, you see.” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Hooper brought his hand away from his waistcoat-pocket—empty. +</p> + +<p> +Pritchard covered his face with his hands for a moment, like a child shutting +out an ugliness. +</p> + +<p> +“And to think of her at Hauraki!” he murmured—“with +’er ’air-ribbon on my beer. ‘Ada,’ she said to her +niece… Oh, my Gawd!”… +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +“On a summer afternoon, when the honeysuckle blooms,<br/> + And all Nature seems at rest,<br/> +Underneath the bower, ’mid the perfume of the flower,<br/> + Sat a maiden with the one she loves the best——” +</p> + +<p class="noindent"> +sang the picnic-party waiting for their train at Glengariff. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I don’t know how you feel about it,” said Pyecroft, +“but ’avin’ seen ’is face for five consecutive nights +on end, I’m inclined to finish what’s left of the beer an’ +thank Gawd he’s dead!” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap24"></a>BELOW THE MILL DAM</h2> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap23"></a>“OUR FATHERS ALSO”</h2> + +<p class="poem"> +By—they are by with mirth and tears,<br/> + Wit or the works of Desire—<br/> +Cushioned about on the kindly years<br/> + Between the wall and the fire.<br/> +<br/> +The grapes are pressed, the corn is shocked—<br/> + Standeth no more to glean;<br/> +For the Gates of Love and Learning locked<br/> + When they went out between.<br/> +<br/> +All lore our Lady Venus bares<br/> + Signalled it was or told<br/> +By the dear lips long given to theirs<br/> + And longer to the mould.<br/> +<br/> +All Profit, all Device, all Truth<br/> + Written it was or said<br/> +By the mighty men of their mighty youth.<br/> + Which is mighty being dead.<br/> +<br/> +The film that floats before their eyes<br/> + The Temple’s Veil they call;<br/> +And the dust that on the Shewbread lies<br/> + Is holy over all.<br/> +<br/> +Warn them of seas that slip our yoke<br/> + Of slow conspiring stars—<br/> +The ancient Front of Things unbroke<br/> + But heavy with new wars?<br/> +<br/> +By—they are by with mirth and tears.<br/> + Wit or the waste of Desire—<br/> +Cushioned about on the kindly years<br/> + Between the wall and the fire. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2>BELOW THE MILL DAM</h2> + +<p> +“Book—Book—Domesday Book!” They were letting in the +water for the evening stint at Robert’s Mill, and the wooden Wheel where +lived the Spirit of the Mill settled to its nine hundred year old song: +“Here Azor, a freeman, held one rod, but it never paid geld. +<i>Nun-nun-nunquam geldavit</i>. Here Reinbert has one villein and four cottars +with one plough—and wood for six hogs and two fisheries of sixpence and a +mill of ten shillings—<i>unum molinum</i>—one mill. +Reinbert’s mill—Robert’s Mill. Then and afterwards and +now—<i>tunc et post et modo</i>—Robert’s Mill. +Book—Book—Domesday Book!” +</p> + +<p> +“I confess,” said the Black Rat on the crossbeam, luxuriously +trimming his whiskers—“I confess I am not above appreciating my +position and all it means.” He was a genuine old English black rat, a +breed which, report says, is rapidly diminishing before the incursions of the +brown variety. +</p> + +<p> +“Appreciation is the surest sign of inadequacy,” said the Grey Cat, +coiled up on a piece of sacking. +</p> + +<p> +“But I know what you mean,” she added. “To sit by right at +the heart of things—eh?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” said the Black Rat, as the old mill shook and the heavy +stones thuttered on the grist. “To possess—er—all this +environment as an integral part of one’s daily life must insensibly of +course … You see?” +</p> + +<p> +“I feel,” said the Grey Cat. “Indeed, if <i>we</i> are not +saturated with the spirit of the Mill, who should be?” +</p> + +<p> +“Book—Book—Domesday Book!” the Wheel, set to his work, +was running off the tenure of the whole rape, for he knew Domesday Book +backwards and forwards: “<i>In Ferle tenuit Abbatia de Wiltuna unam hidam +et unam virgam et dimidiam. Nunquam geldavit</i>. And Agemond, a freeman, has +half a hide and one rod. I remember Agemond well. Charmin’ +fellow—friend of mine. He married a Norman girl in the days when we +rather looked down on the Normans as upstarts. An’ Agemond’s dead? +So he is. Eh, dearie me! dearie me! I remember the wolves howling outside his +door in the big frost of Ten Fifty-Nine…. <i>Essewelde hundredum nunquam geldum +reddidit</i>. Book! Book! Domesday Book!” +</p> + +<p> +“After all,” the Grey Cat continued, “atmospere is life. It +is the influences under which we live that count in the long run. Now, +outside”—she cocked one ear towards the half-opened +door—“there is an absurd convention that rats and cats are, I +won’t go so far as to say natural enemies, but opposed forces. Some such +ruling may be crudely effective—I don’t for a minute presume to set +up my standards as final—among the ditches; but from the larger point of +view that one gains by living at the heart of things, it seems for a rule of +life a little overstrained. Why, because some of your associates have, shall I +say, liberal views on the ultimate destination of a sack +of—er—middlings don’t they call them——” +</p> + +<p> +“Something of that sort,” said the Black Rat, a most sharp and +sweet-toothed judge of everything ground in the mill for the last three years. +</p> + +<p> +“Thanks—middlings be it. <i>Why</i>, as I was saying, must I +disarrange my fur and my digestion to chase you round the dusty arena whenever +we happen to meet?” +</p> + +<p> +“As little reason,” said the Black Rat, “as there is for me, +who, I trust, am a person of ordinarily decent instincts, to wait till you have +gone on a round of calls, and then to assassinate your very charming +children.” +</p> + +<p> +“Exactly! It has its humorous side though.” The Grey Cat yawned. +“The miller seems afflicted by it. He shouted large and vague threats to +my address, last night at tea, that he wasn’t going to keep cats who +‘caught no mice.’ Those were his words. I remember the grammar +sticking in my throat like a herring-bone.” +</p> + +<p> +“And what did you do?” +</p> + +<p> +“What does one do when a barbarian utters? One ceases to utter and +removes. I removed—towards his pantry. It was a <i>riposte</i> he might +appreciate.” +</p> + +<p> +“Really those people grow absolutely insufferable,” said the Black +Rat. “There is a local ruffian who answers to the name of Mangles—a +builder—who has taken possession of the outhouses on the far side of the +Wheel for the last fortnight. He has constructed cubical horrors in red brick +where those deliciously picturesque pigstyes used to stand. Have you +noticed?” +</p> + +<p> +“There has been much misdirected activity of late among the humans. They +jabber inordinately. I haven’t yet been able to arrive at their reason +for existence.” The Cat yawned. +</p> + +<p> +“A couple of them came in here last week with wires, and fixed them all +about the walls. Wires protected by some abominable composition, ending in iron +brackets with glass bulbs. Utterly useless for any purpose and artistically +absolutely hideous. What do they mean?” +</p> + +<p> +“Aaah! I have known <i>four</i>-and-twenty leaders of revolt in +Faenza,” said the Cat, who kept good company with the boarders spending a +summer at the Mill Farm. “It means nothing except that humans +occasionally bring their dogs with them. I object to dogs in all forms.” +</p> + +<p> +“Shouldn’t object to dogs,” said the Wheel sleepily…. +“The Abbot of Wilton kept the best pack in the county. He enclosed all +the Harryngton Woods to Sturt Common. Aluric, a freeman, was dispossessed of +his holding. They tried the case at Lewes, but he got no change out of William +de Warrenne on the bench. William de Warrenne fined Aluric eight and fourpence +for treason, and the Abbot of Wilton excommunicated him for blasphemy. Aluric +was no sportsman. Then the Abbot’s brother married … I’ve forgotten +her name, but she was a charmin’ little woman. The Lady Philippa was her +daughter. That was after the barony was conferred. She rode devilish straight +to hounds. They were a bit throatier than we breed now, but a good pack: one of +the best. The Abbot kept ’em in splendid shape. Now, who was the woman +the Abbot kept? Book—Book! I shall have to go right back to Domesday and +work up the centuries: <i>Modo per omnia reddit burgum +tunc—tunc—tunc</i>! Was it <i>burgum</i> or <i>hundredum</i>? I +shall remember in a minute. There’s no hurry.” He paused as he +turned over silvered with showering drops. +</p> + +<p> +“This won’t do,” said the Waters in the sluice. “Keep +moving.” +</p> + +<p> +The Wheel swung forward; the Waters roared on the buckets and dropped down to +the darkness below. +</p> + +<p> +“Noisier than usual,” said the Black Rat. “It must have been +raining up the valley.” +</p> + +<p> +“Floods maybe,” said the Wheel dreamily. “It isn’t the +proper season, but they can come without warning. I shall never forget the big +one—when the Miller went to sleep and forgot to open the hatches. More +than two hundred years ago it was, but I recall it distinctly. Most +unsettling.” +</p> + +<p> +“We lifted that wheel off his bearings,” cried the Waters. +“We said, ‘Take away that bauble!’ And in the morning he was +five mile down the valley—hung up in a tree.” +</p> + +<p> +“Vulgar!” said the Cat. “But I am sure he never lost his +dignity.” +</p> + +<p> +“We don’t know. He looked like the Ace of Diamonds when we had +finished with him…. Move on there! Keep on moving. Over! Get over!” +</p> + +<p> +“And why on this day more than any other,” said the Wheel +statelily. “I am not aware that my department requires the stimulus of +external pressure to keep it up to its duties. I trust I have the elementary +instincts of a gentleman.” +</p> + +<p> +“Maybe,” the Waters answered together, leaping down on the buckets. +“We only know that you are very stiff on your bearings. Over, get +over!” +</p> + +<p> +The Wheel creaked and groaned. There was certainly greater pressure upon him +than he had ever felt, and his revolutions had increased from six and +three-quarters to eight and a third per minute. But the uproar between the +narrow, weed-hung walls annoyed the Grey Cat. +</p> + +<p> +“Isn’t it almost time,” she said plaintively, “that the +person who is paid to understand these things shuts off those vehement +drippings with that screw-thing on the top of that box-thing.” +</p> + +<p> +“They’ll be shut off at eight o’clock as usual,” said +Rat; “then we can go to dinner.” +</p> + +<p> +“But we shan’t be shut off till ever so late,” said the +Waters gaily. “We shall keep it up all night.” +</p> + +<p> +“The ineradicable offensiveness of youth is partially compensated for by +its eternal hopefulness,” said the Cat. “Our dam is not, I am glad +to say, designed to furnish water for more than four hours at a time. Reserve +is Life.” +</p> + +<p> +“Thank goodness!” said the Black Rat. “Then they can return +to their native ditches.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ditches!” cried the Waters; “Raven’s Gill Brook is no +ditch. It is almost navigable, and <i>we</i> come from there away.” They +slid over solid and compact till the Wheel thudded under their weight. +</p> + +<p> +“Raven’s Gill Brook,” said the Rat. “<i>I</i> never +heard of Raven’s Gill.” +</p> + +<p> +“We are the waters of Harpenden Brook—down from under Callton Rise. +Phew! how the race stinks compared with the heather country.” Another +five foot of water flung itself against the Wheel, broke, roared, gurgled, and +was gone. +</p> + +<p> +“Indeed,” said the Grey Cat, “I am sorry to tell you that +Raven’s Gill Brook is cut off from this valley by an absolutely +impassable range of mountains, and Callton Rise is more than nine miles away. +It belongs to another system entirely.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah yes,” said the Rat, grinning, “but we forget that, for +the young, water always runs uphill.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, hopeless! hopeless! hopeless!” cried the Waters, descending +open-palmed upon the Wheel “There is nothing between here and +Raven’s Gill Brook that a hundred yards of channelling and a few square +feet of concrete could not remove; and hasn’t removed!” +</p> + +<p> +“And Harpenden Brook is north of Raven’s Gill and runs into +Raven’s Gill at the foot of Callton Rise, where ilex trees are, and +<i>we</i> come from there!” These were the glassy, clear waters of the +high chalk. +</p> + +<p> +“And Batten’s Ponds, that are fed by springs, have been led through +Trott’s Wood, taking the spare water from the old Witches’ Spring +under Churt Haw, and we—we—<i>we</i> are their combined +waters!” Those were the Waters from the upland bogs and moors—a +porter-coloured, dusky, and foam-flecked flood. +</p> + +<p> +“It’s all very interesting,” purred the Cat to the sliding +waters, “and I have no doubt that Trott’s Woods and Bott’s +Woods are tremendously important places; but if you could manage to do your +work—whose value I don’t in the least dispute—a little more +soberly, I, for one, should be grateful.” +</p> + +<p> +“Book—book—book—book—book—Domesday +Book!” The urged Wheel was fairly clattering now: “In +Burgelstaltone a monk holds of Earl Godwin one hide and a half with eight +villeins. There is a church—and a monk…. I remember that monk. Blessed if +he could rattle his rosary off any quicker than I am doing now … and wood for +seven hogs. I must be running twelve to the minute … almost as fast as Steam. +Damnable invention, Steam! … Surely it’s time we went to dinner or +prayers—or something. Can’t keep up this pressure, day in and day +out, and not feel it. I don’t mind for myself, of course. <i>Noblesse +oblige</i>, you know. I’m only thinking of the Upper and the Nether +Millstones. They came out of the common rock. They can’t be expected +to——” +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t worry on our account, please,” said the Millstones +huskily. “So long as you supply the power we’ll supply the weight +and the bite.” +</p> + +<p> +“Isn’t it a trifle blasphemous, though, to work you in this +way?” grunted the Wheel. “I seem to remember something about the +Mills of God grinding ‘slowly.’ <i>Slowly</i> was the word!” +</p> + +<p> +“But we are not the Mills of God. We’re only the Upper and the +Nether Millstones. We have received no instructions to be anything else. We are +actuated by power transmitted through you.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah, but let us be merciful as we are strong. Think of all the beautiful +little plants that grow on my woodwork. There are five varieties of rare moss +within less than one square yard—and all these delicate jewels of nature +are being grievously knocked about by this excessive rush of the water.” +</p> + +<p> +“Umph!” growled the Millstones. “What with your religious +scruples and your taste for botany we’d hardly know you for the Wheel +that put the carter’s son under last autumn. You never worried about +<i>him</i>!” +</p> + +<p> +“He ought to have known better.” +</p> + +<p> +“So ought your jewels of nature. Tell ’em to grow where it’s +safe.” +</p> + +<p> +“How a purely mercantile life debases and brutalises!” said the Cat +to the Rat. +</p> + +<p> +“They were such beautiful little plants too,” said the Rat +tenderly. “Maiden’s-tongue and hart’s-hair fern trellising +all over the wall just as they do on the sides of churches in the Downs. Think +what a joy the sight of them must be to our sturdy peasants pulling hay!” +</p> + +<p> +“Golly!” said the Millstones. “There’s nothing like +coming to the heart of things for information”; and they returned to the +song that all English water-mills have sung from time beyond telling: +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +There was a jovial miller once<br/> + Lived on the River Dee,<br/> +And this the burden of his song<br/> + For ever used to be. +</p> + +<p> +Then, as fresh grist poured in and dulled the note: +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +I care for nobody—no not I,<br/> + And nobody cares for me. +</p> + +<p> +“Even these stones have absorbed something of our atmosphere,” said +the Grey Cat. “Nine-tenths of the trouble in this world comes from lack +of detachment.” +</p> + +<p> +“One of your people died from forgetting that, didn’t she?” +said the Rat. +</p> + +<p> +“One only. The example has sufficed us for generations.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah! but what happened to Don’t Care?” the Waters demanded. +</p> + +<p> +“Brutal riding to death of the casual analogy is another mark of +provincialism!” The Grey Cat raised her tufted chin. “I am going to +sleep. With my social obligations I must snatch rest when I can; but, as our +old friend here says, <i>Noblesse oblige</i>…. Pity me! Three functions +to-night in the village, and a barn dance across the valley!” +</p> + +<p> +“There’s no chance, I suppose, of your looking in on the loft about +two. Some of our young people are going to amuse themselves with a new +sacque-dance—best white flour only,” said the Black Rat. +</p> + +<p> +“I believe I am officially supposed not to countenance that sort of +thing, but youth is youth.… By the way, the humans set my milk-bowl in the +loft these days; I hope your youngsters respect it.” +</p> + +<p> +“My dear lady,” said the Black Rat, bowing, “you grieve me. +You hurt me inexpressibly. After all these years, too!” +</p> + +<p> +“A general crush is so mixed—highways and hedges—all that +sort of thing—and no one can answer for one’s best friends. +<i>I</i> never try. So long as mine are amusin’ and in full voice, and +can hold their own at a tile-party, I’m as catholic as these mixed waters +in the dam here!” +</p> + +<p> +“We aren’t mixed. We <i>have</i> mixed. We are one now,” said +the Waters sulkily. +</p> + +<p> +“Still uttering?” said the Cat. “Never mind, here’s the +Miller coming to shut you off. Ye-es, I have known—<i>four</i>—or +five is it?—and twenty leaders of revolt in Faenza…. A little more babble +in the dam, a little more noise in the sluice, a little extra splashing on the +wheel, and then——” +</p> + +<p> +“They will find that nothing has occurred,” said the Black Rat. +“The old things persist and survive and are recognised—our old +friend here first of all. By the way,” he turned toward the Wheel, +“I believe we have to congratulate you on your latest honour.” +</p> + +<p> +“Profoundly well deserved—even if he had never—as he +has—-laboured strenuously through a long life for the amelioration of +millkind,” said the Cat, who belonged to many tile and outhouse +committees. “Doubly deserved, I may say, for the silent and dignified +rebuke his existence offers to the clattering, fidgety-footed demands +of—er—some people. What form did the honour take?” +</p> + +<p> +“It was,” said the Wheel bashfully, “a machine-moulded +pinion.” +</p> + +<p> +“Pinions! Oh, how heavenly!” the Black Rat sighed. “I never +see a bat without wishing for wings.” +</p> + +<p> +“Not exactly that sort of pinion,” said the Wheel, “but a +really ornate circle of toothed iron wheels. Absurd, of course, but gratifying. +Mr. Mangles and an associate herald invested me with it personally—on my +left rim—the side that you can’t see from the mill. I hadn’t +meant to say anything about it—or the new steel straps round my +axles—bright red, you know—to be worn on all occasions—but, +without false modesty, I assure you that the recognition cheered me not a +little.” +</p> + +<p> +“How intensely gratifying!” said the Black Rat. “I must +really steal an hour between lights some day and see what they are doing on +your left side.” +</p> + +<p> +“By the way, have you any light on this recent activity of Mr. +Mangles?” the Grey Cat asked. “He seems to be building small houses +on the far side of the tail-race. Believe me, I don’t ask from any vulgar +curiosity.” +</p> + +<p> +“It affects our Order,” said the Black Rat simply but firmly. +</p> + +<p> +“Thank you,” said the Wheel. “Let me see if I can tabulate it +properly. Nothing like system in accounts of all kinds. Book! Book! Book! On +the side of the Wheel towards the hundred of Burgelstaltone, where till now was +a stye of three hogs, Mangles, a freeman, with four villeins, and two carts of +two thousand bricks, has a new small house of five yards and a half, and one +roof of iron and a floor of cement. Then, now, and afterwards beer in large +tankards. And Felden, a stranger, with three villeins and one very great cart, +deposits on it one engine of iron and brass and a small iron mill of four feet, +and a broad strap of leather. And Mangles, the builder, with two villeins, +constructs the floor for the same, and a floor of new brick with wires for the +small mill. There are there also chalices filled with iron and water, in number +fifty-seven. The whole is valued at one hundred and seventy-four pounds…. +I’m sorry I can’t make myself clearer, but you can see for +yourself.” +</p> + +<p> +“Amazingly lucid,” said the Cat. She was the more to be admired +because the language of Domesday Book is not, perhaps, the clearest medium +wherein to describe a small but complete electric-light installation, deriving +its power from a water-wheel by means of cogs and gearing. +</p> + +<p> +“See for yourself—by all means, see for yourself,” said the +Waters, spluttering and choking with mirth. +</p> + +<p> +“Upon my word,” said the Black Rat furiously, “I may be at +fault, but I wholly fail to perceive where these offensive +eavesdroppers—er—come in. We were discussing a matter that solely +affected our Order.” +</p> + +<p> +Suddenly they heard, as they had heard many times before, the Miller shutting +off the water. To the rattle and rumble of the labouring stones succeeded thick +silence, punctuated with little drops from the stayed wheel. Then some +water-bird in the dam fluttered her wings as she slid to her nest, and the plop +of a water-rat sounded like the fall of a log in the water. +</p> + +<p> +“It is all over—it always is all over at just this time. Listen, +the Miller is going to bed—as usual. Nothing has occurred,” said +the Cat. +</p> + +<p> +Something creaked in the house where the pig-styes had stood, as metal engaged +on metal with a clink and a burr. +</p> + +<p> +“Shall I turn her on?” cried the Miller. +</p> + +<p> +“Ay,” said the voice from the dynamo-house. +</p> + +<p> +“A human in Mangles’ new house!” the Rat squeaked. +</p> + +<p> +“What of it?” said the Grey Cat. “Even supposing Mr. +Mangles’ cats’-meat-coloured hovel ululated with humans, +can’t you see for yourself—that—?” +</p> + +<p> +There was a solid crash of released waters leaping upon the wheel more +furiously than ever, a grinding of cogs, a hum like the hum of a hornet, and +then the unvisited darkness of the old mill was scattered by intolerable white +light. It threw up every cobweb, every burl and knot in the beams and the +floor; till the shadows behind the flakes of rough plaster on the wall lay +clear-cut as shadows of mountains on the photographed moon. +</p> + +<p> +“See! See! See!” hissed the Waters in full flood. “Yes, see +for yourselves. Nothing has occurred. Can’t you see?” +</p> + +<p> +The Rat, amazed, had fallen from his foothold and lay half-stunned on the +floor. The Cat, following her instinct, leaped nigh to the ceiling, and with +flattened ears and bared teeth backed in a corner ready to fight whatever +terror might be loosed on her. But nothing happened. Through the long aching +minutes nothing whatever happened, and her wire-brush tail returned slowly to +its proper shape. +</p> + +<p> +“Whatever it is,” she said at last, “it’s overdone. +They can never keep it up, you know.” +</p> + +<p> +“Much you know,” said the Waters. “Over you go, old man. You +can take the full head of us now. Those new steel axle-straps of yours can +stand anything. Come along, Raven’s Gill, Harpenden, Callton Rise, +Batten’s Ponds, Witches’ Spring, all together! Let’s show +these gentlemen how to work!” +</p> + +<p> +“But—but—I thought it was a decoration. +Why—why—why—it only means more work for <i>me</i>!” +</p> + +<p> +“Exactly. You’re to supply about sixty eight-candle lights when +required. But they won’t be all in use at once——” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah! I thought as much,” said the Cat. “The reaction is bound +to come.” +</p> + +<p> +“<i>And</i>,” said the Waters, “you will do the ordinary work +of the mill as well.” +</p> + +<p> +“Impossible!” the old Wheel quivered as it drove. “Aluric +never did it—nor Azor, nor Reinbert. Not even William de Warrenne or the +Papal Legate. There’s no precedent for it. I tell you there’s no +precedent for working a wheel like this.” +</p> + +<p> +“Wait a while! We’re making one as fast as we can. Aluric and Co. +are dead. So’s the Papal Legate. You’ve no notion how dead they +are, but we’re here—the Waters of Five Separate Systems. +We’re just as interesting as Domesday Book. Would you like to hear about +the land-tenure in Trott’s Wood? It’s squat-right, chiefly.” +The mocking Waters leaped one over the other, chuckling and chattering +profanely. +</p> + +<p> +“In that hundred Jenkins, a tinker, with one dog—<i>unis +canis</i>—holds, by the Grace of God and a habit he has of working hard, +<i>unam hidam</i>—a large potato patch. Charmin’ fellow, Jenkins. +Friend of ours. Now, who the dooce did Jenkins keep? … In the hundred of +Callton is one charcoal-burner <i>irreligiosissimus homo</i>—a bit of a +rip—but a thorough sportsman. <i>Ibi est ecclesia. Non multum</i>. Not +much of a church, <i>quia</i> because, <i>episcopus</i> the Vicar irritated the +Nonconformists <i>tunc et post et modo</i>—then and afterwards and +now—until they built a cut-stone Congregational chapel with red brick +facings that did not return itself—<i>defendebat se</i>—at four +thousand pounds.” +</p> + +<p> +“Charcoal-burners, vicars, schismatics, and red brick facings,” +groaned the Wheel. “But this is sheer blasphemy. What waters have they +let in upon me?” +</p> + +<p> +“Floods from the gutters. Faugh, this light is positively +sickening!” said the Cat, rearranging her fur. +</p> + +<p> +“We come down from the clouds or up from the springs, exactly like all +other waters everywhere. Is that what’s surprising you?” sang the +Waters. +</p> + +<p> +“Of course not. I know my work if you don’t. What I complain of is +your lack of reverence and repose. You’ve no instinct of deference +towards your betters—your heartless parody of the Sacred volume (the +Wheel meant Domesday Book)—proves it.” +</p> + +<p> +“Our betters?” said the Waters most solemnly. “What is there +in all this dammed race that hasn’t come down from the clouds, +or——” +</p> + +<p> +“Spare me that talk, please,” the Wheel persisted. +“You’d <i>never</i> understand. It’s the tone—your tone +that we object to.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes. It’s your tone,” said the Black Rat, picking himself up +limb by limb. +</p> + +<p> +“If you thought a trifle more about the work you’re supposed to do, +and a trifle less about your precious feelings, you’d render a little +more duty in return for the power vested in you—we mean wasted on +you,” the Waters replied. +</p> + +<p> +“I have been some hundreds of years laboriously acquiring the knowledge +which you see fit to challenge so light-heartedly,” the Wheel jarred. +</p> + +<p> +“Challenge him! Challenge him!” clamoured the little waves riddling +down through the tail-race. “As well now as later. Take him up!” +</p> + +<p> +The main mass of the Waters plunging on the Wheel shocked that well-bolted +structure almost into box-lids by saying: “Very good. Tell us what you +suppose yourself to be doing at the present moment.” +</p> + +<p> +“Waiving the offensive form of your question, I answer, purely as a +matter of courtesy, that I am engaged in the trituration of farinaceous +substances whose ultimate destination it would be a breach of the trust reposed +in me to reveal.” +</p> + +<p> +“Fiddle!” said the Waters. “We knew it all along! The first +direct question shows his ignorance of his own job. Listen, old thing. Thanks +to us, you are now actuating a machine of whose construction you know nothing, +that that machine may, over wires of whose ramifications you are, by your very +position, profoundly ignorant, deliver a power which you can never realise, to +localities beyond the extreme limits of your mental horizon, with the object of +producing phenomena which in your wildest dreams (if you ever dream) you could +never comprehend. Is that clear, or would you like it all in words of four +syllables?” +</p> + +<p> +“Your assumptions are deliciously sweeping, but may I point out that a +decent and—the dear old Abbot of Wilton would have put it in his resonant +monkish Latin much better than I can—a scholarly reserve, does not +necessarily connote blank vacuity of mind on all subjects.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah, the dear old Abbot of Wilton,” said the Rat sympathetically, +as one nursed in that bosom. “Charmin’ fellow—thorough +scholar and gentleman. Such a pity!” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, Sacred Fountains!” the Waters were fairly boiling. “He +goes out of his way to expose his ignorance by triple bucketfuls. He creaks to +high Heaven that he is hopelessly behind the common order of things! He invites +the streams of Five Watersheds to witness his su-su-su-pernal incompetence, and +then he talks as though there were untold reserves of knowledge behind him that +he is too modest to bring forward. For a bland, circular, absolutely sincere +impostor, you’re a miracle, O Wheel!” +</p> + +<p> +“I do not pretend to be anything more than an integral portion of an +accepted and not altogether mushroom institution.” +</p> + +<p> +“Quite so,” said the Waters. “Then go +round—hard——” +</p> + +<p> +“To what end?” asked the Wheel. +</p> + +<p> +“Till a big box of tanks in your house begins to fizz and +fume—gassing is the proper word.” +</p> + +<p> +“It would be,” said the Cat, sniffing. +</p> + +<p> +“That will show that your accumulators are full. When the accumulators +are exhausted, and the lights burn badly, you will find us whacking you round +and round again.” +</p> + +<p> +“The end of life as decreed by Mangles and his creatures is to go +whacking round and round for ever,” said the Cat. +</p> + +<p> +“In order,” the Rat said, “that you may throw raw and +unnecessary illumination upon all the unloveliness in the world. Unloveliness +which we shall—er—have always with us. At the same time you will +riotously neglect the so-called little but vital graces that make up +Life.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, Life,” said the Cat, “with its dim delicious half-tones +and veiled indeterminate distances. Its surprisals, escapes, encounters, and +dizzying leaps—its full-throated choruses in honour of the morning star, +and its melting reveries beneath the sun-warmed wall.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, you can go on the tiles, Pussalina, just the same as usual,” +said the laughing Waters. “<i>We</i> sha’n’t interfere with +you.” +</p> + +<p> +“On the tiles, forsooth!” hissed the Cat. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, that’s what it amounts to,” persisted the Waters. +“We see a good deal of the minor graces of life on our way down to our +job.” +</p> + +<p> +“And—but I fear I speak to deaf ears—do they never impress +you?” said the Wheel. +</p> + +<p> +“Enormously,” said the Waters. “We have already learned six +refined synonyms for loafing.” +</p> + +<p> +“But (here again I feel as though preaching in the wilderness) it never +occurs to you that there may exist some small difference between the wholly +animal—ah—rumination of bovine minds and the discerning, +well-apportioned leisure of the finer type of intellect?” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, yes. The bovine mind goes to sleep under a hedge and makes no bones +about it when it’s shouted at. We’ve seen <i>that</i>—in +haying-time—all along the meadows. The finer type is wide awake enough to +fudge up excuses for shirking, and mean enough to get stuffy when its excuses +aren’t accepted. Turn over!” +</p> + +<p> +“But, my good people, no gentleman gets stuffy as you call it. A certain +proper pride, to put it no higher, forbids—-” +</p> + +<p> +“Nothing that he wants to do if he really wants to do it. Get along! What +are you giving us? D’you suppose we’ve scoured half heaven in the +clouds, and half earth in the mists, to be taken in at this time of the day by +a bone-idle, old hand-quern of your type?” +</p> + +<p> +“It is not for me to bandy personalities with you. I can only say that I +simply decline to accept the situation.” +</p> + +<p> +“Decline away. It doesn’t make any odds. They’ll probably put +in a turbine if you decline too much.” +</p> + +<p> +“What’s a turbine?” said the Wheel, quickly. +</p> + +<p> +“A little thing you don’t see, that performs surprising +revolutions. But you won’t decline. You’ll hang on to your two nice +red-strapped axles and your new machine-moulded pinions like—a—like +a leech on a lily stem! There’s centuries of work in your old bones if +you’d only apply yourself to it; and, mechanically, an overshot wheel +with this head of water is about as efficient as a turbine.” +</p> + +<p> +“So in future I am to be considered mechanically? I have been painted by +at least five Royal Academicians.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, you can be painted by five hundred when you aren’t at work, of +course. But while you are at work you’ll work. You won’t half-stop +and think and talk about rare plants and dicky-birds and farinaceous fiduciary +interests. You’ll continue to revolve, and this new head of water will +see that you do so continue.” +</p> + +<p> +“It is a matter on which it would be exceedingly ill-advised to form a +hasty or a premature conclusion. I will give it my most careful +consideration,” said the Wheel. +</p> + +<p> +“Please do,” said the Waters gravely. “Hullo! Here’s +the Miller again.” +</p> + +<p> +The Cat coiled herself in a picturesque attitude on the softest corner of a +sack, and the Rat without haste, yet certainly without rest, slipped behind the +sacking as though an appointment had just occurred to him. +</p> + +<p> +In the doorway, with the young Engineer, stood the Miller grinning amazedly. +</p> + +<p> +“Well—well—well! ’tis true-ly won’erful. +An’ what a power o’ dirt! It come over me now looking at these +lights, that I’ve never rightly seen my own mill before. She needs a lot +bein’ done to her.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah! I suppose one must make oneself moderately agreeable to the baser +sort. They have their uses. This thing controls the dairy.” The Cat, +pincing on her toes, came forward and rubbed her head against the +Miller’s knee. +</p> + +<p> +“Ay, you pretty puss,” he said, stooping. “You’re as +big a cheat as the rest of ’em that catch no mice about me. A +won’erful smooth-skinned, rough-tongued cheat you be. I’ve more +than half a mind——” +</p> + +<p> +“She does her work well,” said the Engineer, pointing to where the +Rat’s beady eyes showed behind the sacking. “Cats and Rats +livin’ together—see?” +</p> + +<p> +“Too much they do—too long they’ve done. I’m sick and +tired of it. Go and take a swim and larn to find your own vittles honest when +you come out, Pussy.” +</p> + +<p> +“My word!” said the Waters, as a sprawling Cat landed all +unannounced in the centre of the tail-race. “Is that you, Mewsalina? You +seem to have been quarrelling with your best friend. Get over to the left. +It’s shallowest there. Up on that alder-root with all four paws. +Good-night!” +</p> + +<p> +“You’ll never get any they rats,” said the Miller, as the +young Engineer struck wrathfully with his stick at the sacking. +“They’re not the common sort. They’re the old black English +sort.” +</p> + +<p> +“Are they, by Jove? I must catch one to stuff, some day.” +</p> + +<hr /> + +<p> +Six months later, in the chill of a January afternoon, they were letting in the +Waters as usual. +</p> + +<p> +“Come along! It’s both gears this evening,” said the Wheel, +kicking joyously in the first rush of the icy stream. “There’s a +heavy load of grist just in from Lamber’s Wood. Eleven miles it came in +an hour and a half in our new motor-lorry, and the Miller’s rigged five +new five-candle lights in his cow-stables. I’m feeding ’em +to-night. There’s a cow due to calve. Oh, while I think of it, +what’s the news from Callton Rise?” +</p> + +<p> +“The waters are finding their level as usual—but why do you +ask?” said the deep outpouring Waters. +</p> + +<p> +“Because Mangles and Felden and the Miller are talking of increasing the +plant here and running a saw-mill by electricity. I was wondering whether +we——” +</p> + +<p> +“I beg your pardon,” said the Waters chuckling. “<i>What</i> +did you say?” +</p> + +<p> +“Whether <i>we</i>, of course, had power enough for the job. It will be a +biggish contract. There’s all Harpenden Brook to be considered and +Batten’s Ponds as well, and Witches’ Fountain, and the +Churt’s Hawd system. +</p> + +<p> +“We’ve power enough for anything in the world,” said the +Waters. “The only question is whether you could stand the strain if we +came down on you full head.” +</p> + +<p> +“Of course I can,” said the Wheel. “Mangles is going to turn +me into a set of turbines—beauties.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh—er—I suppose it’s the frost that has made us a +little thick-headed, but to whom are we talking?” asked the amazed +Waters. +</p> + +<p> +“To me—the Spirit of the Mill, of course.” +</p> + +<p> +“Not to the old Wheel, then?” +</p> + +<p> +“I happen to be living in the old Wheel just at present. When the +turbines are installed I shall go and live in them. What earthly difference +does it make?” +</p> + +<p> +“Absolutely none,” said the Waters, “in the earth or in the +waters under the earth. But we thought turbines didn’t appeal to +you.” +</p> + +<p> +“Not like turbines? Me? My dear fellows, turbines are good for fifteen +hundred revolutions a minute—and with our power we can drive ’em at +full speed. Why, there’s nothing we couldn’t grind or saw or +illuminate or heat with a set of turbines! That’s to say if all the Five +Watersheds are agreeable.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, we’ve been agreeable for ever so long.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then why didn’t you tell me?” +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t know. Suppose it slipped our memory.” +</p> + +<p> +The Waters were holding themselves in for fear of bursting with mirth. +</p> + +<p> +“How careless of you! You should keep abreast of the age, my dear +fellows. We might have settled it long ago, if you’d only spoken. Yes, +four good turbines and a neat brick penstock—eh? This old Wheel’s +absurdly out of date.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well,” said the Cat, who after a little proud seclusion had +returned to her place impenitent as ever. “Praised be Pasht and the Old +Gods, that whatever may have happened <i>I</i>, at least, have preserved the +Spirit of the Mill!” +</p> + +<p> +She looked round as expecting her faithful ally, the Black Rat; but that very +week the Engineer had caught and stuffed him, and had put him in a glass case; +he being a genuine old English black rat. That breed, the report says, is +rapidly diminishing before the incursions of the brown variety. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div style='display:block; margin-top:4em'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TRAFFICS AND DISCOVERIES ***</div> +<div style='text-align:left'> + +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> +Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will +be renamed. +</div> + +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> +Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright +law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, +so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United +States without permission and without paying copyright +royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part +of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project +Gutenberg™ electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG™ +concept and trademark. 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