No More Parades Ford Madox Ford (mini ebook reader txt) đ
- Author: Ford Madox Ford
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âGirtin has gone absent, sir,â the slim dark fellow said, with an air of destiny. Girtin was the respectable man with the mother to whom Tietjens had given the two hoursâ leave the night before.
Tietjens answered:
âHe would have!â with a sour grin. It enhanced his views of strictly respectable humanity. They blackmailed you with lamentable and pathetic tales and then did the dirty on you. He said to the sergeant-major:
âYou will be here for another week or ten days. See that you get your tents up all right and the men comfortable. I will inspect them as soon as I have taken my orderly room. Full marching order. Captain McKechnie will inspect their kits at two.â
The sergeant-major, stiff but graceful, had something at the back of his mind. It came out:
âI have my marching orders for two-thirty this afternoon. The notice for inserting my commission in depot orders is on your table. I leave for the O.T.C. by the three trainâ ââ âŠâ
Tietjens said:
âYour commission!â ââ âŠâ It was a confounded nuisance.
The sergeant-major said:
âSergeant-Major Cowley and I applied for our commissions three months ago. The communications granting them are both on your table togetherâ ââ âŠâ
Tietjens said:
âSergeant-Major Cowleyâ ââ ⊠Good God! Who recommended you?â
The whole organization of his confounded battalion fell to pieces. It appeared that a circular had come round three months beforeâ âbefore Tietjens had been given command of that unitâ âasking for experienced first-class warrant officers capable of serving as instructors in Officersâ Training Corps, with commissions. Sergeant-Major Cowley had been recommended by the colonel of the depot, Sergeant-Major Ledoux by his own colonel. Tietjens felt as if he had been let downâ âbut of course he had not been. It was just the way of the army, all the time. You got a platoon, or a battalion, or, for the matter of that, a dugout or a tent, by herculean labours into good fettle. It ran all right for a day or two, then it all fell to pieces, the personnel scattered to the four winds by what appeared merely wanton orders, coming from the most unexpected headquarters, or the premises were smashed up by a chance shell that might just as well have fallen somewhere elseâ ââ ⊠The finger of Fate!â ââ âŠ
But it put a confounded lot more work on himâ ââ ⊠He said to Sergeant-Major Cowley, whom he found in the next hut where all the paper work of the unit was done:
âI should have thought you would have been enormously better off as regimental sergeant-major than with a commission. I know I would rather have the job.â Cowley answeredâ âhe was very pallid and shakenâ âthat with his unfortunate infirmity, coming on at any moment of shock, he would be better in a job where he could slack off, like an O.T.C. He had always been subject to small fits, over in a minute, or couple of seconds evenâ ââ ⊠But getting too near a H.E. shellâ âafter Noircourt, which had knocked out Tietjens himselfâ âhad brought them on, violent. There was also, he finished, the gentility to be considered. Tietjens said:
âOh, the gentility!â ââ ⊠Thatâs not worth a fleaâs jumpâ ââ ⊠There wonât be any more parades after this war. There arenât any now. Look at who your companions will be in an officerâs quarters; youâd be in a great deal better society in any self-respecting sergeantsâ mess.â Cowley answered that he knew the service had gone to the dogs. All the same his missis liked it. And there was his daughter Winnie to be considered. She had always been a bit wild, and his missis wrote that she had gone wilder than ever, all due to the war. Cowley thought that the bad boys would be a little more careful how they monkeyed with her if she was an officerâs daughterâ ââ ⊠There was probably something in that!
Coming out into the open, confidentially with Tietjens, Cowley dropped his voice huskily to say:
âTake Quartermaster-Sergeant Morgan for R.S.M., sir.â Tietjens said explosively:
âIâm damned if I will.â Then he asked: âWhy?â The wisdom of an old N.C.O.s is a thing no prudent officer neglects.
âHe can do the work, sir,â Cowley said. âHeâs out for a commission, and heâll do his bestâ ââ âŠâ He dropped his husky voice to a still greater depth of mystery:
âYouâre over two hundredâ âI should say nearer three hundredâ âpounds down in your battalion stores. I donât suppose you want to lose a sum of money like that?â
Tietjens said:
âIâm damned if I doâ ââ ⊠But I donât seeâ ââ ⊠Oh, yes, I doâ ââ ⊠If I make him sergeant-major he has to hand over the stores all completeâ ââ ⊠Todayâ ââ ⊠Can he do it?â
Cowley said that Morgan could have till the day after tomorrow. He would look after things till then.
âBut youâll want to have a flutter before you go,â Tietjens said. âDonât stop for me.â
Cowley said that he would stop and see the job through. He had thought of going down into the town and having a flutter. But the girls down there were a common sort, and it was bad for his complaintâ ââ ⊠He would stop and see what could be done with Morgan. Of course it was possible that Morgan might decide to face things out. He might prefer to stick to the money heâd got by disposing of Tietjensâ stores to other battalions that were down, or to civilian contractors. And stand a court martial! But it wasnât likely. He was a Nonconformist deacon, or pew-opener, or even a minister possibly, at home in Walesâ ââ ⊠From near Denbigh! And Cowley had got a very good man, a first-class man, an Oxford professor, now a lance-corporal at the depot, for Morganâs place. The colonel would lend him to Tietjens and would get him rated acting quartermaster-sergeant unpaidâ ââ ⊠Cowley had it all arrangedâ ââ ⊠Lance-Corporal Caldicott was a first-class man, only he could not tell his right hand from his left on parade. Literally could not tell themâ ââ âŠ
So the battalion settled itself downâ ââ ⊠Whilst Cowley and he were at the colonelâs orderly room arranging for the transfer of the professorâ âhe was
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