''Contemptible'' by - (ebooks online reader .TXT) 📖

jellies, inseparable from a drawing-room, and therefore ten times more acceptable and delightful.

He got not a single letter from home, not from any one. Not that he minded much, at that time. Home, parents—any softness of any description—would have seemed unreal.

The happiness of the following day was very much impaired by rain, which fell intermittently throughout the whole day. After the first shower he got up and began to look about him for some sort of protection. Rather than have nothing, he picked up a waterproof sheet that had belonged to a wounded man. It was covered with blood, but the next shower soon washed all trace of it off, and it kept him dry.

The next night, just after rations had been distributed, an order came to march off. Haste, it seemed, was imperative. And so, leaving behind as few things as possible, he paraded his men, without knowing where they were to go, and saw them set off behind the front Platoon. Just as he was about to set off himself, he slipped down the side of one of the holes, and as he fled, his sword slid from its scabbard, and vanished. He knew the chances of returning to that particular spot were five to one against, and he was determined to "hang on" to his sword, come what might, so he let his Platoon go on, while he groped about in the darkness for it. It seemed incredible that a sword could hide itself so completely. He kicked about in the pitch-dark for what seemed to be endless minutes before his foot knocked against it. He "pushed it home" hurriedly, and started off in pursuit of the men.

But the darkness had swallowed them up. He followed the road right into Poussey, but still there was no sign of them. No troops, he learned, had passed through since the previous morning. Evidently they had not gone that way. The only alternative was the "awkward" road over the canal bridge which led into the next village on the line—Souvir.

CHAPTER XXVIII IN RESERVE AT SOUVIR

He hurried on, for morning would break in half-an-hour, and he did not wish to be caught in that unwholesome hundred yards the other side of the canal bridge. He overtook his men sooner than he expected, and the open space was passed without any resistance.

"They're probably expecting a big attack at dawn, and they've brought us up in reserve again," some one said.

Sure enough, the attack took place, but, like its predecessor, it failed, and they naturally expected to be sent back to the trenches at Poussey. In this, however, they were disappointed. Dawn having broken, it was apparently thought to be needlessly imprudent to make the Battalion run the gauntlet once again. So they were allowed to stay where they were, with the caution that they were to be ready to move within five minutes of the Colonel's receipt of the order. It may sound a long time, but only a smart and efficient Battalion can do it. The Adjutant has to open and acquaint the C.O. of the order. He has to rap out his own orders. Sleeping men have to be roused, equipment thrown on, arms taken up. The men have to "fall in" in their right sections; have to be numbered, have to form fours. If there is any muddle whatever, a Battalion cannot move off in five minutes.

They slept propped up against the bank for some hours; then they were moved further up the road into the little village of Souvir. It appeared that their new rôle was to act as Local Reserve, and that they could amuse themselves how they liked as long as they were prepared "to move off at fifteen minutes' notice."

The men broke into two big barns and made themselves tolerably comfortable. They lit little fires in the road and began to cook their breakfasts. The Officers of the Company billeted themselves on the hovel nearest the barns and set about the same object.

"I think," mused the Senior Subaltern, "that it would be an excellent idea if some of us went on a foraging expedition. I should not be at all surprised if we did not have to stop here for weeks. And there may be one or two things to be picked up—before the others."

So two of them went off on a tour of inspection. Noticing bee-hives outside the house of the village priest, they went in and bought two large jars of liquid honey. An estaminet yielded a couple of bottles of Médoc, and a pâtisserie, most unexpectedly, some bread.

Having successfully settled their business, there was time to look around. Souvir was a bigger village than Poussey, and seemed to be teeming with troops, who looked as if they had been used to the place for years, and were likely to remain in it longer. The first object of interest was the church, which had been turned into a hospital for Germans, many of whom were sitting about on benches in the stone-flagged courtyard. The two Officers went in to have a closer look at them. The majority were so greyish pale, their hair such unlovely stubble, their temples so shrunken that the Subaltern pitied them in their morose dejection and slow-witted taciturnity.

"I don't think we'd better go into the church," he said. "They'd probably throw us out."

They passed through an archway in a huge medieval wall into the graveyard, and thence, by a sudden and complete transformation in time, colour and atmosphere, into a most delightful garden of magnificent proportions, with smooth lawns and sweeping drives. The château itself was scarcely in keeping with this stateliness. The impression it gave one came as an anti-climax. The Subaltern was beginning to develop a fine taste in French châteaux, but somehow this one did not rank with the others, although his brain reeled at the thought of the cost of it all. Probably that is why it failed as a work of art and beauty: it made one wonder how much it must have cost.

A passer-by told them that it belonged to a certain woman whose name had been on everybody's lips, just before the war, and the information stimulated their interest. They wandered around, past silent fountains and over velvet lawns, stone terraces and gravel drives. On their way back they passed one of the big bay windows on the ground floor of the château. It was open, and they caught the faint but distinctive aroma of disinfectant. The erstwhile billiard-room had obviously been converted into a hospital dressing-room. The place was deserted, and they turned away without the intuition entering into either of their heads that they themselves would before long be carried into that very room.

Souvir was apparently their headquarters for the time being, for if they moved away by day or night, they always marched back into it. And as, day by day, they saw the same sights and did the same things, the passage of time did not leave such exact impressions on his mind as the changing sights and actions of the moving battles had done.

Compared with the days that had gone before they were divinely comfortable. Unless there was an alarm, they could sleep as long as they liked. There was not sufficient accommodation in the little hut, so the Officers commandeered a little shed at the side of it. Here there was plenty of straw, and for several mornings they lay dozing until eight or nine o'clock.

The men were quite happy in their barns, and would not begin to stir before seven o'clock. Then they would hear in their sleep confused sounds of tramping feet and shouts in the road outside.

The voice of the Quartermaster-Sergeant, distributing the rations, was always the most insistent.

"'Ere, who's 'ad that there tea?"

"Fourty-two Smith took it down the street, Cooler Sawgint."

(When there is more than one man of the same name in a Battalion, the last two figures of his regimental number, are, as it were, hyphenated on to it. Brown's number was, say, 1965, so to prevent mistakes he was always '65 Brown, to distinguish him from all the other Browns.)

"Where's the Orderly Cor'pril of No. 5 Platoon?"

"Comin', Cooler Sawgint!"

Then another voice raised in pained expostulation—

"'Ere, look at 'im—a hackin' up the bacon. Who d'ju think's comin' after you?"

"Go and see why there ain't no rum, Watkins!"

"There ain't 'arf enough sugar for all them!"

"'And over my firewood, will ye, or I'll ...!"

And so on, and so forth. It was the tune to which they finally awoke every morning.

When it was impossible to maintain the pretence of being asleep any longer, they would get up and shake themselves. They had passed the stage of wanting to take clothes off. Their uprising in the morning was as easy and simple as a dog's. Then, aided, perhaps, by one of their servants, they would set about getting their breakfast ready in the front room. The Subaltern discovered what a tremendous amount of trouble is entailed in the preparation of even the simplest meals. Tables to be moved, kettles to be filled, bread cut, jam and bully beef tins opened! But each would have his own particular job, and they would soon be seated round the dirty table, drinking their tea out of cups, or their own mugs, and munching biscuits or bread.

Now that they were getting their rations each night with the regularity of clockwork, they were beginning to appreciate properly the excellence of their fare. "Seeing," as the Senior Subaltern would say, "that we are on Active Service, I think the rations is an extraordinarily well managed show."

The quality was good, and there was plenty of it. Personally, the Subaltern never succeeded in getting on very good terms with the "bully beef." He decided that it was "a bit too strong" for him; but the others devoured large quantities, and seemed all the better for it.

The jam, at that time, and in that particular sector of the line, was good and, moreover, varied. The Subaltern does not ever remember suffering from the now notorious "plum and apple." There was even marmalade.

He openly delighted in the biscuits, and would go about his work all day munching them. The bacon, too, as some one said, was "better than what we have in the Mess, sometimes." None of them posed as connoisseurs of rum, but a Sergeant, who looked as if he knew what he was talking about, praised it heartily; and, taken in hot tea, it banished all sorts of cares....

Tea (without rum) and bacon, to be followed by ration bread and marmalade (if possible) was the staple fare at breakfast. They would sit around the fire and smoke—there was a tobacco allowance included in the rations. The Subaltern, however, had lost his pipe, and attempts at cigarette rolling were not particularly successful.

Every other day there used to be a mail, and with it, generally, papers from home. This was the first definite news they had had from "home" since leaving in mid-August. There was an enthralling interest in seeing how the people at home "were taking things."

To be perfectly candid, before the war, the Army had placed very little reliance upon the patriotism or integrity of the country. The Army was a thing apart—detached from the swirl of conflicting ideas, and the eddies of political strife. The Army was, so to speak, on the bank, and it looked with stern disapproval at the river sweeping so swiftly by. It neither understood the forces that were hurrying the waters along, nor did it realise the goal that they were striving to reach. Perhaps it did not take the trouble, perhaps it could not.

Then, when the war clouds began to blacken the horizon, the Army, having so little sympathy with the vast and complex civilisation which it was to defend, felt convinced that the national feelings and political sense of the nation would be slumbering so soundly that no call of honour could