Chapter 8

Then came a Cockney humorist, who, in times of peace, was the owner of a fried fish and chip barrow in that home of low comedians--the East End. After him appeared Sergeant Andrews, disguised in one of Eliza's discarded skirts, with a wisp of straw on his head to represent a lady's hair. Some vulgar song he sang in a shrill, falsetto voice that caused great dismay among the pigs, as yet unused to the vagaries of the British soldier.

After the interval, during which the audience _en masse_ made a pilgrimage to Eliza's back door to buy beer at a penny a glass, there came the usual mixture of the vulgar and the sentimental, for nothing on earth is more sentimental than a soldier. There was the inevitable "Beautiful Picture in a Beautiful Golden Frame," and a recitation in Yiddish which was well applauded simply because no man had any idea what it was about. The Sergeant-Major gave a very creditable rendering of "Loch Lomond" in a voice that would terrify a recruit, and we finished up the evening with a song requesting a certain naughty boy to hold out his hand, which was shouted by everyone with so much vigour that one wondered how it was the men could still sing "God save the King" when the time came.

And far into the night, when the farmyard lay still and ghostly, and the pigs had gone off to bed, we still sat and talked in the "Officers' Mess," and recalled jokes of George Robey and Harry Tate, or hummed over the tunes we had heard at the last Queen's Hall concert. As the Captain had said, we wanted "taking out of ourselves," and it had just needed an impromptu concert in an old Flemish barn to do it.

XXIII

THE "STRAFE" THAT FAILED

There is a certain battery in France where the name of Archibald Smith brings a scowl to every brow and an oath to every lip. The Battery Major still crimsons with wrath at the thought of him, and the Observing Officer remembers bitterly the long, uncomfortable hours he spent, perched up in a tree a hundred yards or so from the German lines. And this is how Archibald Smith was the unwitting cause of so much anger to the battery, and the saver of many a German life.

One morning shortly before dawn the Commanding Officer of an infantry regiment was wading down a communicating trench, when he met an artillery officer, accompanied by three men with a big roll of telephone wire.

"Hullo, what are you doing at this hour?" he asked.

"We hope to do some good 'strafing,' sir," said the subaltern. "I'm coming up to observe. Some aeroplane fellow has found out that Brother Boche does his relieving by day in the trenches opposite. We hope to catch the relief to-day at ten."

"Where are you going to observe from?"

"There's an old sniper's post in one of the trees just behind your trenches. If I get up there before light I shall get a topping view, and am not likely to get spotted. That's why I'm going up there now, before it gets light."

"Well, are you going to stick up on that confounded perch until ten o'clock?" asked the C.O. "You'd better come and have some breakfast with us first."

But the Observing Officer knew the necessity of getting to his post as soon as possible and, reluctantly refusing the Colonel's invitation, he went on his way. Ten minutes later, he was lying full length on a platform constructed in one of the trees just behind the firing line. With the aid of his glasses, he scanned the German sandbags and, in the growing light, picked out a broad communicating trench winding towards the rear. "Once they are in that gutter," he muttered, "we shall get lots of them," and he allowed this thought to fortify him during his long wait.

* * * * *

"Quite sure the telephone's all right?" asked the Observing Officer for the fiftieth time. "If that wire were to go wrong we should have no means of getting on to the battery, for the infantry can only get on by 'phoning to Brigade Headquarters first, and you know what that means."

The telephone orderly, situated in a trench almost underneath the observer's tree, smiled consolingly, "That's all right, sir," he said. "I can ring up the battery in a second when the 'Uns come, as they ought to in a minute."

He had hardly spoken when they came. The subaltern could see them quite distinctly at the turnings of the trench, and at other times an occasional head or rifle showed itself. "God!" said the subaltern, "if we search that trench with shrapnel, we must get heaps of them," and he issued a hurried order. Trembling in his excitement, he awaited the report "Just fired, sir," but nothing happened. The orderly called and called the battery, but there was no reply. The wire was cut!

Half an hour later, the Battery Major came across his Observing Officer and a sergeant gazing dismally at two ends of cut wire.

"I was just coming down to see what was the matter. I hear from the Brigade that some doddering idiot has cut our wire. Who in the hell was it?"

"I don't know, sir. All I know is that I have seen a wonderful target, and couldn't fire a round at it. The relief's over by now, and, as we leave this sector to-night, we've lost a priceless chance."

"It must be some wretched infantry blighter," said the Major. "I'll just go and have a talk to their C.O.," and he hurried off to the Colonel's dug-out, leaving the Observer to lament his lost target.

The C.O. smiled soothingly. "My dear Wilson," he said to the Major, "I don't think it could have been one of our men. They have been warned so often. What do you say, Richards?" he asked the Adjutant.

"Well, sir, I'm not sure. I saw that young fellow Smith with some wire about half an hour ago, but I don't expect he did it. I'll send for him to make sure."

Second Lieutenant Archibald Smith certainly looked harmless enough. He was thin and freckled, and his big blue eyes gazed appealingly through his glasses.

"Where did you get that wire you had just now?" asked the Adjutant.

Smith beamed. "I got it just behind the wood, sir. There's a lot of old wi ..." but the Major interrupted him. "That's the place," he cried excitedly. "Well, what the devil did you go cutting my wire for?"

Archibald Smith looked at him in alarmed fascination. "I didn't think it was any good, sir. I wa-wanted some string, and...."

"What did you want string for? Were you going to hang yourself to the roof of your dug-out?"

"No, sir. I wanted to wrap up a p-parcel to send home, sir. I wa-anted to send back some socks and underclothes to be darned. I'm very sorry, sir."

"Sorry? Sorry be damned, and your underclothes too!" And the Battery Major, who had more bad language at his disposal than most men in the Army, for once forgot he was in the presence of a senior officer.

* * * * *

While the Major, his subaltern, and three men with a roll of wire wended their sorry way back to the battery, Archibald Smith, surprised and hurt, sat in his dug-out, amusing himself by making fierce bayonet thrusts at his parcel, and alternately wishing it were the Major or himself.

XXIV

THE NIGHTLY ROUND

I swear, and rub my eyes.

"Dusk, sir," says the Sergeant-Major with a smile of comprehension, and he lets fall the waterproof sheet which acts as a door to my dug-out. I yawn prodigiously, get up slowly from my bed--one of two banks of earth that run parallel down each side of my muddy hovel, rather after the fashion of seats down each side of an omnibus--and go out into the trench, along which the command "Stand to arms" has just been passed. The men leave their letters and their newspapers; Private Webb, who earned his living in times of peace by drawing thin, elongated ladies in varying stages of undress for fashion catalogues, puts aside his portrait of the Sergeant, who is still smiling with ecstasy at a tin of chloride of lime; the obstinate sleepers are roused, to a great flow of bad language, and all stand to their arms in the possibility of an attack.

It is a monotonous time, that hour of waiting until darkness falls, for gossip is scarce in the trenches, and the display of fireworks in the shape of German star shells has long since ceased to interest us--always excepting those moments when we are in front of our trench on some patrol. Away to the left, where the artillery have been busy all day, the shelling slackens as the light fades, and the rifle shots grow more and more frequent. Presently the extra sentries are posted--one man in every three--the disgusted working parties are told off to their work of filling sandbags or improving the communication trenches, and the long, trying night begins.

All down the line the German bullets spin overhead or crack like whips against our sandbags, sending little clods of earth down into the trench; all down the line we stand on our firing platforms, and answer back to the little spurts of flame which mark the enemy trench; sudden flashes and explosions tell of bombs or grenades, and star shells from both sides sweep high into the air to silhouette the unwary and to give one something to fire at, for firing into the darkness with the probability of hitting nothing more dangerous than a tree or a sandbag is work of but little interest.

I wander on my rounds to see that all the sentries are on the alert, and, suddenly, nearly fall over a man lying face downwards along the bottom of the trench. "Here, you can't sleep here, you know; you give no one a chance to pass," I say, and, for answer, I am told to "shut up," while a suppressed but still audible giggle from Private Harris warns me that the situation is not as I had imagined. The figure in the mud gets up and proves to be an officer of the Engineers, listening for sounds of mining underneath us. "I think they're at it again, but I'm not certain yet," he says cheerfully as he goes off to his own dug-out. I, in turn, lie down in the mud with my ear pressed to the ground, and I seem to hear, far beneath me, the rumble of the trolleys and the sound of the pick, so that I am left for the rest of the night in the uncomfortable expectation of flying heavenwards at any moment.

A buzz of voices which reaches me as I return from a visit to a working party informs me that the one great event of the night has taken place--the rations and the mail have arrived and have been "dumped" by the carrying party in a little side trench. Before I reach the spot a man comes hurrying up to me, "Please, sir," he says, "young Denham has been hit by a rifle grenade. 'E's got it very bad." Just as I pass the side trench, I hear the sergeant who is issuing the letters call: "Denham. A letter for young Denham," and someone says, "I'll take it to him, Sergeant, 'e's in my section."

But the letter has arrived too late, for when I reach the other end of the trench Denham is dead, and a corporal, is carefully searching his pockets for his letters and money to hand over to the platoon commander. They have carried him close to the brazier for light, and the flames find reflection on the white skin of his throat where his tunic has been torn open, and there is an ugly black stain on the bandage that has been roughly tied round him. Only one man in millions, it is true, but one more letter sent home with that awful "Killed" written across it, and one more mother mourning for her only child.

And so the night draws on. Now there is a lull, and the sentries, standing on the fire platforms, allow their heavy lids to fall in a moment's sleep; now a sudden burst of intense fire runs along the line, and everyone springs to his rifle, while star shells go up by dozens; now a huge rumble from the distance tells that a mine has been fired, and we wonder dully who fired it, and how many have been killed--dully only, for death has long since ceased to mean anything to us, and our powers of realisation and pity, thank God! have been blunted until the only things that matter are food and sleep.

At last the order to stand to arms is given again, and the new day comes creeping sadly over the plain of Flanders. What looked like a great hand stretched up appealingly to heaven becomes a shattered, broken tree; the uniform veil of grey gives place to grass and empty tins, dead bodies lying huddled up grotesquely, and winding lines of German trenches. The sky goes faintly blue, and the sun peeps out, gleaming on the drops of rain that still hang from our barbed wire, and on the long row of bayonets along the trench.

The new day is here, but what will it bring? The monotony may be broken by an attack, the battalion may be relieved. Who knows? Who cares? Enough that daylight is here and the sun is shining, that periscopes and sleep are once more permitted, that breakfast is at hand, and that some day we shall get back to billets.

XXV

JOHN WILLIAMS, TRAMP AND SOLDIER

On a wet and cheerless evening in September 1914, John Williams, tramp, sat in the bar of the Golden Lion and gazed regretfully at the tankard before him, which must of necessity remain empty, seeing that he had just spent his last penny. To him came a recruiting sergeant.

"Would you like a drink, mate?" he asked.

John Williams did not hesitate.

"You ought to be in the Army," said the sergeant, as he put down his empty tankard, "a fine great body of a man like you. It's the best life there is."

"I bean't so sartain as I want to be a sojer. I be a hindependent man."

"It's a good life for a healthy man," went on the sergeant. "We'll talk it over," and he ordered another drink apiece.

John Williams, who had had more than enough before the sergeant had spoken to him, gazed mistily at his new acquaintance. "Thee do seem to have a main lot o' money to spend."

The sergeant laughed. "It's Army pay, mate, as does it. I get a fine, easy life, good clothes and food, and plenty of money for my glass of beer. Where did you sleep last night?" he asked suddenly.

"If I do mind me right," said John Williams, "it were in a leaky barn, over Newton way."

"Where are you going to sleep to-night?" asked the sergeant again.

Williams remembered his empty pocket. "I doan't know," he said with regret. "Most likely on some seat in the park."

"Well, you come along o' me, and you'll get a comfortable barricks to sleep in, a life as you likes, and a bob a day to spend on yourself."

John Williams listened to the dripping of the rain outside. To his bemused brain the thought of a "comfortable barricks" was very, very tempting. "Blame me if I doan't come along o' thee," he said at length.

In wartime a medical examination is soon over and an attestation paper filled up. "There's nothing wrong with you, my man," said the Medical Officer, "except that you're half drunk."

"I bean't drunk, mister," protested Williams sleepily.

"We'll take you at your word, anyhow," said the doctor. "You're too good a man physically to lose for the Army."

Thus it was that John Williams took the King's Shilling, and swore to serve his country as a soldier should.

* * * * *

One of the most wonderful things about the British Army is the way that recruits are gradually fashioned into soldiers. There are thousands of men fighting on our different fronts who, a year ago, hated the thought of discipline and order; they are now amongst the best soldiers we have. But there are exceptions--Private John Williams was one. In a little over a year of military service, he had absented himself without leave no fewer than eleven times, and the various punishments meted out to him failed signally in their object to break him of his habit. In every respect save one he was a good soldier, but, do what it would, the Army could not bring him to see the folly of repeated desertion; the life in the Army is not the life for a man with the wander thirst of centuries in his blood. Williams had all the gipsy's love of wandering and solitude, and not even a threatened punishment of death will cure a man of that.

So it came about that John Williams sat outside his billet one September evening, and watched the white chalk road that ran over the hill towards Amiens. After the flat and cultivated country of Flanders, the rolling hills called with an unparalleled insistence, and the idea of spending the two remaining days before the battalion went back to the trenches in company with sixty other men in a barn grew more and more odious. If he were to go off even for twenty-four hours, he would receive, on return, probably nothing more than a few days Field Punishment, which, after all, was not so bad when one grew used to it. He was sick of the life of a soldier, sick of obeying officers half his age, sick of being ordered to do things that seemed senseless to him; he would be quit of it all for twenty-four hours.

John Williams went to the only shop in the village to buy food, with the aid of fifty centimes and a wonderful Lingua Franca of his own, and when his companions collected in their billet that night he was already far away on the open road. He walked fast through the still September evening, and as he walked he sang, and the woods echoed to the strange songs that gipsies sing to themselves as they squat round their fires at night. When at last he came to a halt he soon found sleep, and lay huddled up in his greatcoat at the foot of a poplar tree, until the dawn awoke him.

All through the summer day he walked, his Romany blood singing in his veins at the feel of the turf beneath his feet, and evening found him strolling contentedly through the village to his billet. Suddenly a sentry challenged: "'Alt! who goes there?"

"Downshires," came the reply.

"Well, what the 'ell are you doin' of 'ere?"

"I be going back to my regiment."

"Well, your regiment's in the trenches. They relieved us sudden like last night, owing to us getting cut up. You see, they Germans attacked us and killed a good few of our chaps before we drove 'em out again, so the Downshires 'ad to come up and relieve us late; somewhere about eleven o'clock they must 'ave left 'ere. What are you doing of, any'ow?" he asked jokingly. "Are you a bloomin' deserter what's come to be arrested?" But he posed the question to empty air, for Williams was retracing his steps at a steady double.

"Seems to me that bloke 'll get hisself inter trouble," said the sentry of the Westfords as he spat in disgust. Then he forgot all about it, and fell to wondering what the bar of the Horse and Plough must be looking like at the moment.

John Williams knew that he had burnt his boats, and he became a deserter in real earnest. For several weeks he remained at large, and each day made the idea of giving himself up of his own accord more difficult to entertain; but at last he was singled out from among the many men who wander about behind the firing line, and was placed under a guard that put hope of escape out of the question. Not even the wander thirst in his gipsy blood could set his feet on the wide chalk road again, or give him one more night of freedom.

* * * * *

"He might have a long term of imprisonment, mightn't he, sir?" asked the junior member of the Court Martial. "He could have no idea that his regiment was suddenly warned for the trenches when he deserted. Besides, the man used to be a tramp, and it must be exceptionally hard for a man who has led a wandering life to accustom himself to discipline. It must be in his blood to desert." And he blushed slightly, for he sounded sentimental, and there is little room for sentiment in an army on active service.

The President of the Court was a Major who liked his warm fire and his linen sheets, which, with the elements of discipline and warfare, occupied most of his thoughts. "I fear you forget," he said rather testily, "that this is the twelfth occasion on which this man has made off. I have never heard of such a case in my life. Besides, on this occasion he was warned that the Downshires were in the trenches by the sentry of the Westfords, and, instead of giving himself up, he deliberately turned round and ran off, so that the excuse of ignorance does not hold water. That the man was a tramp is, to my mind, no excuse either--the army is not a rest home for tired tramps. The man is an out-and-out scoundrel."

So the junior member, fearful of seeming sentimental and unmilitary, timidly suggested the sentence of death, to which the other two agreed.

"We must make an example of these fellows. There are far too many cases of desertion," said the Major, as he lit his pipe and hurried off to his tea.

* * * * *

Thus ended the career of No. 1234 Pte. John Williams, formerly a tramp in the west of England, unmourned and despised.

On the morning after he had been shot, his platoon sergeant sat before a brazier and talked to a corporal. "'E ain't no bloomin' loss, 'e ain't. 'E gave me too much trouble, and I got fair sick of 'aving to report 'im absent. It serves 'im blamed well right, that's what I say."

The corporal sipped his tea out of an extremely dirty canteen. "Well," he said at length, "I 'ope as the poor devil don't find it so warm where 'e's gone as what it is 'ere. I quite liked un, though 'e were a bit free with 'is fists, and always dreamin' like," which was probably the only appreciation ever uttered in memory of John Williams, tramp and soldier.

XXVI

THE CLEARING HOUSE

You collect your belongings, you stretch and yawn, you rub your eyes to rid them of sleep--and incidentally you leave great black marks all down your face--you struggle to get on your equipment in a filthy second-class carriage where are three other officers struggling to get on their equipment, and waving their arms about like the sails of windmills. Then you obtain a half share of the window and gaze out as the train crawls round the outskirts of the town, that lies still and quiet in the dusk of the morning. You have arrived at your destination--you are at the base.

This quaint old town, with its streets running up the hill from the river, with its beautiful spires and queer old houses, is the great clearing house of the British Army. Here the new troops arrive; here they leave for the front; here, muddy and wounded, they are driven in motor chars-à-bancs and ambulances from the station to the hospitals; here they are driven down to the river-side and carried on to the hospital ships that are bound for England.

And this gigantic clearing house buzzes with soldiers in khaki. There are the hotels where the generals and staff officers take their tea; there are the cafés haunted by subalterns; there are little "Débits de Vins" where "Tommies" go and explain, in "pidgin" English, that they are dying for glasses of beer. In all the streets, great motor lorries lumber by, laden with blackened soldiers who have been down on the quay, unloading shells, food, hay, oil, anything and everything that can be needed for the British Expeditionary Force. And, in the two main thoroughfares of an afternoon, there flows an unceasing crowd--generals and privates, French men and women, officers hunting through the shops for comforts to take up the line, people winding their busy way through the throng, and people strolling along with the tide, intent on snatching all they can of pleasure and amusement while they have the opportunity.

And a few years ago these same streets would lie sleepily in the sun, dreaming of the days of splendour long by. In the square before the wonderful cathedral there would be stillness--here and there, perhaps, a pigeon would come fluttering down from the ledges and cornices of the Gothic façade; sometimes a nondescript dog would raise a lazy head to snap at the flies; occasionally the streets would send back a nasal echo as a group of American tourists, with their Baedekers and maps, came hurrying along to "do" the town before the next train left for Paris--beyond that ... nothing.