Men at Arms Read online

  Well, he reflected, he had not joined the army for his own comfort. He had expected a grim initiation. Life in barracks had been a survival from long years of peace, something rare and protected, quite unconnected with his purpose. That was over and done with; this was war.

  And yet on this dark evening, his spirit sank. The occupation of this husk of a house, perhaps, was a microcosm of that new world he had enlisted to defeat. Something quite worthless, a poor parody of civilization, had been driven out; he and his fellows had moved in, bringing the new world with them; the world that was taking firm shape everywhere all about him, bounded by barbed wire and reeking of carbolic.

  His knee hurt more tonight than ever before. He stumped woefully to Paschendael, undressed, spread his clothes on the foot of his bed, and lay down leaving the single bulb shining in his eyes. Soon he fell asleep and soon after was awakened by the cheery return of his companions.

  6

  THERE was nothing obnoxious about the batch from the Training Depot. There were no grounds on which the Barrack batch could assume superiority. The disconcerting quality about them was their resemblance at every point. They had their Trimmer, a black sheep named Hemp. They had their Sarum-Smith, a malcontent named Colenso. They even had their ‘uncles’, a genial, stoutish schoolmaster named ‘Tubby’ Blake and a rubber planter from Malay named Roderick. It was as though in their advance the Barrack batch had turned a corner and suddenly been brought up sharp by a looking-glass in which they found themselves reflected. There was no enmity between the two groups but there was little friendship. They continued as they had begun, eating at separate tables and inhabiting separate bedrooms. To Guy it seemed that there were just twice too many young officers at Kut-al-Imara House. They were diminished and caricatured by duplication, and the whole hierarchic structure of army life was affronted by this congregation of so many men of perfectly equal rank. The regular officers charged with their training lived in billets, appeared more or less punctually for duty, sauntered from class to class during working hours and punctually departed. Often at their approach a sergeant instructor would say: ‘Come on now, look alive. Officer coming.’ oblivious of the rank of his squad. The orderlies and non-commissioned instructors were under the command of a quartermaster-sergeant. The second lieutenants had no responsibility for, nor authority over them.

  Living conditions grew slightly more tolerable. Rudimentary furniture appeared; a mess-committee was formed consisting of the camp-commandant, Guy and ‘Tubby’ Blake; the food was improved, the bar stocked. A motion to hire a wireless-set was hotly debated and narrowly lost through the combination of the elderly with the thrifty. The regimental Comforts Fund lent a dart board and a ping-pong table; but in spite of these amenities the house was generally deserted in the evening. Southsand offered a dance hall, a cinema and several hotels and there was more money about. Each officer was greeted on his return from leave with a note crediting him with back pay and a number of quite unexpected allowances. All Guy’s creditors save Sarum-Smith repaid their loans. Sarum-Smith said ‘With regard to that little matter of a fiver, uncle, if it’s all the same to you, I’ll let it run a bit longer:’

  It seemed to Guy that there was now a slight nuance in the use of ‘Uncle’. What had before been, at heart, an expression of respect, of ‘the deference which youth owes to age’, was now perceptibly derisive. The young officers were much at their ease in Southsand; they picked up girls of the town, they drank in congenial palm-lounges and snuggeries, they felt their leisure free from observation. In barracks Guy had been a link between them and their seniors. Here he was a lame old buffer who did not shine at the work or join in the fun. He had always stood in their esteem on the very verge of absurdity. Now his stiff knee and supporting stick carried him over.

  He was excused from parades and Physical Training. He hobbled alone to instruction in the gym where they marched as a squad, and hobbled back alone behind them. They had been given battle-dress and now wore it for classes. At night they changed into service-dress if they wished. There was no order about it. ‘Blues’ were out. The work of the course was Small Arms, morning and afternoon. The lessons followed the Manual page by page, designed for the comprehension of the dullest possible recruit.

  ‘Just imagine, gentlemen, that you’re playing football. I daresay some of you wish you were. All right? You’re outside right. There’s a wind blowing straight down the field. All right? You’re taking a comer kick. All right? Do you aim straight at the goal? Can’t anyone tell me? Mr Trimmer, do you aim straight at the goal?’

  ‘Oh, yes; Sergeant.’

  ‘You do, do you? What does anyone else think?’

  ‘No, Sergeant.’

  ‘No, Sergeant.’

  ‘No, Sergeant.’

  ‘Oh, you don’t, don’t you? Well, where do you aim?’

  ‘I’d try and pass.’

  ‘That’s not the answer I want. Suppose you want to shoot a goal, do you aim straight at it?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘No’

  ‘No, Sergeant.’

  ‘Well, where do you aim? Come along, doesn’t anyone here play football? You aim up field, don’t you?’

  ‘Yes, Sergeant.’

  ‘Why? Can’t any of you think? You aim up field because it’s into the wind, isn’t it? …’

  Guy took his turn at the aiming-rest and laid off for wind. Later he lowered himself painfully to the gymnasium floor and pointed a rifle at Sarum-Smith’s eye while Sarum-Smith squinnied at him through an ‘aiming-disc’ and declared all his shots wide.

  It was generally known that Guy had once shot a lion. The non-commissioned officers took up the theme: ‘Dreaming of big game, Mr Crouchback?’ they asked when Guy’s attention wandered, and they gave their fire order: ‘Ahead a bushy-top tree. Right, four o’clock, ten degrees, corner of yellow field. In that corner a lion. At that lion, two rounds fire.’

  Guy’s position on the mess-committee was far from being a hollow dignity, indeed, it lacked dignity of any kind for it exposed him to rather sharp complaints: ‘Uncle, why can’t we have better pickles?’ ‘Uncle, why isn’t whisky cheaper here than at the Grand Hotel?’ ‘Why do we take in The Times? No one reads it except you.’ Throughout all the smooth revolutions of barracks life there had been accumulating tiny grits of envy which were now generating heat.

  All that week Guy was increasingly lonely and dispirited. The news on the eighth day that Apthorpe was rejoining them cheered him throughout a tedious session of ‘Judging Distance’.

  ‘…Why do we judge distance? To estimate the range of the target correctly. All right? Correct range makes fire effective and avoids waste of ammunition. All right? At two hundred yards all parts of the body are distinctly seen. At three hundred yards the outline of the face is blurred. At four hundred yards no face. At six hundred yards the head is a dot and the body tapers. Any questions?…’

  As he limped back from the gym to the house he repeated to himself: ‘Six hundred yards the head is a dot; four hundred yards, no face,’ not to fix it in his mind, but as a meaningless jingle. Before he reached the house he was saying: ‘Four hundred yards, the head is a face, six hundred yards, no dot,’ It was the worst afternoon since he joined the army.

  Then he found Apthorpe sitting in the hall.

  ‘I’m delighted to see you back,’ said Guy, with sincerity. ‘Are you all right again?’

  ‘No, no, far from it. But I’ve been passed fit for light duties.’

  ‘Bechuana tummy again?’

  ‘It’s no joking matter, old man. I met with rather a nasty accident. In the bathroom when I hadn’t a stitch on.’

  ‘Do tell me.’

  ‘I was going to, only you seem to find it so funny. I was staying with my aunt at Peterborough. There wasn’t a great deal to do and I didn’t want to get out of condition, so I decided to run through some of the P. T. tables. Somehow the very first morning I slipped and came the most awful cropper. I can tell you
it hurt like the devil.’

  ‘Whereabouts, Apthorpe?’

  ‘In my knee. It was literally agony. I quite thought I’d broken, it. I had quite a business finding an M.O. My aunt wanted me to see her doctor but I insisted on going through service channels. When I did, he took it very seriously. Packed me off to hospital. As a matter of fact that was interesting. I don’t think you’ve ever been in a military hospital, Crouchback?’

  ‘Not yet.’

  ‘It’s well worth while. One should get to know all arms of the service. I had a sapper in the next bed to mine – with ulcers.’

  ‘Apthorpe, there’s one thing I must ask you—’

  ‘I was there over Christmas. The VADs sang carols—’

  ‘Apthorpe, are you lame?’

  ‘Well, what d’you expect, old man? A thing like this doesn’t clear up in a day even with the best treatment.’

  ‘I’m lame too.’

  ‘Very sorry to hear it. But I was telling you about Christmas in the ward. The SMO made punch—’

  ‘Don’t you realize what awful fools we’re going to look, the two of us, I mean, both going lame?’

  ’No.’

  ‘Like a pair of twins.’

  ‘Frankly, old man, I think that’s a bit far-fetched.’

  But when he and Apthorpe appeared at the dining-room door, each leaning on his stick, there was a general turning of heads, then laughter, then a round of clapping from both tables.

  ‘I say, Crouchback, has this been pre-arranged?’

  ‘No. It seems quite spontaneous,’

  ‘Well, I consider it’s in pretty poor taste.’

  They filled their mugs at the urn and sat down.

  ‘Not the first tea I’ve had in this room!’ said Apthorpe.

  ‘How is that?’

  ‘We used to play Kut-al-Imara when I was at Staplehurst. I was never quite first-class at cricket but I played goal for the First Eleven my last two seasons.’

  Guy had come to rejoice in facts about Apthorpe’s private life. They were rather rare. The aunt at Peterborough was a new character; now there was Staplehurst.

  ‘Was that your prep school?’

  ‘Yes. It’s that rather prominent building I expect you’ve noticed the other side of the town. I should have thought you’d have heard of it. It’s very well known. My aunt was rather High Church,’ he added with the air of thus somehow confirming the school’s reputation.

  ‘Your aunt at Peterborough?’

  ‘No, no, of course not,’ said Apthorpe crossly. ‘My aunt at Tunbridge Wells. My aunt at Peterborough doesn’t go in for that sort of thing at all.’

  ‘Was it a good school?’

  ‘Staplehurst? One of the best. Quite outstanding. At least it was in my day.’

  ‘I meant Kut-al-Imara.’

  ‘We thought them awful little ticks. They usually beat us, of course, but then they made a fetish of games. We just took them in our stride at Staplehurst.’

  Leonard joined them.

  ‘We’ve kept a bed for you in our room, Uncle,’ he said.

  ‘Jolly decent of you, but to tell you the truth I’ve got rather a lot of gear. I had a look round before you chaps dismissed and found an empty room, so I’m moving in there alone. I shall have to read a bit at night, I expect, to catch up with you. The sapper I met in hospital lent me some very interesting books, pretty confidential ones. The sort of thing you aren’t allowed to take into the front line trenches in case it fell into the hands of the enemy.’

  ‘Sounds like an ATM.’

  ‘This is an ATM.’

  ‘We’ve all been issued with those.’

  ‘Well, it can’t be at all the same thing. I got it from this sapper major. He had an internal ulcer so he passed it on to me.’

  ‘Is this the thing?’ asked Leonard, taking from the pocket of his battle-dress trousers a copy of the January Army Training Memorandum that was issued to all officers.

  ‘I couldn’t say offhand,’ said Apthorpe. ‘Anyway I don’t think I ought to talk about it.’

  So Apthorpe’s gear, that vast accumulation of ant-proof boxes, water-proof bundles, strangely shaped, heavily initialled tin trunks and leather cases all bound about with straps and brass buckles, was shut away from all eyes but his.

  Guy had seen them often enough in barracks, incuriously. He could have asked about them then, in the days of confidence before the Captain-Commandant’s luncheon party, and learned their secrets. All he knew now, from an early chance reference, was that somewhere among these possessions lay something rare and mysterious which Apthorpe spoke of as his ‘Bush Thunder-box’.

  That night for the first time Guy went out into the town. He and Apthorpe hired a car for the evening and drove from hotel to hotel, finding Halberdiers everywhere, drinking and moving on in search of greater privacy.

  ‘It seems to me you’ve let the young gentlemen become rather uppish in my absence,’ said Apthorpe.

  In particular they sought an hotel called the Royal Court where Apthorpe’s aunts had stayed when they came to visit him at school.

  ‘Not one of the showy places, but everything just right. Only a few people know of it.’

  No one knew of it that evening. At length when all bars were shut Guy said: ‘Couldn’t we visit Staplehurst?’

  ‘There wouldn’t be anyone there, old man. Holidays. And anyway it’s a bit late.’

  ‘I mean, couldn’t we just go and look at it?’

  ‘Sound scheme. Driver, go to Staplehurst.’

  ‘Staplehurst Grove or Staplehurst Drive?’

  ‘Staplehurst House.’

  ‘Well, I know the Grove and the Drive. I’ll try there, shall I? Is it a Private?’

  ‘I don’t follow you, driver.’

  ‘A private hotel?’

  ‘It is a Private School.’

  There was a moon and a high wind off-shore. They followed the Parade and mounted to the outskirts of the town.

  ‘It all seems rather changed,’ said Apthorpe. ‘I don’t remember any of this.’

  ‘We’re in the Grove now, sir. The Drive is round on the left.’

  ‘It stood just about here,’ said Apthorpe. ‘Something must have happened to it.’

  They got out into the moonlight and the bitter North wind.

  All round them lay little shuttered villas. Here, under their feet and beyond the neat hedges, lay the fields where muddy Apthorpe had kept goal. Somewhere among these gardens and garages bits of brickwork, perhaps, survived from the sanctuary where clean Apthorpe in lace cotta had lighted the tapers.

  ‘Vandals,’ said Apthorpe bitterly.

  Then the two lame men climbed into the car and drove back to Kut-al-Imara in alcoholic gloom.

  7

  NEXT day Apthorpe had a touch of Bechuana tummy but he rose none the less. Guy was first down, driven from bed by thirst. It was a grey and bitter morning, heavy with coming snow. He found one of the regular officers in the hall engaged at the notice board with a large sheet headed in red chalk: ‘READ THIS. IT CONCERNS YOU.’

  ‘Great bit of luck,’ he said. ‘We’ve got Mudshore for today. Embus at eight-thirty. Draw haversack rations. You’d better pass the word to your chaps.’

  Guy climbed the stairs and put his head into each dormitory in turn saying: ‘We’ve got Mudshore for today. Bus leaves in twenty minutes.’

  ‘Who’s Mudshore?’

  ‘I’ve no idea.’

  Then he returned to the notice board and learned that Mudshore was a rifle-range some ten miles distant.

  Thus began the saddest day of the new dispensation.

  Mudshore range was a stretch of sea-marsh transected at regular intervals by banks and ending in a colourless natural escarpment. It was surrounded by wire and cautionary notices; there was a tin hut by the nearest bank, the firing point. When they arrived they found a soldier in his shirt-sleeves shaving at the door; another was crouching by a Soyer stove; a third appeared buttoning his tun
ic, unshaved.

  The major in charge of the expedition went forward to investigate. They heard his tones, ferocious at first, grow gradually softer and end with: ‘Very well, Sergeant. It’s clearly not your fault. Carry on. I’ll try and get through to Area.’

  He returned to his party.

  ‘There seems to have been some sort of misunderstanding. The last order the range-keeper got from Area was that firing was cancelled for today. They’re expecting snow. I’ll see what can be done. Meanwhile since we’re here, it’s a good opportunity to run through Range Discipline.’

  For an hour, while the light broadened into a leaden glare, they learned and practised the elaborate code of precautions which, at this stage of the Second World War, surrounded the firing of live ammunition. Then the major returned to them from the hut where he had been engaged on the telephone. ‘All right. They don’t expect snow for an hour or two. We can carry on. Our walking wounded can make themselves useful in the butts.’