Tell England Part 39

(Major Hardy might have said more. He might have told us that he had been recommended once for a D.S.O., and twice for a court-martial, because he persisted in devoting his playtime to sharpshooting and sniping in No Man's Land, and to leading unauthorised patrols on to the enemy's wire. But it was not till later that we were to learn why he had been known throughout his Army Corps as Major Fool-hardy.)

Padre Monty had not been wounded, it seemed, but only buried alive.

"The doctor and I had been taking cover in a sh.e.l.l-hole," he explained, between the sweet and the dessert, "when a high-explosive hurled the whole of our shelter on top of us, leaving only our heads free. We were two heads sticking out of the ground like two turnips.

After about five hours the C.O. sent a runner to find the padre and the M.O., alive or dead. The fellow traced us to our sh.e.l.l-hole, and when he saw our heads, he actually came to attention and saluted.

'The C.O. would like to see you in the Mess, sir,' said he to me.

'And I should dearly like to see him in the Mess,' said I. 'However, stand at ease.' 'Stand at the devil,' said the doctor. 'Go and get spades and dig us out.'"

"Hum," commented Major Hardy, "if you weren't a padre, I should believe that story. But all padre are liars, _what_."

Monty bowed acknowledgments.

"And then," suggested the Major, "you felt the pull of the Dardanelles."

"Exactly, who could resist it? I wasn't going to miss the most romantic fight of all. The whole world's off to the Dardanelles. I knew the East Ches.h.i.+re's chaplain was coming home, time expired, so I applied--"

"How ripping! That's our brigade," interrupted I, unconsciously returning his previous flattery.

"Is that so?" said he. "Well, let's go above and get to know one another."

We went on deck, he, Doe, and I, and watched the new arrivals.

Troop-trains were rolling right up to the quay and disgorging hundreds of men, spruce in their tropical kit of new yellow drill and pith helmets. Unattached officers arrived singly or in pairs; in carriages or on foot. Many of them were doctors, who were being drafted to the East in large numbers. A still greater proportion consisted of young Second Lieutenants, who, like ourselves, were being sent out to replace the terrible losses in subalterns.

"The world looks East this summer," mused Monty. Then he turned to me in a sudden, emphatic way that he had when he was going to hold forth. "But there's a thrill about it all, my lads. It means great developments where we're going to. Six new divisions are being quietly s.h.i.+pped to the Mediterranean. You and I are only atoms in a landslide towards Gallipoli. There's some secret move to force the gates of the Dardanelles in a month, and enter Constantinople before Christmas. Big things afoot! Big things afoot!"

"Jove! I hope so," said I, caught by his keenness.

"Just look round," pursued Monty, switching off in his own style to a new subject, "isn't our Tommy the most lovable creature in the world?"

I followed his glance, and saw that the decks were littered with rec.u.mbent Tommies, who, considering themselves to have embarked, had cast off their equipment and lain down to get cool and rested.

"Look at them!" spouted Monty, and by his suddenness I knew he was about to hold forth at some length. "You'll learn that the Army, when on active service, does an astonis.h.i.+ng amount of waiting; and Tommy does an astonis.h.i.+ng amount of reclining. Lying down, while you wait to get started, is two-thirds of the Army's work. Directly the Army begins to wait, Tommy relieves his aching back and shoulders of equipment, and reclines. Quite right, too. There's no other profession in the world, where, with perfect dutifulness, you can spend so much time on your back. Active Service is two-parts Inaction--"

What more of his views Monty would have expounded I can't say, for a voice yelled from the promenade-deck above us:

"You there! What's your rank?"

I jumped out of my skin, and Doe out of his, for we thought the voice was addressing us, Monty turned without agitation and looked up at the speaker. It was Major Hardy. He was leaning against the deck-rail, and had fixed with his monocle the nearest rec.u.mbent soldier. This soldier was just the other side of us, so the Major was obliged to shout over our heads.

"What's your rank?" he repeated. "Come along, my man. Get a move on.

Jump to it. What's your rank?"

The Tommy, flurried by this surprise attack, climbed on to his feet, came to attention, and said:

"Inniskillings, sir."

"d.a.m.n the man--_what_," cried the Major. "What's your _rank_? I said."

"What, sir?" respectfully inquired the Tommy, whose powers of apprehension had been disorganised by so sudden a raid.

The Major adopted two methods calculated to penetrate the soldier's intelligence: he leant over the rail, and he spoke very slowly.

"What's--your--b.l.o.o.d.y--rank? Are you a general, or a private?"

"No, sir," answered the bewildered Tommy.

"Oh, G.o.d d.a.m.n you to h.e.l.l! What's your _rank_?"

"Oh, private, sir."

"Then, for Christ's sake, go and do some work. What are privates for? Get that kit of mine from the quay."

The Major dropped his monocle on his chest, and looked down at us.

"Sorry, padre," he said, and walked away.

I watched till he was out of sight, and then said indignantly:

"So he jolly well ought to have apologised."

"And he _did_," retorted Monty. "Be just to him. It took me six months--"

"He's off," thought I.

"--to get the Army's bad language into proportion. At first I opened on it with my heavies in sermon after sermon. Then I saw proportion, and decided on a tariff, allowing an officer a 'd.a.m.n' and a man a 'b.l.o.o.d.y.' Winter and Neuve Chapelle taught me the rock-bottom level on which we are fighting this war, and I spiked my guns. No one has a right to condemn them, who hasn't floundered in mud under sh.e.l.l-fire."

I think that, after this, we dropped into silence, and watched the quay emptying itself of men, and the _Rangoon's_ decks becoming more and more crowded, as the day declined. The Embarkation was practically complete. The Devonport Staff Officers wished us "a good voyage," and went home to their teas in Plymouth. And, just before dinner, the gangway was hauled on to the quay. This was the final act, for, though the s.h.i.+p was not yet moving, we had broken communication with England.

--2

At dinner, it being the first night afloat, the champagne corks began to pop, and the conversation to grow noisier and noisier. By the time the nutcrackers were busy, the more riotous subalterns had reached that state of merriness, in which they found every distant pop of a cork the excuse for a fresh cheer and cries of "Take cover!"

Major Hardy, too, was beaming. He had sipped the best part of three bottles of champagne, and was feeling himself, multiplied by three.

He a.s.sured Monty that the padres had been the most magnificent people of the war. He told three times the story of one who had died going over the top with his men. That padre was a man. The men would have followed him anywhere. For he was a man every inch of him. But, of course, the victim and hero of the war, said Major Hardy, looking at Doe, myself, and the weary Jimmy Doon, was the junior subaltern.

Everybody was prepared to take off his hat to the junior subaltern.

He had died in greater numbers than any other rank. He had only just left school, and yet he had led his men from in front. The Major, if he had fifty hats, would take them all off to the junior subaltern.

His heart beat at one with the heart of the junior subaltern. And, steward, confound it, where was the drink-steward? There would be the most awful b.l.o.o.d.y row, if he weren't looked after properly.

Dinner over, the riotous juniors rushed upstairs to the Officers'

Lounge, a large room with a bar at one end, and a piano at the other. Some congregated near the bar to order liqueurs, while others surrounded the piano to roar rag-time choruses that one of their number was playing. This artist had a whole manual of rag-time tunes, and seemed to have begun at Number One and decided to work through the collection. Each air was caught up and sung with more enthusiasm than the last. And see, there was Major Hardy, leaning over the pianist that he might read the words through his monocle, and singing with the best of them: "Everybody's doing it--doing it--doing it," and "Hitchy-koo, hitchy-koo, hitchy-koo."

The Spirit of Riot was aboard to-night. The wines of Heidsieck and Veuve Pommery glowed in the cheeks of the subalterns. It was the last night in an English harbour, and what ho! for a rag. It was the first night afloat, and what ho! for a rough-house. And there was Elation in the air at the sight of Britain embarking for the Dardanelles to teach the Turk what the Empire meant. So shout, my lads. "Hitchy-koo, hitchy-koo, hitchy-koo."

Major Hardy was equal to any of them. He was the Master of the Revels. He had a big s.p.a.ce cleared at one end of the lounge, and organised a Rugby scrum. He arranged the sides, interlocked the subalterns in the three-two-three formation, forced their heads down like a master coaching boys, and, when he had given the word "Shove like h.e.l.l," ran round to the back of the scrum, got into it with his head well down, and pushed to such purpose that the whole of the opposite side was rushed off its feet, and the scrum sent hurtling across the lounge. A few chairs were broken, as the scrimmagers swept like an avalanche over the room. Major Hardy was hot with success. "A walk over! Absolutely ran them off their feet! Come and shove for them, you slackers," he shouted to those, who so far had only looked on and laughed. A score of fellows rushed to add their weight to the defeated side, and another score to swell the pack of the victors. "That's the style," cried the Major. "There are only about sixty of us in this scrum. Pack well down, boys. Not more than twenty in the front row. Ball's in! Shove like blazes!" Into it he got himself, and shoved--shoved till the scrum was rolled back across the lounge; shoved till the side, which was being run off its feet, broke up in laughter, and was at once knocked down like ninepins by the rush of the winning forwards; shoved till his own crowd fell over the prostrate forms of their victims, and collapsed into a heap of humanity on to the floor.

Wiping his brow and whistling, he organised musical chairs; and, after musical chairs, c.o.c.k-fighting. Already he was limping on one knee, and his left eye was red and swollen. But he was enjoying himself so much that his enjoyment was infectious. To see him was to feel that Life was a riotous adventure, and this planet of ours the liveliest of lively worlds. And really, in spite of all, I'm not sure that it isn't.

Doe and I with our hands in our pockets had contented ourselves with being onlookers. The high spirits of Major Hardy's disorderly mob were radiating too much like electric waves through the room for us not to be caught by an artificial spell of happiness. But neither of us felt rowdy to-night. Monty, too, as he stood between us, looked on and moralised.