by James Hanley
‘But why worry?’ he exclaimed; ‘it’s all over now. Forget it.’ There was the feeling that all this chatter was nothing but irritating. ‘I understand,’ he said, ‘quite.’
‘That time you came in and you were loaded up,’ continued Giles. ‘Remember? And you were supposed to go right to your hut with those other blokes. And I said a man was wanted to help carry pans and buckets for the cook, and I made you carry them with the pack still on your back. You’d come with the others that nine miles from the station. Remember. That’s only one lousy thing, and I don’t know why I did it. Fact! And you were—well, you said nothing—you just did it. And then that time I had to make a report to the sergeant. I didn’t like you—I hated all you fellows. I told him you were lousy—I mean, that way. Remember! They turned you out of your bunk about half-eleven that night. We chucked you in the tank, scrubbed you. That was me. I put holes in the sandbags. I put itchy cotton in your trousers that time you had to carry stores.’
There was no pause.
Now Joseph Kilkey realized that there was only one thing to do. Sit and listen! If he didn’t, the fellow would haunt him. What on earth had come over the fellow? He might be Father Moynihan and this man Giles telling him his sins. Let him talk on until he had completely emptied himself. ‘To-morrow I’ll be gone. Far away. And we’ll have forgotten all those things. All of them,’ he told himself.
The stream of words became a drone in his ears, but again he sat up with a jerk. It was listening to a man’s confession. No man had ever done this before. At least, Joseph Kilkey had never seen one do just what this soldier was doing. ‘Bit of a lad,’ said Mr. Kilkey to himself—‘only a kid really.’ But he had put him through the ropes all right. Not a doubt of it. And he was old enough to be Giles’s father. He hoped those two others would not come in now. He got up and went to the hut, shut the door, returned to his bed.
‘You know, son, all this you’re telling me now, what good is it? It’s all finished long ago. See! I’ll shake hands again. There.’
Holding the hand Giles said. ‘Bin asking myself this week now, why I done all them things to you. You never done anything to me. Nor the other fellers. None of them! And yet I hated the sight of the bloody lot of you. Remember that time you give me a letter to post addressed to some Catholic Sister or somebody. I read it. I laughed. I opened all your letters, read the lot. All these fellers has their letters read. There’s a fellow named Diver here. His missus sent him her photo. We read his letters to her. Laughed like hell. I done that with your letters. I tore some up. Two came for you a month ago. One H.M.S. I said. ‘Bloody conchie getting letters.’ I chucked them in the fire. I used to go into the cookhouse just before they were serving out. Remember that time you got stuck in the guard-room for saying something I made you say with my boot, mate? I put sand in your grub.’ Suddenly the soldier paused. Perhaps it was the strange look on Joseph Kilkey’s face that made him do so.
‘Go ahead! Get it off your chest. I’ve seen worse things in the world than you think I have, me lad. Nothing makes me scared, or sick or anything.’
‘I’m bloody sorry you’re going, mate. Will you have these?’ Giles said. He pulled a small tissue-paper parcel from his pocket and held it out to Mr. Kilkey.
‘Oh!’ said Kilkey. ‘I don’t smoke cigarettes, son. You keep them. I smoke a pipe.’
‘I’ll change them. I’ll get you tobacco,’ said Giles. ‘I’ll get it to-night.’
‘You’re only a kid,’ he said, ‘a bit of a kid. Well! Well!’ and he gave him a hearty slap on the back.
‘You don’t—you fellers don’t believe in war, do you?’ asked Giles.
‘No! I don’t. I wouldn’t have the heart to kill anybody. That’s just it.’
‘You’re a worker and I’m a worker too,’ the soldier said. ‘That’s it. I joined two years ago when I was sixteen. My brother was blown up at the Marne. I joined his old regiment. Next month I’m going over with the rest of them. Sometimes I’d like to be like you fellers, but I couldn’t I don’t think. You require guts. I know. I’ve been at this camp long enough to find out. Last week when you had to empty the tank and somebody had emptied a bucket of filth into it, I wanted to tell you about that, and d’you know what I said? I said: ‘Aw, blast him!’ that’s what I said. So you see what kind of mate I am. Real human, mate. I used to work in the foundry with my dad.’
‘Well, cheer up, son. Probably you’ll soon be back at the foundry with your dad. Now don’t keep on telling me these things. You don’t have to, really. There. Now we’ve shook hands on that three times over. We’re a couple of pals. I’ll remember you when I’ve got to Conton. And you’ll remember me while you’re here. Maybe we won’t see each other any more. No matter! We might, you know. We both belong to Gelton. It’s not a bad place any time, though I’ve seen better when I was your age. My father had a lovely white farmhouse in Ireland. And believe it or not, son, for all the grass you’ve seen it’s none of it as green as where I came from! Now you go off and meet your girl I’m sure you have one. And don’t be saying all these things to me. They go into one ear and out of the other. We’re good pals.’
Private George Giles was short and rather stout, too stout for any army, so Kilkey thought. A somewhat gawky youth with nothing exceptional about his appearance to distinguish him from the rest of the world’s gawky youths of eighteen years. He had rosy cheeks, freckles, blue eyes, and tow-coloured hair, the kind of hair that asks to fly in the wind and not lie under the burden of hair oil to which George afflicted it. It was an open honest face, though the eyes did at times show a shiftiness or crafty kind of look that somehow didn’t seem right in that kind of face. He was a slovenly rather than a careless soldier, though France would eventually take little account of that.
‘Yes, that’s what you should be doing, son,’ said Kilkey, ‘out like all the other lads, looking for a girl. Have you got a girl? Or haven’t you?’
Mr. Kilkey had become warm, even fatherly. Gawky he was, slovenly he was, but somewhere inside George lay imagination. Otherwise he could not have stood like this, and opened his heart to Joseph Kilkey. Mr. Kilkey knew this. Just a rough-and-ready lad who thought he was a wonderful chap because he was in the Gelton Regiment. And now he was wonderful. Openly, with almost alarming frankness he recounted all the lies and meannesses, the filthy tricks, the dirty jokes, the humiliations he had practised on conscientious-objector Kilkey.
‘Remember that time you got cold on that march, somebody pushed you in the stream, and you came back to the camp all soaking, you got the’flu and they shifted your mates out of the hut fear they’d get it. I used to have to bring grub to you. I didn’t have to. But I worked it all the same. Well——’
Again Private Giles paused. He seemed to have forgotten what he wanted to say. It seemed, too, a revelation that willed itself to come and then at the last moment turned tail and retreated.
Joe Kilkey laughed. ‘Go on,’ he said. ‘Clear out and get away to your mates.’
With the revelation temporarily in retreat Private Giles asked: ‘Are you married, mate?’
This made the other laugh. Joseph Kilkey had never laughed like he had to-day. Was he married? And then Private Giles left the bed and went and sat beside Mr. Kilkey. What was going to be the end of this.
‘Well, I look married, don’t I?’ said Mr. Kilkey. He moved up a bit on the bed. ‘Yes, son, I’m married all right. I’ve a wife and I’ve a little boy named Dermod. He’ll be five next birthday.’
‘That time, mate, I used to bring in your grub,’ he looked straight into Joseph Kilkey’s eyes. ‘That time——’ It must come, he couldn’t hold back any longer, he was filled with a sudden overwhelming shame, and he stammered—‘That time I——Well, three times you had stew, remember that. I used to wet in your grub, mate.’
There! It was out now. The weight had gone—the mind was free, but the shame hung like a cold clammy skin.
‘You wet in my food?’ said Joseph Kilk
ey, and he put down his pipe.
‘Yes, I did, mate, and I’m bloody sorry about it. I’m sorry you’re going away because I think you’re a decent bloke and you’re Gelton just like me. We’re both workers, mate, you and me. Both the same.’
‘Yes, my little lad is just turned five,’ said Kilkey, continuing on as though he had never heard the words that were spoken to him. ‘Five next January, I believe. I wish I could see him. I wouldn’t miss anything but that, son. War isn’t just killing people, you know.’
Private Giles put his hand out. ‘Forgive me, mate,’ he said, ‘you’re a decent bloke. A bloody decent bloke—or—I,’ and then he scrambled to his feet and ran out of the hut.
Joseph Kilkey did not move. He felt cold—hot—he sat like a stone statue. He stared at the wooden walls.
He could hear Giles’s words quite plainly, then suddenly they grew heavy, noisy words, clanking like chains in the far corner of the hut.
‘He used to wet in my——’
Joseph Kilkey went outside. Against the wall he was suddenly sick. When meal-time came he could not eat anything, continuously he retched.
But just after tea was over the mail was called. A letter from Father Moynihan cheered him up. He forgot about Giles, about the food. He went off to the end of the grounds, leaned against the barbed-wire fence that held them in, and began to read it. He turned the letter over and over. It was something from another world. It carried the smell, the taste, the feel, the picture of a world that seemed lost. The letter made him happy. It was full of hope. He read it three times, put it back in the envelope. But he took it out again, read it a fourth time. Then his name was called. He stuffed the letter back into his pocket. He knew what this call meant.
He with a dozen other men, all in civilian clothes, were lined up in platoon order, marched off to go before the Commandant of the camp. The usual thing—same looks, same words, meaning nothing to any of them.
‘If any of you during these past weeks have changed his opinion, and now sees, etc. etc.—believes, etc. etc.’
They marched out again. France! No! Conton! Yes. That was their answer.
‘You’ll see, Joseph! Everything will come right in the end. And your little boy. He is well. You’ll all be together soon. Don’t worry. Keep up your courage, and don’t withdraw. I admire you in many ways, and I say this as one who has met many very intelligent men whom he hasn’t admired half so much.’
The words were singing in Joseph Kilkey’s head. He, Father Moynihan, believed that everything would come right. ‘I hope it does,’ he muttered. ‘I hope it does.’ Father Moynihan always remembered this monthly letter. A good man. Finer than some ignorant people imagined.
In that other world it was coming home from work in the evening and shutting the door behind you, shutting everything out and being free—left alone in your own home. In this world it was getting a letter. Amidst the acres of churned-up mud, a letter was like a flower.
At seven o’clock he was sent along to help wash dishes. This would be the last job he would ever do at the camp.
He returned to his hut about nine o’clock. Keele was sitting reading at the table. He looked up as Kilkey came up.
‘What’s up, Kilkey?’ he asked, dropping the paper.
‘Nothing,’ replied Kilkey, and immediately began to undress for bed.
‘I saw you didn’t eat any tea,’ continued Keele, ‘and when I came out I saw you being sick back of the stores hut. Had bad news or anything?’
‘No,’ said Kilkey, ‘why?’ and he paused to glance out through the window. ‘Will you be glad to get out of this, Mr. Keele?’ he asked.
‘Oh! It’s Conton! I thought there was something up. I don’t—no, I don’t think so. Any place will be better than this. You see, we’re just intruders here. We don’t belong at all. We’re strangers. This camp is a soldiers’ camp. Well, they’ve had a good try, and seeing they haven’t succeeded they’re shifting us out of it. I think we’ll be better treated at Conton. And we shan’t be lonely either. There’s only men like ourselves there.’
‘I’m glad to hear that,’ replied Kilkey, now undressed. He got into bed.
‘Did you have bad news or anything?’ repeated Keele.
‘No! As a matter of fact I had good news. But I haven’t felt very well to-day. As a matter of fact I haven’t felt too good since I was down with the ‘flu that time.’ He gave a little laugh as he stretched himself out in the bed. ‘When somebody told me I’d been here just on twenty-nine weeks—well, I couldn’t believe it.’ He drew the bedclothes up to his chin.
Keele lit a cigarette, and sat back in the chair. ‘How old are you, really?’
‘I’m turned fifty,’ said Kilkey.
‘It’s a damn scandal. Mistake or no mistake. It’s a scandal.’
‘Well, they’re still considering it at Whitehall or wherever they consider these things,’ said Mr. Kilkey, ‘but really after these twenty-nine weeks of it, I hardly see why they should bother. I’ve learned a lot since I’ve been here, Mr. Keele. And now I feel I can go right through with it, and I’ll never give in to them. That’s what this camp’s done for me. I believe more and more in what I’ve done. If they came to-morrow and said I could go home—well, perhaps I would go back home—but I’d take with me what I learned to-day. These chaps here—especially the young fellows. You know, Mr. Keele, I was talking to one to-day, a nice lad. It shows you all right. Just talking to some of them. In fact, the lad said he was sorry I was going. But it’s a terrible war, Mr. Keele, a terrible war. I wonder how long it will continue? Lumme! I’ll have forgotten what a winch looks like when I get back, and I won’t be able to tell the bow from the stern of a ship.’
At this moment the other occupant of the hut came in. He had more definite news. They were leaving at seven in the morning for Conton.
‘And that’s good-bye to this hell.’
He said not another word, but undressed and got into bed. Later Keele himself followed.
‘Yes, it seemed good-bye this time!’
They called good night to each other from their beds, and Keele reached up and switched out the light.
II
‘Oh, Mrs., Mrs., Mrs.,’ exclaimed Mrs. Gumbs, as she put her head through the door, and saw Fanny Fury sitting at the table, pen and ink and paper in front of her. ‘Yesterday you were as bright as a lark. You make me despair. What’s the matter?’
‘Nothing,’ Mrs. Fury said. ‘Nothing.’
‘Don’t talk nonsense, woman.’ She threw down a small parcel on the table. ‘There! There’s your meat ration. I was in that queue a solid hour before I could get anything.’ She stood at the table edge, hands clasped together. ‘I got you some neck. Best I could do. You ought to go out more. Sitting moping there! I thought—well, it doesn’t matter what I thought. Have you had bad news?’
‘No.’ The woman shook her head. ‘I’m worried about Denny,’ she said, and she looked up at Mrs. Gumbs, who at once grabbed a chair and sat down.
‘I don’t suppose there’s a women in the land to-day, Mrs., who isn’t worrying about her husband. You’ll have word soon. You know, what with these ships getting sealed orders and the rest of it—well, they’re all over the place and that’s a fact. Don’t be worrying yourself about it. I’m going to make myself a bit of dinner and then I’m going to bed. And I advise you to do the same. Night work is different from day work. You haven’t worked nights on these ships. You don’t know.’
‘My husband’s been so long away. I’ve written three times, and never a line,’ said Mrs. Fury. ‘I wouldn’t care if he wrote only a line saying he was all right. I can’t sleep at night thinking about it. It’s months—months since he sailed, Mrs. Gumbs. He’s all I’ve got now; and I am worried about him.’ She ran the pen to and fro across the table.
‘Are—is that a letter you’re writing to him now?’ asked Mrs. Gumbs.
‘It is.’
‘Well, now,’ and here Mrs. Gumbs leaned over
the table and patted the woman’s hand. ‘It’s all right to think about your husband. We all think about them, and our friends. It’s natural. But you have to think of yourself too, now haven’t you? And after all, things could be worse. Couldn’t they? And sometimes nice things happen. Now you saw your boy. Well, that was nice—wasn’t it? It was sad as well—but still, it was better than not seeing him. Now keep your chin up, Mrs., as they say. Your husband’s all right. Really he is. I feel he is, you see, sailors don’t get much time for writing letters now. You understand. Not like being ashore. Cheer up.’
‘I am,’ she said, ‘I’ve always kept my head up, but I can’t help worrying.’
‘I can’t help saying it, Mrs., but to me it’s astonishing that not one of your children—except that lad who’s at sea—has ever come near you. See what you get for being a slave to a family. They simply laugh at you. Oh well, I must go now. See you at seven,’ she said, got up and went out.
Mrs. Fury picked up the pen and continued with her letter. Half a dozen times she had begun it, only to fling the paper into the fire. She began imagining things. Perhaps whilst she was actually writing, Denny would come in, bag on his back, take her by surprise. His ‘Hello’ was in her ears. She wondered if he got her letters at all. What happened to them after she had posted them in the pillar-box? Or perhaps the ship carrying his letters to her had been held up at some port, turned back—maybe sunk. Yet he might actually be on the way home now, this very minute—and she found herself exclaiming: ‘I’m sure Denny’ll hate all those steps. He hates long flights of stairs.’
She read over what she had already written—surely he would write after that. There was such a lot of news in it for him. She could see him now, even whilst she was writing, passing from stoke-hold to engine-room, and back again, carrying things on his back.