The Balliols

by Alec Waugh

  He turned towards the dug-out steps, then paused, his eye caught by a couple of papers that lay on the edge of Tallent’s wire bed. He picked them up. They were The Spectator and The Nation.

  “I see there’s an article on War Poetry in The Nation. Is it any good?”

  Tallent shrugged his shoulders.

  “You know what The Nation is. Negative, critical, snobbishly intellectual; and in the long run nearly always right. Most of it’s an attack on The Poetry Magazine.”

  “Oh, is it? Well. … I’d like to borrow it some time. Not now. Good night. Good night, Balliol.”

  While he had been discussing a military problem, Rickman had remained the self-confident, confidence-inspiring soldier. The moment he had picked up The Nation, that odd self-consciousness had come back into his manner. And into Tallent’s manner had come the suggestion of what Hugh could best describe as a supercilious drawl. As the gas curtain flapped behind Rickman, Tallent gave an impatient little laugh.

  “I shouldn’t have done that, I suppose, but I just couldn’t resist it. I left that paper out there specially. He makes me so mad with his damned poetry, and The Poetry Magazine is where most of it comes out. But I suppose all this is gibberish to you.”

  “I knew he wrote poetry.”

  “Did you? Yes, of course, you would. Anyone would before they’d been in the mess five minutes. ‘A little thing I tossed off the other night.’ And you know quite well he’d been polishing it for weeks. That fumbling gesture in his pocket. How well I know it. The way he leads the subject round. ‘By the way, I’m not certain that I haven’t got it on me now.’ As though he wasn’t sure, when you know damn well that he takes it out of his pocket and reads it over to himself every time he goes to the latrine. God, it makes me sick!”

  His outburst astonished Hugh. He couldn’t imagine anyone getting so excited over so amiable, if incomprehensible, an idiosyncrasy as poetizing.

  “But the stuff is all right, isn’t it? The thing he showed me seemed to be.”

  “Oh, it’s well enough. It scans, it rhymes, you can see what it’s driving at. But it isn’t poetry. And there are no two ways about a poem. Poems aren’t like novels. A novel can have interest and value without being literature. It can argue a case; it can present a setting; its subject matter may be significant. At the worst it can give entertainment. But verses that aren’t poetry haven’t any reason or excuse for their existence. It’s one thing or the other. There’s no middle way. And when you know men, as I do, who’ve given their lives to poetry, to have to listen to a man like Rickman.… Hell’s bells, it makes me mad. Forget it. Let’s have some whisky. Then I’ll take you round the guns.”

  There were four guns to each section. The section covered the half of a brigade front. One gun team was actually in the front line system. The other three were echeloned in reserve at a distance of four to five hundred yards apart. Over the muddy, slippery duck-board track it took the best part of two hours to go round the guns.

  The gun teams, like the company itself, led an independent, self-contained existence; not unlike that of shipwrecked sailors. The landscape, as far as the eye could travel, was grey-brown, undulating plains. The villages were crumbled walls and heaps of rubble. The roads ran straight and wide flanked by tall trees that thinned and dwindled as they neared the line. The sentry leaning against the parapet could see them leading towards the German line, to be lost in the brown mud of the unowned shell holes, to reappear on the other side, to pass over the horizon, leading no-whither. Looking backwards, he could see the same road vanishing he knew not where in the grey distances of a foreign land. He was as much marooned as any sailor on a Pacific atoll. His home was the narrow strip of trench, its dug-out, its emplacement, where he and his dozen fellows depended for everything on one another.

  “You’d think they were pretty wretched, but they’re not really,” Tallent said to Hugh. “They’ve got their jokes. They’ve got companionship. They’ve the same things to grouse over. Everything’s shared. They’ve got none of the responsibilities that they had in civilian life: the making of ends meet, the fear of losing a job when they’ve wives and children dependent on them. They’ve been relieved of a great deal. They grouse like hell now but when it’s all over a good many of them will look back and wonder whether it really was the hell they thought it.”

  In the course of his round of the guns Hugh was to meet another old acquaintance. A pair of perky eyes, surmounted by a shock of red and rebel hair that even a steel helmet could not subdue, grinned recognition at him.

  “Good lord, it’s Walker!”

  “Yes, me, Mr. Hugh; Sir, I mean.…”

  “I never knew you were a machine-gunner.”

  “No, sir. I’ve been transferred a bit.”

  From the dug-out came a stifled titter which suggested that a story lay behind this admission. Hugh could imagine that.

  “I expect you find this a bit of a change from packing cases for Peel & Hardy.”

  “Yes, sir. Used to pack cases. Now I carries them.”

  His voice was as confident and cheeky as it had ever been. In spite of the steel helmet, the leather jacket, the khaki trousers, the sandbagged shins, Hugh could not see that the war had made any essential difference to the packer who had been hauled up to a board meeting to be reprimanded and had instead received a rise of salary, because the chairman had liked the look of him.

  “What sort of a soldier is he making?” Hugh asked the moment they were out of earshot.

  Tallent shrugged his shoulders.

  “He’s a very typical old soldier.”

  “Does that mean he’s never out of trouble?”

  “That he never ought to be out of trouble. As a matter of fact, he’s got about the cleanest crime sheet in the company. Heaven knows how he manages it. But … oh well, this’ll be an example. It was about six months ago, before Rickman took over, when we were out on rest. Evans was in charge. He was a terror. I don’t think anyone was sorry when he got a Blighty one at Loos. But anyhow, this is the story. It’s a fair example.”

  It was a story that had been often recounted, not only in the officer’s, but in the sergeants’ and the corporals’ messes. And always to the accompaniment of many laughs from those who knew Walker well.

  One morning Walker had overslept. It was not the first time he had done so, nor would it be the last. Reveille had gone at 6.30. It was now nearly seven o’clock, only just time to shave and wash before his breakfast. He had meant to clean the barrel of his gun; it was in a fearful state. He had dropped it in the mud the night before. It must be cleaned before the next parade. One never knew when it might be inspected. You could never trust officers, they always did things at funny times. That barrel had to be cleaned, and yet the mess orderlies were just going for the food. If he cleaned it now, he would miss his meal, and Walker could not remember a single occasion on which he had done that. No, the barrel would have to wait; breakfast was much more important.

  The morning of Walker’s rest also happened to be the morning Captain Evans had chosen for one of his surprise visits to the gun teams. No one ever knew when he was coming; usually he never knew himself till five minutes before. Nothing was ready for him. His visits were a menace to the subaltern.

  Half-way through the morning parades a whisper ran round No. 2 section: “Cap’n’s coming round.” Walker’s heart had sunk within him. He pictured himself in irons bound to a wheel, undergoing ten days’ Field Punishment No. 1. He had visions of courts martial; of a crime sheet inches long. Out of the corner of his eye he could see Captain Evans inspecting the gun; he saw him take out the barrel, and hold it to the light.

  “Mr. Tallent,” the Captain called.

  “Sir?”

  “Here a minute.”

  They walked out of earshot of the section. Tallent had known what that meant. Evans was very particular about not criticizing his officers before their men.

  “This barrel is filthy, Mr. Tallent. A disgr
ace to the company.”

  “Yes, sir. Sergeant Simpson.…”

  “I don’t want to hear anything about Sergeant Simpson. This gun is under your charge. I expect it to be clean. That’s what section officers are for. You don’t know your duty. If you can’t keep your guns clean when you are out of the line, what are you going to do in action? Very bad, Mr. Tallent, very bad. I can see that you’ve got no hold over your section. I shall be forced to cancel your leave to Amiens.”

  Tallent had been counting on that leave. He had returned to the section, restless for revenge. Some one was going to pay for this. It wasn’t his fault that the gun was dirty; that wasn’t his job, it was the Sergeant’s job. He wasn’t going to take this sort of thing lying down. He despatched an orderly for the section sergeants.

  “Look here, you two, this barrel is absolutely filthy.…”

  “Yes, sir. Lance-Corporal.…”

  “I don’t want to hear anything about any Lance-Corporal. You two are directly responsible for the gun’s cleanliness. That’s what you are sergeants for. If you don’t keep your guns clean you are not fit to be sergeants. You are both under open arrest.”

  As soon as he had gone the two sergeants looked at each other.

  “‘Tweren’t our fault, Bill.”

  “Naw, Joe, ‘twas that blarsted fool of a Lance-Jack.”

  “‘Ere you,” he bawled at one of the men, “run off and fetch me Lance-Corporal Wilkinson and hustle yerself.”

  “Now, ‘ere, me lad,” said Sergeant Simpson to the perspiring one stripe, “that there barrel of yours is dirty, can’t see down it.”

  “Is it now?”

  “Not ’arf it isn’t.”

  “Well, Sergeant, Private Walker.…”

  “I don’t want to hear nothing about your Private Walker. It’s your fault if ‘e don’t clean his gun, that’s what you’re there for. Don’t think yer a Lance-Jack for your looks, do yer? You can go under close arrest, you can. Off yer get to the guardroom and quick too.”

  Lance-Corporal Wilkinson went to the guardroom, but on the way he had five minutes’ vituperative conversation with Walker.

  “See ‘ere, you bloomin’ fool, that gun o’ yours is dirty, got that? It’s your job to see it’s clean, got that? And termorror mornin’ you’ll be up before the Cap’n, got that? Twenty-six days’ number one, that’s what you’re in for, got that? Now then, don’t answer me back; you’re for it. See?”

  At last the long arm of justice had fallen on the collar of the real culprit.

  Next morning there was a string of prisoners for company orders. The two Sergeants were marched in first.

  “Dirty barrel, sir,” Tallent had explained. “It was in a most filthy state. It’s the Sergeant’s business to see it’s clean, sir.”

  “H’m. Is this the gun I spoke to you about, Mr. Tallent?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “H’m, well, er, yes.” It was obviously the section officer’s fault that the barrel was dirty and yet he had to back up his officers. “Look here!” he blazed out. “You’re Sergeants, and are supposed to look after your section. You’ve got no excuse.…”

  “Please, sir.…”

  “Don’t answer me back, you’ve got no excuse whatever. It’s through Sergeants like you that the company will be losing its good name, do you see?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Well … er … let me see. There’s a twenty mile route march to-morrow, isn’t there, Sergeant-Major? I thought so. You’ll conduct it Sergeant Simpson, and Sergeant Henry, you’ll attend. March out.”

  Then Lance-Corporal Wilkinson was marched in.

  “A dirty barrel, sir,” explained the two Sergeants in unison. “It’s the Lance-Corporal’s job to see that the gun is cleaned. We can’t do it all, sir; we expect him to do that, sir. We have a lot to do, sir. What with guards, sir, and.…”

  “Yes, yes,” said the Captain. This was getting beyond a joke; still, he supposed he had to back up his Sergeants. If he didn’t punish the men his N.C.O.s brought up, they would cease to take interest in their work.

  But it was considerably less firmly that he addressed the Corporal.

  “It’s the Corporal’s job to see after his gun. If the gun’s dirty, it’s your fault.”

  “But, sir.…”

  “Don’t answer me back. I hold you responsible. Sergeant-Major, put Lance-Corporal Wilkinson down for Cookhouse Guard. March out.”

  And then, trembling and without excuse, Private Walker, No. 1352 of the 305th M.G. Company, was brought into the presence of Justice.

  “A dirty barrel, sir,” said Lance-Corporal Wilkinson. “It’s his fault. I allus says to my No. 1. ‘It’s you ‘as got to fire that there gun, an’ it’s up ter you ter see that it’s clean.’ That’s what I says, sir, to my No. 1. ‘No. 1,’ I says, sir.…”

  “Thank you, Corporal, quite enough. Now, is this the same gun?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Well, I am sick of it. I’ve heard enough about this beastly gun, and I am not going to hear any more. It’s wasted enough of my time already. Case dismissed. March out.”

  It was a story that had been told many times.

  “The leopard doesn’t change his spots,” thought Hugh. “I think I’ll take him as a runner. He’s the kind of man to keep me in a good humour in a place like this.”

  Walker’s gun team was posted in a sunken road that ran about a quarter of a mile behind No Man’s Land and joined the main communication trenches of a battalion front. The high banks of the road were scarred with the bare earth of funk-holes and lined with the stumps of trees whose latticed branches had once formed a green canopy over the green grasses, where weeds and wild fruit and flowers had rioted in confusion.

  At four o’clock on the following afternoon the greater part of the gun team was seated round the dug-out’s mouth, cleaning themselves, their rifles, the spare parts of the gun. One or two crouched, huddled in great-coats, their shirts across their knees, searching the seams for lice. With steady deliberation Walker announced his captures.

  “Twenty-seven, twenty-eight, twenty-nine. Damme if I don’t believe I’ll get my fifty.”

  “You’d better chuck it,” an old soldier counselled him. “You’ll never get rid of them things. Why, I was once seven weeks.…”

  The Corporal interrupted the discussion.

  “You let Walker alone, ‘e’s doin’ no harm by that, which is more than ‘e can usually say for himself. Did you ‘ear about wot ‘e did last relief?”

  Every man in the section had heard the story at least six times, but it was a good yarn, so they murmured “No.” They let the Corporal carry on.

  “Well, ‘e was carryin’ some belt boxes down to the dump and as they kept on slippin’ off his rifle, Walker ‘e looks round for a bit of rope to tie ‘em on with. Well, o’ course ‘e didn’t find any. So wot do you think ‘e does? ’E whips out ’is wire-cutters and goes up to a bit of telephone wire that was running alongside of the trench, and damme if ‘e doesn’t shear off a bit two yards long. ’E ties up ’is belt boxes and trots along to the dump perfectly happy and then next morning the Colonel’s telephone’s out of order, and Walker wonders why.”

  The story was greeted with the usual good-humoured laugh. From the main communication trench came the sound of a fatigue man singing:

  “There’s a good time coming for the ladies

  There’s a good time coming for the girls.…”

  The gun team caught up the refrain. For Walker it had associations.

  “I guess this lane’s seen a bit of cuddling in its time.”

  “Just like ’Ampstead on a Sunday.”

  “That’s where I used to go when I was walking out. There was always a nice shady spot somewhere round the Leg o’ Mutton pond. Could do with a little of it now.”

  The singing from the communication trench grew louder and nearer.

  “‘Ullo, ‘ere’s the water party back.”

  T
wo men with petrol cans slung round their shoulders, slithered down the track.

  “Any news?” they were asked, eagerly.

  “Sergeant Major’s gone on leaf.”

  “Good. Anythink else?”

  “Dunno for certain, but a gunner told me as ’ow ’e’d over’eard one of ’is orficers sayin’ as ’ow we were going out of the line for a three weeks’ rest soon.”

  “Good again.”

  Walker grunted ominously.

  “Don’t trust rumours like that. The army don’t do you a good turn unless it knows it can get its own back later on. A rest now only means the bloody salient a fortnight later.”

  “You’re a cheerful blighter!”

  “I’m an old soldier. I know their games.”

  “There’s no need to grumble even if you are.”

  “I don’t grumble.”

  “Don’t you! You grumble more than the rest of the ‘ole gun team put together.”

  “That’s because I’m tireder of the war than they are. What are we doing to-night, any’ow?”

  “What we allus do: deepen the emplacement, sandbag the dugout.”

  “As usual.”

  “As usual.”

  “As per bloody usual.”

  “And it’s time we was gettin’ busy on it,” the Corporal said.

  It was beginning to grow dark. The lilac of a winter sunset was fading into grey. The outline of an occasional lonely gable stood black against the sky. From behind the line came the rumble of heavy guns. The business of war resumed its suspended life. It was time to post sentries; to arrange the screens that would hide the gun flash, to send a party to the dump for rations.

  The arrival of the limbers provided the one excitement of trench life. It was the one thing in the daily routine that really mattered. Attacks might fail, a gun team might be wiped out, dug-outs might be wrecked. That was part of the inevitable machinery of war. One was prepared for that, but if anything went wrong with rations.…

  With the rations arrived the mail, the rum issue, rumours. The limber corporal was never without some sensation. Leave had been stopped; there was a big push up north; the Company was to be relieved next week. The men lived for rations. When it was over there was nothing left but to wait patiently till another twenty-four hours had passed.