Good Enough For Nelson

by John Winton

  At the pontoon at Sandquay, boats were arriving and leaving with feverish speed, as though a film of a peaceful day out on the river had been speeded up several times. The tooting of whistles, the figures of the boats’ crews, the washing of the water, once again took The Bodger back to his own days as a cadet. The river was still, as ever, the most evocative part of Dartmouth. Occasionally, after the thudding and rubbing sounds of a boat coming alongside, there was a sharper, louder clunking as one boat met another. Voices were then raised. Hot words were exchanged, and hard words. Phrases such as ‘rule of the road’ and ‘port to port’ and ‘you clumsy bugger’ came floating across the busy waters.

  As The Bodger watched, he noticed a slackening of the tempo of river life. The water seemed to be emptying of boats. The sailing dinghies were being drawn up on the floating pontoon. The motor-cutters were being secured alongside the main jetty, and their crews were taking off their life-jackets. A large yacht secured to a buoy out in the stream was being abandoned by her crew, who were rowing themselves ashore in a rubber dinghy.

  ‘What’s happening, Bo?’

  ‘You might well ask, Bodger. They’re all going to play cricket, would you believe? Somebody somewhere up there,’ the Bosun raised his eyes disgustedly to the sky, ‘has decreed that they’re all going to play cricket this afternoon. We’ve got a hundred bods ready to take their proficiency tests, and they’re always crying out for them to take them and just as you’ve got things going nicely, you can bet your old boots, whango whango, up the hill everybody, play cricket. I’m told they’re even getting people out of the sickbay,’ the Bosun added bitterly. ‘Giving ‘em pain-killing drugs and all, to keep ‘em on their feet while they play cricket.’

  The Bodger did not actually see anyone up on the playing fields under the influence of pain-killing drugs, but almost everybody else in the College was there. The Nine Cricket Games, as they came to be called, were the sort of concerted mass activity which the College always did well. It was team endeavour, translated on to a massive, almost a Homeric, scale. So many games of cricket had probably never been held simultaneously in the college before, but the problems had been overcome. The challenges had been surmounted, gear had been obtained, extra pitches marked out, and the games had all begun. Everywhere The Bodger looked, there was a game of cricket. The main pitches were all occupied and subsidiary ones had been created beside them. Some fielders were so close together and so uncertain of the rules that they were not sure which game they were actually playing in. Not all the pitches had proper stumps and not all the stumps proper bails. Not all the wicket-keepers had proper gloves, and some had improvised with leather gloves, fives gloves or woolly mittens of their own.

  The word had gone round and the games were being watched by a vast crowd, in carnival mood. Some of the College wives were there, wearing straw hats and summer dresses, and pushing children in push-carts. Older children eddied to and fro, in and out of the fringes of the nearest game.

  The divisional officers were also out in strength. One of them, Charlie Charleshaughton, also a gunnery officer, and in charge of the Jellicoe Division, strode round the field, singling out individual Jellicoes for his own brand of encouragement. ‘Bags of go, Jellicoe!’ he barked, wherever he recognised one of his flock. ‘Bags of go, Jellicoe!’ came the phrase, rising and falling, fading and strengthening, louder and softer, with a sort of divisional doppler effect, as Charlie Charleshaughton tacked around the field.

  The Gromboolians were in general delighted to be invited to play cricket. Some of them already played at home, and all of them considered it an essential part of coming to England, like watching the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace. For those who did not know the laws of the game, John Jemingham explained.

  John Jerningham, known as the Hon. John, was as near to the immaculate conception of what a very parfait naval officer should be as any naval officer ever could be. His linen was always perfectly clean, his tie always tied with an extra large and shiny knot, his uniforms always cut and worn with a flair that nobody else could ever quite match. The Bodger had served with him in the old Superb and knew that under the affectation of indolence, the Hon. John was a very able man.

  ‘Cricket is a very subtle game.’ the Hon. John was saying to an audience, mostly of Gromboolians. ‘It is probably the most subtle game in the world. But the rules are very simple. There are two sides, the batting side who are ‘in’, as it is termed, and the fielding side who are not in, but out, out, that is to say, on the field. Each side has one innings each, in some matches, two innings. To start an innings, the fielding side go out first, and then two batsmen from the side who are in go out, out on the field that is. Those two batsmen are in until the fielding side get one of them out in which case he comes in and another batsman goes out and he is in until they get him out. As each batsman is out he comes in and another one goes out until ten batsmen are out. The whole side are then out, and everybody comes in, including the eleventh batsman who is not out. However, although he is not out, he still comes in with everybody else. Now they have got the batting side out, the fielding side go in, while the side who were batting, having come in after being all out, go out to field. Once again, two batsmen from the side who are in go out and are in until they are out and come in again. So it goes on, until that side too are all out, and then everybody comes in again, and the match is over. Any questions? No? Well, now you all know the rules, you can all push off and play.’

  The Bodger intercepted Bungey One as he darted by with a piece of paper.

  ‘Congratulations. How did you manage to organise it? Did you split them up into those who had played before and those who hadn’t?’

  ‘Good Lord, no, sir, there wasn’t time for that. I got an alphabetical list of all the Officers Under Training and chopped them off, every eleven names.’ Bungey One looked down at his list. ‘So this game here, sir, nearest you, has Aaron, Abdulabia, Acland, Adrianovitch, Anson, and so on. That far one, right up there, beyond the pavilion, is where Wilson, Yashif, Young and Ziegler are playing, sir.’

  ‘Well done indeed.’

  ‘Yes sir, it’s simpler if you work to a system. The top name on the list of eleven is the captain of the side, and the second one is the wicketkeeper. Numbers three and four are the opening batsmen, numbers ten and eleven on the list are the opening bowlers. Everybody knows what they are supposed to be doing, that way, sir.’

  ‘I see.’

  The Bodger and Jimmy began to walk round the field, their progress marked by every eye. The fielders fielded more assiduously, the bowlers bowled more strenuously, and the batsmen batted more stoutly, wherever they chanced to look. And if a fielder stopped a ball, or a bowler got a wicket, or a batsman chanced to score a run while The Bodger was watching, he was envied by everybody in the game. Even the newest comer to Dartmouth knew that the surest and quickest way to commendation was by some startling feat on the games field.

  They stopped by one game, where the batting side were sitting on the grass slope or on the nearby steps leading up from one main playing field to the other. Looking over the scorer’s shoulder, The Bodger saw that the batting side were Bingley, Bombulada, Brightwell, Broad, Burslem, Callaghan, and so on.

  ‘Ey oop,’ one of the batting side was saying, as he helped another to put on his pads. ‘Ey oop, lad, they’re batting pads not shin pads.’ The lad clearly spoke as an expert on cricket, in a broad Yorkshire accent. With his ruddy face, his prominent cheek-bones and his tufty, straw-coloured hair, he even looked like a Yorkshireman. The Bodger was charmed and refreshed by the thought; so many Yorkshiremen he had met did not play cricket, just as so many Welshmen could not sing or play rugby football.

  ‘What’s your name?’ The Bodger asked.

  ‘Bingley, sir. John Bingley. From Bingley. In Yorkshire, sir.’

  ‘Isn’t that where Len Hutton comes from?’

  ‘Sir Leonard Hootton, sir,’ Bingley said, sharply. ‘No, that’s Poodsey, s
ir.’

  ‘Ah. And you play a lot of cricket, do you, Bingley?’

  ‘Oh yes. I’ve played it all me life. Love it. My father once had a trial for Yorkshire, sir.’

  ‘Ah,’ said The Bodger, recognising that in Bingley and in Pudsey, that was better than being a Knight of the Garter.

  The scorer was a coal-black Gromboolian.

  ‘What’s your name?’ The Bodger asked him.

  ‘Bombulada, sir.’

  ‘And where are you from?’

  ‘Nigeria, sir.’

  ‘Do you play cricket at home?’

  ‘Oh yes, sir, all the time.’

  ‘All the time? Why do you play it all the time?’

  ‘Well, sir, we dress eleven players in white flannels, sir, and put six wooden stumps in the ground a certain distance apart, and then one of the players picks up a little red ball and then the witch-doctor shouts “play”, sir.’

  Bombulada paused and looked at The Bodger.

  ‘Yes?’ said The Bodger helplessly, though already half-guessing what was to come.

  ‘Well, sir, as soon as they hear the word “play” sir, down comes the rain. Very powerful white man’s rain-making juju, sir.’

  While Jimmy and the batting side were all chuckling, The Bodger told himself, you asked for that. You walked straight into that with your chin sticking out. Bombulada’s shining black face was absolutely expressionless, and, as so often at Dartmouth, The Bodger could not be sure whether he was having his leg pulled or not. But twenty, or even ten years ago, such a conversation would have been impossible. Even now, it was a bold midshipman who cracked such a joke with the Captain of the College, that is, if it were a joke. Bombulada’s face gave no sign.

  A wicket fell in the adjacent game. There was some clapping and ‘Bags of go, Jellicoe!’ The Bodger and Jimmy moved on.

  As they went round the College The Bodger was interested and flattered to see that the process of supercession was already well under way. By slow but steady degrees, Jimmy’s status in the College was diminishing, whilst his own was growing. It was ever thus: the Captain is dead, long live the Captain. It was to him that the College would now be looking for professional direction, just as they would look to Julia for a social lead.

  ‘Julia on her way is she?’ Jimmy asked, as they walked along the front of the College towards the Captain’s house that evening.

  ‘In a day or two. She’s tying up a few loose ends after we sold our house in Scotland. Hello, what’s this?’

  It was the sound of many bass voices raised in rough harmony.

  ‘A British tar … is a soaring soul ... As free as a mountain … bird ... His energetic fist... should be ready to resist... A dictatorial word...’ The Massed Port and Starboard Britannia Choirs were in good voice, and working well. Their diction was surprisingly clear. Monsignor would be delighted.

  ‘His... foot should stamp and his throat should growl his hair should twirl and his face should scowl his eye should flash and his breast protrude and this should be his customary attitude . . . His attitude . . . His attitude . . . His ATTI .... TUDE...!’

  ‘Make it so,’ said The Bodger.

  CHAPTER IV

  The Bodger awoke with a start and knew exactly who and where he was. He was the Assyrian, to come down like a wolf on the fold. The Bodger sat bolt upright, and at once felt a violent pang in his temples. Seeing Jimmy Forster-Jones off the night before had been an arduous business. None of them, The Bodger conceded now, were as young as they were. And talking of the young, it was time for The Bodger to be up and about. Even now the little woolly lambs were assembling. The Bodger put on old sailing trousers, and an old submarine frock, and went outside.

  It was just after six o’clock, on a summer morning at Dartmouth. The harbour was hidden in a pearly mist which came lapping up the hill as far as the edge of the parade ground, so that the flagstaff seemed to be rising directly out of a foaming mysterious sea. Sounds of town and harbour in the early morning floated up through the mist, their impact and meanings blurred and filtered. The hard ground underfoot was damp, there was dew on the grass, and somewhere a lark was singing. It was summer at Dartmouth, and a moment just out of The Bodger’s memories. This was just as it had been. It was true that the place had a rejuvenating effect. The middle-aged came to it to refresh themselves, as though to drink from youth.

  There was a figure lurking on the parapet, in a beret and a woolly pully with lieutenant commander’s stripes on the shoulders. It was, unbelievably, the Captain’s Secretary.

  ‘Good morning, Scratch, what are you doing here?’

  ‘Good morning, sir. I’m here for the SLACOUT’s EMAs, sir.’

  ‘The what?’

  The Bodger fancied that his Secretary was looking at him almost pityingly. ‘The Supplementary List Aircrew Officers Under Training’s early morning activities, sir.’

  The Bodger was no wiser, but he was far more interested in the Secretary’s presence, there, at that time. Officers of the Supply and Secretariat Branch were not noted for early activities, even when they were only watching them. One could expect a Captain’s Secretary to get up with the lark, if there was a lark getting up at a reasonable hour, after colours.

  ‘But why you, Scratch?’

  ‘I’m affiliated to Hawke Division, sir. One of the DOs has to be present for every divisional activity, sir.’

  The Bodger mentally kicked himself. He should have known that. He did know that, but the early hour had fuddled him.

  As so often at Dartmouth, the peacefulness of the scene was strenuously at odds with the frantic activity of its inhabitants. There was a rapid thudding of running feet and a ragged platoon in shirts and singlets came doubling round the corner of the parade ground, crossed in front of the flagstaff, and disappeared to The Bodger’s left.

  ‘Brace up there, Hawkes!’ barked the Secretary, so suddenly that The Bodger jumped. ‘You’re a shambles, Hawkes!’

  On an impulse, The Bodger ran down and followed them. As he swung round the end of the ramp and began to run uphill he was surprised and delighted to find how quickly and easily he could catch them up. The last runner in the platoon, a Gromboolian, glanced round when he fancied he heard The Bodger’s footsteps and the whites of his eyes showed when he realised who his pursuer was. He accelerated. The Bodger matched him. He spurted again, and again The Bodger responded. All at once, the young man seemed to give up and, so suddenly The Bodger almost ran over him, he stopped, turned round, fell on his knees, and put his hands together in an appealing gesture of supplication. The Bodger reeled back from him, amazed.

  ‘It was me, sir.’

  ‘It was you what?’ said The Bodger, trying to control his hard breathing. He was not nearly as fit as he had thought.

  ‘It was me, sir.’

  ‘You what?’

  ‘Me using all those rolls of bog-papers, sir. Hundreds and thousands of them, sir.’

  The Bodger’s mind staggered back from yet another surrealist Dartmouth conversation.

  ‘You have found me out, sir, and discovered me. So you are following me up the hill, sir.’

  A harsh imperious voice sailed down the hill from the direction of the tennis courts. ‘Come on Qureshi, you bloody skulker, get up this hill before I have to come down and boot you up here! Qureshi, do you hear me?’

  Qureshi rolled the whites of his eyes at The Bodger again. ‘It’s excusing me now, sir, please.’ Qureshi unfolded himself gracefully and fluidly to his feet, saluted with a delicate flip of his hand, and then ran off, with his hands firmly clasped together, as in prayer.

  As The Bodger was still marvelling over the encounter, actually wondering whether it had ever happened, another midshipman in shorts and singlet came doubling down the other way, towards the river. He stopped at The Bodger’s wave, though still marking time smartly on the spot. Finally he stood to attention, his thumbs correctly in line with the seams on his shorts.

  There was something familia
r about his face. He was the same midshipman who had been doubling down the drive when The Bodger first drove up on his first morning. Now that The Bodger came to consider it more carefully, he had seen this young man doubling around the College on other occasions. In fact, he was always doubling round the College. The Bodger was reluctant to ask, fearful of unleashing some further improbability.

  ‘Haven’t I seen you before, doubling about the place?’

  ‘Yes, sir. I’m under punishment, sir.’

  ‘What for? What did you or didn’t do?’

  ‘Slack doubling at EMAs, sir.”

  The boy’s face was still familiar, in some other, more remote way, which set The Bodger’s memory prickling. ‘What’s your name?’

  ‘Persimmons, sir.’

  ‘And what entry are you, Persimmons?’

  ‘Basic B, sir.’

  ‘And what’s that?’

  ‘We take an exam, sir, and then the interview, sir, and then we come here, sir.’

  ‘No university course, or anything like that?’

  ‘No, sir. We just come here, sir, and then go to sea, sir. If we pass, sir.’

  ‘How very refreshing to hear that.’ It was indeed refreshing to meet a young man with a recognisable training scheme. But Persimmons himself did not look refreshed. In fact, he looked tired out. There was a weary stoop to his shoulders and he had a lack-lustre way of answering questions, odd in so young a man. The Bodger’s memory still troubled him.

  ‘Tell me ... Are you ... Have you got any relatives in the Navy?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’ Persimmons was obviously reluctant. ‘My father is an admiral.’

  Black Sebastian! Involuntarily, The Bodger stepped back half a pace at that name. Admiral Sir Jasper Abercrombie Sebastian Persimmons KGB, DSO and Bar, DSC and Bar, the ex-submariner who had forsaken the trade and become the most ferocious submarine hunter ever read of in books or dreamed of in dreams. Now Sixth Sea Lord, a power in the Service, and still a name to cow disobedient children.