A Test to Destruction

by Henry Williamson

  “Oh yes, you fire flintlock muskets from a forked hand-rest, don’t you, on Guy Fawkes’ Day?”

  “Don’t let the talkin’ stop the drinkin’,” said Phillip, emptying his glass.

  “Shall we continue playing in accordance with the rules of the Portland Club, partner?” said Swayne blandly.

  “Yes, let’s be posh,” said the major.

  “‘Posh’? I don’t understand thieves’ slang, major.”

  “You would if ever you’d been in the ranks, Swayne.”

  “But I have been in the ranks, major.”

  “In what lot?”

  So far all had been in fun; now it looked as though Swayne was turning nasty.

  “Lot? What were you in civvy street, an auctioneer, major? Oh, you mean what regiment! I do beg your pardon, major! Naturally, the Army Service Corps would never have heard of the Honourable Harquebus Corps.”

  “Oh yes, I ’ave. I’ve seen your fellers in the Lord Mayor’s Show. As I said, it takes all sorts to make a world.”

  Coupar roared with laughter, while Swayne said, suddenly very quiet, “What were you doing when the Lord Mayor’s Procession went by, major? Selling souvenirs on the kerb, with a hawker’s licence and little tray?”

  “Oh bollocks to you, Swayne,” said Coupar.

  “We don’t want to know what you had for breakfast, you pox-doctor’s clerk!”

  Almost grimly the major took the other pack, shuffled and cut to Swayne, who dealt. Phillip found Mr. Bones the Butcher among his cards. Someone had been playing Happy Families.

  “God’s Body,” said Coupar. “Did I deal this sewage? Definitely no bid,” as he swigged his glass of wine.

  “Doubled,” said Phillip, filling the glasses.

  “Bloody fool, you can’t double nothing,” said Swayne.

  “Yes you can. Double nothing is nothing.”

  “You mean, ‘No bid’ I presume, partner?” Swayne shook his head as though sadly, and said, “This fellow drinks his bathwater.”

  “YOUR CALL, SWINE!” yelled Coupar.

  “It’s mine,” said the major. “I can’t do anything.”

  “Try eating oysters,” said Swayne. “And your reply will then be, ‘content’.”

  “How kind of you to correct my ignorance, Swayne.”

  “Impotence, major.”

  “Five no trumps,” said Coupar.

  “You’re all bloody mad,” said Swayne.

  “I’ll bid eight no trumps,” said Phillip.

  “You’re blotto. There isn’t such a call!”

  “But I’ve just made it!”

  “It’s not ‘in the rules of the Portland Club’,” mimicked Coupar.

  “All right, I’ll make it nine no trumps!”

  “I’ll double that,” said Coupar.

  “That isn’t ‘in the rules of the Portland Club’, either,” said the major. “Is it, Swayne?”

  “You’ve never been inside the Portland, major!”

  “Where’s that?” asked Coupar. “Among the harlots around Paddington, you ponce?”

  “Ask the major, Copper Nob.”

  “I’ve stood just about enough from you, Swayne,” said the major. “I’ve just about had enough of your swanking ways!” The major looked quite pale.

  “Don’t take any notice of old Swine, he’s pissed as arseholes, major.”

  “Tell me, partner,” said Phillip, challenging Swayne, “Do the Portland Club rules expressly forbid a player calling nine of a suit?”

  “I’ve just told you.”

  “You said ‘it stands to reason’. Does it also stand to the Portland Club rules?”

  “I don’t suppose they do, any more than they state any other negative, such as ‘you don’t gargle with your wine’, or——”

  “Drink your bath-water?” suggested Coupar.

  “Very well, I call ten no trumps!”

  “And I double ten no trumps,” retorted Coupar, banging his fist on the table so hard that a glass jumped off.

  “Redoubled!” cried Phillip, balancing his glass on his head, in imitation of Major Maurice Baring at Advanced G.H.Q. in 1917.

  “Steady on, lads,” said the major. “Miss Shore won’t care for a rough ’ouse.”

  Phillip laid down his cards, including Mr. Bones the Butcher.

  Swayne jumped up, bawling, “This man’s a card sharper!”

  “Come on, get a decent pack, and stop mucking about, everyone,” said Coupar. “Where’s the booze? Christ, the bottle’s empty! You’ve swigged it all!” to Phillip. “What are you here for? Dypsomania?”

  “That’s right, he’s dipped it too much,” said Swayne.

  “I kept two bottles in reserve,” said the major. He went down on hands and knees before a grandfather clock in a corner of the room. “One club,” his voice said, as he bumped into the case, which set the weights within thumping, whereupon the works began to click and whirr and the clock struck fifteen times.

  “I told you, everything about this place is dippy,” sighed Swayne, looking as though he were about to renounce the world. “The f——g clock’s just called fifteen no trumps!”

  “Steady on, Swayne!” said the major, still on hands and knees before his secret cellar.

  “It’s Maddison’s call,” said Coupar.

  “Sixteen no bumps!” as the major came back with two bottles.

  “Half a tick,” said the major. “We don’t want to leave evidence about, in case Miss Shore comes in,” and taking the empty bottles, he hid them inside the clock case. Then he refilled the glasses; Phillip put his back on his head.

  “Your call, major,” said Swayne, winking at the other two. He had dealt the major all the court cards during the visit to the clock.

  “One club,” said the major.

  “No bid.”

  “No.”

  “No.”

  Phillip led a small heart. Coupar, the major’s partner, immediately spread his cards as though opening a fan on the green baize table. “Yarborough,” he said. “Bad luck, partner.”

  Major Wetley took out his pipe and began to fill it. He lit the tobacco and puffed steadily until a cloud of smoke hung over the table. Then he examined the fuming crown of tobacco, and with the matchbox tamped it level.

  “Take your time, partner,” said Coupar. “We’ve each got another two weeks in this ’ere skrimshankers’ ’ome.”

  “The major starts off with a gas attack,” said Swayne. “It only wants a few belches to complete the picture of a genuine old Aly Sloper’s Cavalryman’s idea of a battle.”

  “Let me tell you this, Swayne,” replied Major Wetley, putting his pipe on the table, “I never had a single bearing, big, little, or main, run in any one of my engines in my convoy the whole time I was in France! And shall I tell you why? ‘More haste, less speed’ was my motto, and I had the loyalest lot of drivers any man could wish for.”

  “Yes, at six bob a day pay!” said Coupar. “They stuck loyally to their cushy jobs, of course they did! And pinched the soldiers’ rum and rations!”

  “You deserve the O.B.E., major,” remarked Swayne, as the major, taking up his pipe, puffed furiously to keep the damp tobacco alight. “My God, what are you smoking? ‘Wayside Returns’?”

  “Don’t you like it? It’s ‘Tortoiseshell Shag’, Swayne.”

  “Well tortoises don’t shag very quickly as a rule, I’ll agree.”

  “Quite a lot of it is smoked among pore people.” The major belched several times. “Pardon. I’ve got indigestion.”

  “Come come, major, this isn’t Rowton House! Although I’ll admit it’s beginning to smell like that stately ’ome.”

  “Oh, so you’ve lived there, Swayne, have you?” said Coupar.

  “I happen to like ‘Tortoiseshell Shag’ and also it’s cheap, Swayne.”

  “You’re not ‘pore’, major. You’ve got plenty of money. What is it an A.S.G. major gets, twenty-four bob a day? And no mess bills to pay! You must be ‘rolling in
t’ brass’, major.”

  “Twenty-four shillings a day don’t go very far when a man’s got two boys to educate, Swayne. You’re only a young man, and won’t know what responsibility for a family entails.”

  “I don’t want to know either. Where are your sons at school, Harrow?”

  “You know perfectly well that a man like me would not be able to afford such an education for his sons, Swayne,” said the major, putting down his pipe again. “Now I’ll ask you a question, Swayne. Where were you educated?”

  “He wasn’t,” said Coupar. “He’s the most ignorant sod that ever broke his pore mother’s heart. ‘Swing, swing together’—all bloody crooks in ‘lovely summer weather’.”

  “Where were you, Copper Nob?” asked Swayne.

  “Epsom.”

  “Never ’eard of it. Oh yes, of course, ‘Where the salts come from’. You look as though a dose would do you good. Where were you, major?”

  “I was educated at the Polytechnic, Swayne. And talking about Epsom salts, I feel I could do with some now. This wine is beginning to play Old Harry with my interior economy.” He tapped his stomach.

  Coupar gave him a hearty slap on the back, which shook the cards out of the major’s hand and on to the floor.

  “Christ, the old four-flusher! He’s got every court card in the pack and only called ‘one club’!”

  The major collected his cards, “Ah, that’s better,” as up came wind. “I feel better now. Thanks.” He began to re-sort his hand laboriously, before laying the cards face up on the table.

  “I don’t see as ’ow I could lose a trick. Any’ow, I’ll risk it.”

  “Four arse-pieces, four kings, four queens, and the knave of clubs,” remarked Swayne. “What a nerve you’ve got, major! Trust the A.S.C. to be cheese-paring! They pinch most of the troops’ rations as it is. One mouldy club! ‘What did you do in the Great War, Daddy?’ ‘I “won” the fighting soldiers’ rations, dear, I never went faster than eight miles an hour, glued to the wheel, eyes sweeping the road ahead, and then when I got to my journey’s end I called one club.”’

  “Too true, I never exceeded eight miles per hour with any of my lorries,” said the major. “So you’re right there, Swayne.”

  “Otherwise the horrible harquebusses would have been shaken to bits,” laughed Phillip.

  “Who the hell are you grinning at?” said Swayne, looking at Phillip. “What ‘lot are you from’, as the major would say?”

  “Oh various lots, here and there.”

  “You don’t mind my asking?”

  “Not at all. I used to ask personal questions myself.”

  “That’s got you, Swine!”

  Ignoring Coupar, Swayne went on, “Have you been out?”

  “I think so.”

  “Where were you?”

  “Oh, here and there.”

  “Royal Staybacks, weren’t you?” said Coupar, winking.

  “Were you ever in the firing line?” persisted Swayne.

  “For a short time.”

  “Who were you with?”

  “I kicked off with a battalion of the London Regiment.”

  “Oh, the Gor’ blimey boys!”

  “What’s the H.H.C. then, if they’re not Gor’ blimey boys dolled up?” said Coupar, winking again at Phillip.

  “If you want to know, the H.H.C. is recruited among gentlemen.”

  “With obvious exceptions,” remarked Coupar.

  “Anyway, which battalion of the London Regiment were you?” went on Swayne, staring at Phillip.

  “London Highlanders.”

  “The real stuff,” said Coupar. “Not like Swayne’s Saturday Afternoon Wet Bobbed Brummagen Fireguards. Look at him! Look at old Swine! Just take a look at him! Look, I ask you! Look at his bloody face! Saturday afternoon guardsman, guarding what, you may well ask! Sweet Fanny Adams! He fancies himself in that tunic, obviously. Doesn’t know what a perfect twott he looks in it. Look at the silly sod! Did you ever see anything like it? Got as far as the base and came home with corns on his arse!”

  “If I look a twott, you look like a bloody horse-collar, with that wide grinning mug,” said Swayne, flushing. “At least I didn’t go sick as soon as I got to the base with non-existent rheumatism!”

  “Like hell I did! You had trench fever in Piccadilly as soon as they combed you out of the Pay Corps!”

  “You bore me, Coupar. Come on, shuffle the cards. What’s the score, partner?”

  “Suck it and see,” answered Coupar, hurling the scoring pad at Swayne. Cards followed. Over went the table. Swayne removed his belt. Coupar began to tear off his tunic, thus exposing a soft front of chest and belly in one contour.

  “Steady boys, mind what you’re at,” said the major, looking up from probing his teeth with a pencil point.

  “Permit me to help with your sons’ education,” replied Swayne, emptying his pockets of loose cash, and throwing the coins into the major’s lap.

  Phillip, wine glass still on head, waited for the scrap; but once his shirt-sleeves were tucked up Coupar seized the remaining full bottle of wine, together with an empty bottle, and began a juggling act.

  “Steady on,” said the major, as the full bottle fell on Swayne’s toes.

  “You bag of guts, you did that deliberately,” shouted Swayne, kicking Coupar on the rump, so that he fell sprawling.

  “By Jesus, I won’t stand for that!” he yelled, getting up.

  Phillip put down his glass and got between them. Swayne turned on him, Phillip squared up to Swayne. Coupar picked up the card table and drove at both. All three collapsed on the floor.

  “That’s enough!” said the major, absent-mindedly breaking the pencil point between his teeth. “No rough housing, boys. You know the unwritten rules of hospitality.” He tried to blow the point out, producing hissing noises in Swayne’s direction.

  “Ah, it’s always the unwritten rules that count in life, major,” retorted Swayne, getting up. “As, for example, the unwritten rule that a field officer is protected by his rank from hearing from his juniors what they really think about him and the chemical muck he calls wine!”

  “Well, you’ve said enow’ about my wine already, Swayne, but if there’s owt else worryin’ you, out wi’ it, man!”

  “Your rank forbids, major!”

  “There’s no rank in a convalescent home, we’re all equal ’ere as far as I am concerned, Swayne.”

  “Very well, in my opinion you’re an absolute outsider.” Swayne, his eyes bloodshot, glared at the major. The major looked down, saying nothing.

  “Hold hard!” said Phillip. “I think you should apologise to the major for that remark, Swayne, which was in gross bad taste!”

  “‘Gross’ is pronounced with a long ‘o’, as in ‘grocers’,” said Swayne. “Who are you to tell me what is good taste, when you can’t even pronounce the King’s English?”

  “Will you fight?”

  “Touché, what?”

  “Put up your hands!”

  “Oh, don’t let’s have quarrelling, boys. It’s all my fault, so I ask pardon of all. I’m afraid I don’t know much about red wine. They told me where I bought it that it was the stuff they drank in the Foreign Legion. It’s rather on the acid side, I think. I’ve got some bicarbonate of soda upstairs. If you’ll excuse me, I’ll go and get some. I find it a good standby.”

  The major staggered away, hissing and sucking, and came back with a wooden pill-box, which he offered round. Phillip put two tablets in his glass, then took them out and ground them up between finger and thumb; and when he dropped the pieces into the glass, the red wine fizzed and changed to green.

  “It’s bloody conjuror’s wine!” said Swayne. “I thought the major had a look of the Mad Magician about him. If this is what they drink in the Foreign Legion, no wonder they go periodically cafard.” He put three tablets in his mouth. Phillip drank his green wine. Coupar chewed away. Soon all four were belching.

  “That was it,�
� said the major. “Acidity! Flatulence! It’s all my fault, as I said just now.”

  “After all, the French make petrol out of this stuff for their camions,” said Swayne.

  “Alcohol, or what they call alcool, surely,” said Phillip, recalling mechanics in a comic French film carrying huge cans lettered alcool, in the Electric Palace when he was a boy. “Well, thank you for a jolly good birthday party, major.”

  The major looked grateful. Not to be outdone, Swayne said with a gracious manner, “My dear major, I do apologise for my stupid remarks. It was a most amusing party. Would you all care to be my guests at the Pier Hotel across the water, and crack a bottle of bubbly?”

  “Thank you very much, Swayne, but I think I’ll go to bed, after I’ve cleared up this little fracas. It’s just as well Miss Shore was out, I think. Don’t you bother, I can do it. I’ll get rid of the bottles, too, and wash out the glasses.”

  “How about you, Maddison?”

  “I’m supposed to be in bed, Swayne, so I think I should stay here. By the way, were you at Bullecourt in May ’17? That was where Bill Whiting got his V.C.”

  “I was there, in Bill’s company!”

  “I heard about it, I was with the M.G.C. then. Your chaps put up a wonderful show. But then the H.H.C. is a corps d’élite!”

  “With the London Highlanders,” bowed Swayne. “No ill feelings?”

  “On the contrary!”

  “Come on Swayne, before Miss Shore gets back.”

  “I can’t bear that bloody old woman!” said Swayne, winsomely to Phillip. “Have you met her yet?”

  “Oh yes.”

  “Well——!”

  When the other two had gone, the major said, “I usually brew myself a cup of tea at this time, would you care to join me?”

  In the wardrobe at the other end of the Major’s bedroom Phillip saw fishing rods standing in one corner. The major said he spent some of his time fishing for pollock and codling, and had had some good sport off the rocks by Pendennis point. Soon they were like old friends. The major told him he was born in Staffordshire, and had had a haulage business before the war. Had Phillip been to the Potteries? Or read anything of Arnold Bennett’s? He was a fine writer, and his Five Towns novels would become part of English literature. He offered to lend him a copy of Clayhanger. While the tea was brewing, Phillip glanced at the book, saw a passage about the fires of the kilns glowing in the smoky night, and decided that he must read it.