by David Lodge
‘This kind of self-mutilation is of course not unknown in times of war. Soldiers on active service have been known to take this drastic step in order to be invalided out of the Army. Of course in actual combat it is possible to claim that the mutilation was in fact a wound, for self-mutilation is a serious military offence. Higgins may not have known this, or not thought about it; or perhaps he hoped to pass off the mutilation as an accident. Anyway, supposing that this was Higgins’s intention, you have heard Inspector Jordon explain what might have happened. The rifle, which you have seen, is a long, heavy weapon. Higgins may have rested the butt on the ground, and stooped, or perhaps knelt, to get his thumb on the trigger, while holding his left hand outstretched in front of the barrel, or against the mouth of the barrel. Then, through nervousness, clumsiness, any one of a dozen causes, he may have slipped, overbalanced, or the rifle may have skidded on the wet grass so that when the weapon exploded, the barrel was pointing not at his finger, but at his body. This, perhaps, was the “accident” to which Higgins referred with his dying breath.
‘How does such a hypothesis fit in with the rest of the evidence? We have a young man, deeply unhappy in the Army, and no doubt desperately anxious to escape from it. Not sufficiently desperate to contemplate suicide, perhaps, against which he would have religious, and ordinary human scruples. But still capable of seizing on any other expedient, however drastic. On the day of the rifle-practice his unhappiness reaches a climax. He fails humiliatingly at the rifle-firing. He is roughly reprimanded by his N.C.O. He is told that he will be “back-squadded”—that is, he will have to begin all over again the training he has hated so much. But at the same time he is left alone in possession of a weapon with a live round in it. It is unlikely, I think, that the idea of mutilating himself should have occurred to him out of the blue at that moment. But you have heard his friend, Trooper Brady, recall that he had casually mentioned self-mutilation in Higgins’s presence. The reference was clearly made in jest: Brady and some other soldiers were joking about ways of getting out of the Army. But the suggestion may have lodged in Higgins’s mind, with the tragic result that we know. If so, it is scarcely necessary to say that Trooper Brady has no cause to feel in any way responsible. Only a somewhat unbalanced mind could have taken his joke seriously.
‘Well gentlemen, I have put to you the alternative explanations of Higgins’s death as clearly as I can. You may feel that none of the explanations can be proved beyond reasonable doubt. In that case you would have to return an open verdict.…’
After retiring for three-quarters of an hour, the jury returned an open verdict. But neither Mike nor I had any doubt that Percy had met his death by trying to shoot off his trigger finger and, characteristically, had bungled the operation.
It was a shock to Mike, but to me merely a surprise. I was mildly piqued at not having perceived the significance of the fact that Percy was left-handed. The shrewd and careful investigation of the Coroner’s Court drew from me a half-grudging respect for ‘our British Institutions’. It had been an interesting experience, but I was glad that Percy’s death, with all its attendant inconveniences, was over and done with. Or was it? I wondered, looking at Mike huddled in the corner of the truck that was taking us back to camp. In defiance of regulations he was smoking, frowning as he drew deeply on the cigarette. In the presence of the other soldiers who had been witnesses at the inquest, conversation was imprudent, but I guessed what he was brooding about: the probability, revealed to him for the first time as he stood in public view in the witness box, that his casual joke about shooting off one’s trigger finger had suggested to Percy an escape route from his private military hell that led to his death. It was a remark that anyone might have made, and had I done so, my conscience would not have been troubled. But Mike’s mind did not work like mine, and I had a feeling that behind that frown a guilt-complex was already in gestation.
But I was wrong; or at least Mike said I was wrong. We didn’t have the opportunity to speak openly until we were in the train that took us from Richmond to Darlington, on our way to London for the long-delayed seventy-two. As it was a Thursday evening there were few passengers in the train, and we had a compartment to ourselves. I said as casually as I could:
‘You’re not worrying about what you said to Percy, are you?’
‘What I said to Percy?’
I couldn’t decide whether he genuinely hadn’t caught my meaning, but his answer when I was more specific was reassuring.
‘Oh no. I’m not “blaming myself”, if that’s what you mean. If Percy was that desperate … it doesn’t really matter where he got the idea from.’
‘What’s on your mind then? You don’t look too happy. After all, they didn’t come to a verdict of suicide. Isn’t that what you wanted?’
‘But don’t you see?’ he burst out, dragging off his beret, and running his fingers through his coarse red hair. ‘Don’t you see? Don’t you see what fools we’ve been? By trying to protect Percy from a verdict of suicide, we had to protect Baker. But it was totally unnecessary. Baker was responsible for Percy’s death; without him Percy would never have tried to mutilate himself. Now he’s going to get off scot-free.’
‘I wouldn’t be so sure. Remember what the Coroner said. And there’s the regimental inquiry.’
Mike merely said: ‘We’ll see,’ and relapsed into a moody silence. Then he said:
‘The young fool.’
‘Who?’
‘Percy. What did he think he could gain by shooting off his finger? He’d have been court-martialled straight away. How was he going to explain it?’
I began to take an academic interest in the problem. ‘Yes, he’d have been better advised to shoot off his big toe. I believe they used to do that in the War. It’s easier to explain as an accident.’
Mike regarded me suspiciously, as if he thought I was being too detached. I continued hastily:
‘The whole thing’s full of tragic irony. After all, if there were seven holes in the other target, at least three of them must have been Percy’s. He couldn’t have been such a bad shot after all.’
Mike nodded gloomily. ‘You’d think,’ he said, ‘that some of the other witnesses would have had the guts to tell the Coroner how beastly Baker was to Percy all along.’
This seemed so irrational, that I made no reply. The train trundled sluggishly through the dark, misty countryside. I was suddenly filled with impatience to get home.
‘Will you get to Hastings tonight?’ I asked.
‘I’m not going home this week-end,’ he replied. ‘I couldn’t face it.’
‘But won’t your family expect you?’
‘I didn’t tell them about the leave. I’m staying with some friends in London.’
‘Oh,’ I said, surprised. Then I added: ‘What about meeting somewhere in London on Sunday, and coming back together?’
‘Good idea.’
‘Where then? And what time?’
‘Have a drink with me on Sunday. Could you manage two o’clock?’
‘Maybe,’ I said doubtfully. I wanted very much to meet Mike, but I knew it would upset my parents if I missed the ritual of Sunday dinner.
‘I’ll be at O’Connell’s Club. It’s just off the Tottenham Court Road. Ask the doorman for me.’
‘O.K., I’ll try and make it. I might be a bit late.’
‘I’ll be there till about three.’
Darlington Station seemed more than ever like a frontier post: on the broad, busy platform where the London expresses pulled in, one inhaled liberty with the sulphurous air. It was a relief to see, for the first time in weeks, people who had no connection at all with the Army. But in another way this made one more keenly aware of one’s exclusion from the free world. In our coarse, ill-fitting uniforms and clumsy boots, we lost the right to be considered as individuals; we were marked out as ‘soldiers’, an inferior species of humanity. The middle-aged woman in our compartment of the London train eyed us over her Harper’s Ba
zaar with vague alarm, as if she expected to be raped at any moment. Her presence inhibited conversation, and in a way I was glad. Matching Mike’s concern over Percy’s death was becoming rather a strain. Lapped around by the warm upholstery and the fug, I surrendered to sleep.
I was surprised by my own excitement as we approached London. The northern suburbs flashed past, and then, more slowly, the dingy, sooty environs of King’s Cross. I went into the corridor and put my head out of the window, watching the great engine picking its way delicately over the points. It seemed impossible that I had been away for only two months.
‘Cor, ain’t it bleeding marvellous to be back in the dear old Smoke,’ said a Cockney soldier behind me.
It was.
FOUR
AFTER LUNCH I sat on my bed polishing brasses for the guard-duty. It was a hot day, and the other occupants of the hut lay prone on their beds, held back on the brink of sleep by the dance music from somebody’s portable radio. At 1.45 the programme changed to ‘Listen With Mother’. We listened solemnly to the nursery rhymes and tales of anthropomorphous railway engines.
In the afternoon I went round the camp with Roy Ludlow, checking the P.R.I. inventory. Panes of glass in the carpenters’ shop; mowing machines in the gardeners’ shed; vacuum cleaners in the technical museum; armchairs in the unit Quiet Room; heaps of broken electrical equipment in a deserted Nissen hut…. It was the busiest day I had had at Badmore for a long time.
When we got back to the ‘A’ Squadron Offices, Henry the barber was in action. He toured the camp every week, visiting a different section each day.
He was a sleek, dapper little man, with a neat, black moustache, and thin, black, oiled hair combed straight back from his widow’s peak. The usual Army barber is a kind of half-tamed sheep-shearer, but Henry was a true representative of his ancient trade: I felt sure that somewhere in the case where he kept his scissors and combs, there was a razor and cupping-bowl. He really belonged to some marbled emporium, applying the mysterious arts of hot towels and vibro-massage, discreetly urging the beneficial effects of brightly-coloured and exotically-named hair lotions. His various working-places at Badmore could scarcely have been more different. He cut ‘A’ Squadron’s hair, for instance, in the Unit Sports Store, which adjoined the Squadron Offices, surrounded by piles of mud-encrusted football jerseys, taking his equipment as he needed it from his battered case. His customers did not pay him personally: each man had sixpence per week stopped from his pay for one haircut per week, whether he wanted it or not. There was thus no incentive to Henry to give individual attention, and yet he did. Poised on the balls of his feet, he snipped deftly at our hair, delicately adjusting personal tastes to the exigencies of Army regulations; while from the corner of his mouth dribbled a constant stream of banter, gossip, innuendo and—to anyone above a lance-corporal—servile flattery. Since Henry was paid by the P.R.I. he was particularly deferential to me.
I deliberately left it late before going to get a haircut: I wanted to be Henry’s last client. When I entered the Sports Store there were only two customers: Roy Ludlow was in the chair, and his pal Connolly was waiting. Henry was in the middle of one of his salacious anecdotes.
‘… he was up and down, up and down, faster than a barmaid’s knickers——’
Connolly, who hadn’t heard the expression before, guffawed.
‘Good afternoon, Corporal!’ Henry greeted me. ‘I didn’t expect to see you again.’
‘Neither did I, Henry. The bastards have put me on guard tonight.’
Henry clucked sympathetically. ‘That’s hard, that is; and you being released on Wednesday.’
‘Go on, Henry,’ said Ludlow, anxious to hear the rest of the story.
‘No, I’m sorry,’ said Henry firmly. ‘Corporal Browne is a pure-minded young man. I wouldn’t want to scandalize him.’
‘Fugg off,’ protested Connolly derisively.
‘How old are you?’ Henry asked him.
‘Eighteen. Why?’
‘Eighteen, and using language like that,’ sighed Henry, shaking his head with every appearance of real concern. ‘What would your mother say?’
‘She don’t know anythink about it. I don’t swear when I’m at ’ome. ’Sa funny thing that,’ he continued reflectively. ‘In camp I’m fugging and blinding all day long, and when I’m at ’ome I don’t say nothink except maybe “soddit”, and me ma says that ’erself when she’s burnt the joint or somethink.’
‘Thanks, Henry.’
Ludlow got up from the chair, running a finger round the inside of his collar. ‘See you,’ he added to Connolly. As his heavy footsteps receded I pondered the truth of Connolly’s observation. For us soldier-commuters ‘home’ and ‘camp’ were two disparate, self-contained worlds, with their own laws and customs; every week we passed from one to the other and back again, changing like chameleons to melt into the new environment. At home I drank tea without sugar; in camp I drank the common, intensely sweetened brew. They seemed like totally different drinks. The particular instance Connolly had stumbled on had more serious implications. I had been swearing more and more steadily as my military service lengthened and approached its end. At Catterick Mike and I had, by tacit agreement, abstained from using obscene language, as a kind of gesture, a way of signalling our resistance to the brutalizing forces of the Army. My present free use of obscenity was a measure of how far I had moved from those days of stubborn non-conformity.
‘Now, Corporal,’ said Henry, shaking Connolly’s glossy curls from his cape.
I seated myself on the hard wooden chair, and Henry tucked the cape round my neck with his cool, moist fingers.
‘Not too much off, Henry.’
‘I know. Just enough to get past the inspection tonight. Who’s Orderly Officer?’
‘The Adjutant.’
‘Hmm. I’d better take a bit off the sides then. He’s a great one for having the sideboards level with the ears, is the Adjutant.’
‘O.K., Henry, you know best. But remember, I’m released on Wednesday.’
‘Trust me, Corporal. Nobody will know you’ve been in the Army.’
‘I don’t know about that. I shall feel like shouting it to everyone I meet.’
‘Glad to get out eh? Well, it’s not surprising. I won’t say I didn’t enjoy my time in the Army. But that was different. France and Belgium at the end of the war.’
‘I shouldn’t have thought that was very enjoyable. There were some pretty tough campaigns then, weren’t there?’
‘Oh I kept well out of that. I was batman to a captain on the general staff. We were in Paris after the liberation; then Brussels. Lovely. Those French women, they were so grateful they were fighting to sleep with you. Exhausting it was, in the end.’
‘That reminds me, Henry,’ I said, grasping the opportunity. ‘I want some French letters off you.’
The snip-snap of the scissors behind my ears faltered momentarily. I was grateful that there was no mirror in which I would have to brazen out his surprise.
‘Certainly, Corporal, certainly,’ he murmured obsequiously, after a pause.
‘Could you give them to me now?’ I asked, alert for the sound of another customer approaching. Henry laid down his scissors and took a cardboard box from his case.
‘How many, Corporal?’
‘Oh, I don’t know. Two? No, make it half a dozen.’ How many times could you use them? I wondered vaguely.
‘Plain or teat end?’
‘Plain.’
I didn’t stop to ask what the difference was. I was sweating slightly under the strain of appearing unconcerned. Henry gave me the packets, and I slipped them into the map pocket on my thigh, as it was the most accessible. It occurred to me that I had never used it before, for maps or anything else.
‘How much do I owe you, Henry?’
‘Forget it, Corporal.’
‘No, Henry——’
‘You’ve done me a few favours in the past, Corporal. Getting me m
y money early last Christmas. Have them on me. A little parting gift.’
There was no humour in his voice: rather an almost sentimental gravity. He continued to cut my hair in silence, while I gradually relaxed.
I trusted that the things were as easy to use as they seemed to be in theory. And that Pauline would have no objection. But my mind was fairly easy on that score. Hadn’t she said once that Catholic teaching on marriage was ‘squalid’? No doubt that had been one of the knottiest problems in her tangled relationship with Mike. When had she said that? It was a long time back. It must have been a time when Mike was still very much the link between us, when we anxiously talked and corresponded about him, like two watchers conferring at the bedside of someone gravely ill, our fingers straying imperceptibly towards each other in the darkness of the sick-room. One of those strangely tormented, bitter-sweet week-ends wrested from the serfdom of Catterick.