by Alan Burns
Standing in the officers’ latrine a week later, they decided to paint on the ammunition store: Join the Movement For Peace. It was, in Gerson’s phrase, “the correct slogan”. Dan thought it was too long.
Gerson said: “It can’t be helped. Those words are essential. There may be another comrade along to help us.”
“Another comrade”! Dan felt he had been knighted.
Hidden by a rolling, heavy midnight fog, Dan waited just outside the camp. He felt safe in the fog and darkness. Gerson loomed up, nosing around, looking for him. Dan kipped round behind him, pushed a stick in his back and roared:
“Welcome, Comrade!”
“For Christ’s sake, have some sense,” Gerson snapped.
“Can’t you take a joke?”
“Yes. Where’s the brush?”
“You were bringing it.”
“Hell. Now what can we do? We can’t paint with our bare hands.”
“I’ll find something,” Dan said.
He ran off and returned twenty minutes later, bearing, like an Olympic flame, his shaving brush.
“The best I could find. All the paintbrush shops are shut. It’s a capitalist conspiracy.”
“Watch out for sentries,” Gerson said; “you know what happens if we’re caught.”
They crept across the battalion football field, then through lines of elephantoid field guns.
“Down!”
Dan flopped on the squelchy earth. Ten yards ahead, a sentry stood, heavy like a lead soldier, staring. His slung rifle poked awkwardly out of his khaki cape. Gerson, crawling correctly as he had been taught in basic training, moved away, quick and quiet. Dan crawled after, feeling ridiculous.
They reached the ammunition store. Gerson unwrapped a paint tin.
“Take it,” he said. “You paint first, and I’ll keep watch. A short whistle means danger.”
He folded and pocketed the brown paper.
“It’s oil paint, I’m afraid, which is tricky, because it stains your clothes. Be careful.”
The hut was built of corrugated-iron sheets. It had once been painted light green. In places the paint had come away, showing rusty orange beneath; elsewhere it bubbled up in wide blisters or formed a separate corrugated skin of thin green. Dan scrubbed the paint on. Green specks and slivers mixed with dollops of white showered over him. The letters began huge and got smaller and smaller as he tired. He did the final “E” and went back to Gerson. But Gerson had gone. He returned to the wall, and with the last of the paint added an exclamation mark. The hairs of the brush were rubbed away; only the small bone handle remained.
Huts and guns and piles of junk, grey animals, jumped from the fog, lurched at him. He found he was swinging the paint tin; Gerson had not said how to get rid of it. He passed an empty oil drum which had been stood straight and painted shiny black for a general’s inspection. He lifted the edge and pushed the tin inside.
In his room Dan tried to get the oil paint off his hands and uniform. He used paraffin from a lamp kept “for emergencies”.
As soon as he woke he longed to go and see the slogan, but Gerson had forbidden it. He waited by the NAAFI, hoping to overhear excited conversation; he was disappointed. However, on the regimental notice board a paper had been pasted over the “afternoon programme”. It read:
Important. All ranks will attend parade, regimental parade ground. 1430 hours.
A. Digby-Smith. Adjutant.
Dan thought of going sick, or deserting. He could not find Gerson.
He marched at the head of his platoon, hearing the crunch of their boots on the concrete. His battalion formed up. The high bawl of the Sergeant Major:
“Talyar-r-r-n, Talyarr-r-r-n, shun!”
The Adjutant walked slowly up and down the ranks. Dan held his breath, stared straight ahead. The Adjutant came right up to him, stood glaring, inches away.
“Stand easy, Graveson. Now, let’s have a look at your chaps.”
Dan relaxed.
“Just a security check,” the Adjutant murmured.
“Now men,” he turned to them, “each section in turn will come smartly to attention and all ranks will hold their hands smartly in front of them.”
As each man begged for alms, the Adjutant walked gravely by, accompanied by Lt. Graveson. With the tips of his fingers he turned over each pair of hands, and looked at them keenly. A man with big grimy hands and dirty bitten nails said:
“I work down the boilers, sir.”
“Hold your tongue, man! Don’t you know you’re on parade? Speak when you’re spoken to!”
The Adjutant looked up at the man, who was a foot taller, and snapped:
“A disgraceful turnout. No excuse. Take that man’s name, Mr Graveson.”
He smiled at the Sergeant and glanced at his hands too. “Carry on, Mr Graveson!”
“Yessir! Platoo-oo-oon, by the right, qu-i-i-i-i-ck march!”
Since 1747 Friday had been regimental mess night. From seven o’clock until nine, all junior officers stood about the mess lounge in dress uniform, drinking, chatting, waiting for the CO to lead the regiment into dinner. Dan stood fingering the stem of his glass. He heard Gerson’s clear, clipped voice:
“…Hunt ball on Tuesday.”
“Where the devil is one to procure scarlet tails these days?” Crabbe asked.
Dan stood near them.
“That’s a problem for you regulars,” said Gerson; “I think I’ll trot along in my DJ.”*
A pause. They sipped whisky.
“So you’re a national serviceman,” Crabbe said. “What were you in before?”
“I’m a lawyer,” Gerson replied.
“Defending swindlers and murderers, eh?”
“Not exactly. I dealt mainly with land law and property.”
“Oh yes.”
Crabbe finished his drink.
“What’ll you have?” Crabbe asked Gerson.
Dan stood quiet.
“And you, old chap?” Crabbe turned to him.
“No thanks,” Dan said.
Crabbe brought back two whiskies. On the way he had been thinking.
“What is land law exactly? Sounds a bore.”
“Strangely enough, land law is ninety per cent of the law, although less than a tenth of the people own land.”
“Why is that?” Dan asked innocently.
“Because most of our laws were made by nineteenth-century landed gentry, whose first concern was with their own property.”
Crabbe left them. Dan said to Gerson:
“Next week he’ll be telling the mess that land law is ninety per cent of the law and what are they going to do about it!”
“Really?” Gerson said. “Please excuse me a moment.”
Dan rolled the stem of his glass between his fingers. The chat rose and fell around him. He lit a cigarette.
At a quarter to nine something unusual happened. The Adjutant stood at one end of the lounge banging the table with his glass, calling:
“Quiet, gentlemen. One moment please, gentlemen. Quiet.”
There was some whispering. The Adj. had drunk only two gins the whole evening – a sign something was brewing.
“I do apologize, gentlemen. But the security chaps have a thing on their mind. And you know what that means. We’ll just have to play along with them. This afternoon we had a special parade and inspection for all non-commissioned ranks. Now Intelligence is so damned thorough – suppose we should thank Heavens for it – it seems it will be necessary for us in the mess to undergo a similar check. A mere formality for completeness, you understand, gentlemen. All junior officers then, if you please, gentlemen, form along that wall, and we can finish in five minutes.”
A roar of voices all talking at once – some protesting, some making jokes, all asking what it was
all about. Rapidly the Adjutant walked past, glancing at their hands held out. He made it clear that it was not his idea, but that he was formally carrying out superior orders. Dan remembered the early morning spent scrubbing his hands almost raw with pumice stone and scalding water. By electric light the streaks of white across his hands barely showed. The Adjutant checked and passed him without a sign. Perhaps he lingered a moment. Dan could not be sure.
A week had passed. The slogan had been blacked over by military police before more than a dozen men had seen it. No one had quite understood it; there had been some puzzled talk – a paragraph in the Movement for Peace Newsletter under “News from the Branches”.
“How’s it going, old boy?”
The Adjutant’s hand rested on Dan’s shoulder. This treatment was reserved for field officers and RSMs.*
“Quite well, thank you, sir.”
“Could you take ten minutes off this afternoon? The CO would like a word with you.”
“Yes sir. What time would be convenient, sir?”
“What about 1430 hours?”
“Well, I’m down for firing practice then, sir.”
The Adjutant frowned.
“Never mind about that, Graveson.”
“Very well, sir.”
Rarely did the Commanding Officer talk officially with a person of inferior rank without being supported by his menials: Second in Command, Adjutant, Regimental Sergeant Major, Aide-de-Camp. Dan was relieved, therefore, to find Colonel York quite alone.
“Glad to see you, Graveson.”
The Colonel did not get up from his heavy leather chair. He sat like an old lion, with whiskery brows, paws for hands and a way of turning his head round slowly.
“Do sit down. Smoke?”
“No, thank you, sir.”
“Wise man.”
Dan sat straight on his wooden chair, his hands on his lap. The Colonel glanced down at a file of papers and a copy of Queens Regulations. He pulled at the lobe of his ear, flicked the bristles of his moustache. Dan had seen him behave like this when talking with very senior officers.
“It’s about this security report, Graveson. It seems that, on the afternoon, 3rd July – that is, Monday last – during the delivery of a lecture to P Company, you were guilty of conduct which amounted to incitement to mutiny. What have you to say?”
“I have absolutely no idea what it is all about, sir. There must be some mistake.”
“I don’t think so,” the Colonel murmured. “You were giving instruction on the twenty-five-pounders?”*
“That is possible.”
“You initiated a discussion on the value of the weapon?”
“I prefaced my lecture with a general description of the gun, including its cash cost. I had obtained the information from the regimental office.”
“Indeed. What followed?”
“I’m not sure, sir.”
“Come, come, Graveson. I have the details here. But I prefer to know your side of the picture. ‘Audi alteram partem’,* you know.”
“Well sir, the figures in thousands of pounds meant nothing to the men. So I may have translated them into terms they could understand. One gun equals twenty motor cars, for example.”
“Or so many council houses or hospital beds? Did you even find it necessary to discuss the position of old-age pensioners?”
“No sir, that was one of the men.”
“Did you not ask the men to ‘vote’ on which they would ‘prefer to have their money spent on’?”
“It was not quite like that, sir.”
“You understand, Graveson, that I cannot have one of my officers carrying on like this.”
“Sir.”
“No one sympathizes with the pensioners more than I do, but this kind of talk, in the regiment’s time – it’s sheer pacifism. Or worse. You join the army to do a job. A job for your country. If you would prefer to be on the other side – very well, then. But you cannot have it both ways!”
“It seems to me—”
“Don’t argue with me. And don’t interrupt. The fact is, Graveson, I am instructed to request you to resign your commission with effect from the first of next month. You will have twelve days’ leave until that date.”
“It’s a terrible shock, sir.”
“I’m sorry, Graveson. I’ve never had a thing like this in my regiment. I cannot concern myself with personal feelings. It’s more than a question of regimental discipline – the matter is out of my hands.”
“I must have time to think about it.”
“That is impossible. I formally request you to resign.”
Dan stood up.
“I cannot do that, sir. I consider I have the right of any citizen to hold political views and express them, so long as I do not break army or civil law. If I am charged with an offence, then I wish to be tried by court martial. The publicity will no doubt create—”
“You may take whatever action you think fit,” the Colonel said decisively. “But I must warn you that a number of other matters, including a recent occurrence you no doubt have in mind, would certainly be raised against you in the event of your acting foolishly. A court martial, needless to say, has the power to award the heaviest penalties. I still hope we may settle this matter man to man without unpleasantness.”
“I am only asking for my democratic—”
“Yes, yes, yes. Very well; that will be all, Graveson. I advise you to consider your position carefully.”
“I will, sir. Thank you, sir.”
In the outer office, the Adjutant handed him a typed document:
“…commanded by Her Majesty to inform you that, following certain admissions, the army council have decided that Lieutenant Daniel Graveson should be called upon to… resign his commission… Should he neglect or refuse to submit his application to resign within fourteen days… steps will be taken with a view to terminating the said commission with effect from…”
“Will you sign for it, sir?” the clerk said.
“What?”
“To show you received it, sir.”
“No.”
The clerk looked towards the Adjutant, who said:
“Never mind about that now.”
He marched smartly across the parade ground among the drilling squads and companies. Orders of command whined and roared over his head. He tried to appear as if he had important business to attend to. But he did not know where to go. A sergeant glanced at him sideways – did he know? How long would the news take to travel round the camp?
He found himself at the education centre. Forlorn and empty. Dusty posters told stories in pictures about first aid, fire drill, artificial respiration. Men with moustaches demonstrated life-saving. Old coloured maps showed the distribution of barley, wheat and sugar beet in the neighbouring fields. Who cared? A film of dust covered the globe’s northern hemisphere. The centre was mainly used as a source of drawing pins. The bottom pins from all the posters had been borrowed, leaving pinholes and blobs of rust in the flapping corners. Old Major Caulfield came in:
“What can I do for you, Graveson?”
“I’m waiting for Mr Gerson, if that’s all right, sir.”
“By all means.”
Dan watched the sagging face, the huge dark veins in the hands.
“Did I ever show you these, Graveson?”
Glossy photographs of a chubby bouncing man.
“I was army breast-stroke champion in those days – nineteen thirty-two.”
He still wore his Army Swimming Club blazer and tie. Gerson came in. A spot in the palm of the Major’s hand was then travelling towards his heart – a thickening, a slight thickening of the blood, easing towards the muscular heart to cover over and close two hefty pounding vital bloodfilled arteries and stop the flow of blood. He’d be gone and turned to slime.
“The granting of a commission,” said Gerson, “is part of the Queen’s prerogative. There need be no court martial, no appeal. That which Her Majesty giveth, she may also take away. But you can make a political fight. Do you want to?”
“I’ll do anything.”
“Don’t underrate the strength of the forces against you. Don’t start a battle you can’t win. Will your own platoon speak up for you? Can you depend on any of the NCOs,* or your brother officers? What about your family?”
“I don’t expect much help from anyone else.”
“I see. Well, how do you propose to start the campaign?”
“I am prepared to follow out any plan the Communist Party proposes.”
Gerson said nothing for a minute, then:
“In my opinion, you should resign with as little fuss as possible.”
* * *
“Dan! We’re going to Helen’s. Put your uniform on,” his father called up the stairs.
“I’m sick to death of the bloody uniform.”
“Do as you please.”
Then, on the last day of his leave, a letter arrived, addressed to “265546221 Pte.* Graveson, D”. His father held it out to him:
“What’s all that about?”
Dan read the short printed letter.
“Good news. I’ve been posted to another unit. It’s quite close by – Epping Forest. On the Central Line. I’ll be able to get home for the weekends.”
“Aren’t you an officer any more?”
“The envelope? That’s just a typist’s error.”
In the car, outside the Tube station, his father said:
“You’re in some trouble.”
“It’s nothing.”
“Then why the long face? I’m a bit older than you—”
“Old enough to be my father.”
“—and I still know a thing or two. If only you’ll tell me what kind of a jam you’re in—”
“Raspberry. I’ve been demoted, temporarily.”
“I knew it. What happened?”
“Well, the CO is an absolute tyrant. Real guards disciplinarian. Punishment parades for the slightest mistake. He’s completely inhuman. I led a deputation of the men to complain, I threatened we’d see our MPs and get publicity in the papers… it was nearly a mutiny.”