The military philosophers (6 page)

‘The process was known afterwards as doing a Blackhead,’ he allowed. ‘Alternatively, having a Blackhead done on you. The public may think we’re a staid crowd, but we have our professional jokes like everyone else. I say, what are your views on liquid refreshment? Would it be acceptable? I wouldn’t say no myself. Don’t I see a buffet over there? Let’s make tracks.’

This subsequent conversation explained why Pennistone and the rest of us, like Jacob and the Angel, had to wrestle with Blackhead until the coming of day, or nearly that. Such was the biblical comparison that sprang to mind as I climbed the stairs leading to Blackhead’s room, the moral exile to which his own kind had banished him emphasized not only by its smallness, but also by the fact that he lived there alone, isolation rare for one of his putatively low degree – if, indeed, his degree was low. I opened the door a crack, but further enlargement of entry was blocked by sheer stowage of paper, the files thickly banked about the floor like wholesale goods awaiting allotment to retailers, or, more credibly, the residue of a totally unsaleable commodity stored up here out of everyone’s way. Blackhead himself was writing. He jumped up for a second and fiercely kicked a great cliff of files aside so that I could squeeze into the room. Then he returned to whatever he was at, his right hand moving feverishly across the paper, while his left thumb and forefinger, both stained with ink, rested on the handle of a saucerless cup.

‘I’ll attend to you in a minute, Jenkins.’

Not only was Blackhead, so to speak, beyond rank, he was also beyond age; beyond or outside Time. He might have been a worn – terribly worn – thirty-five; on the other hand (had not superannuation regulations, no doubt as sacred to Blackhead as any other official ordinances, precluded any such thing), he could easily have achieved threescore years and ten, with a safe prospect for his century. Emaciated, though obviously immensely strong, he was probably in truth approaching fifty. His hair, which formed an irregular wiry fringe over a furrowed leathery brow, was of a metallic shade that could have been natural to him all his life.

‘Glad you’ve come, Jenkins,’ he said, putting his face still closer to the paper on which he was writing. ‘Pennistone minuted me … Polish Women’s Corps … terms I haven’t been able fully to interpret… In short don’t at all comprehend …’

His hand continued to move at immense speed, with a nervous shaky intensity, backwards and forwards across the page of the file, ending at last in a signature. He blotted the minute, read through what he had written, closed the covers. Then he placed the file on an already overhanging tower of similar dockets, a vast rickety skyscraper of official comment, based on the flimsy foundation of a wire tray. At this final burden, the pyramid began to tremble, at first seemed likely to topple over. Blackhead showed absolute command of the situation. He steadied the pile with scarcely a touch of his practised hand. Then, eyes glinting behind his spectacles, he rose jerkily and began rummaging about among similar foothills of files ranged on a side table.

‘Belgian Women’s Corps, bicycle for … Norwegian military attaché, office furniture … Royal Netherlands Artillery, second echelon lorries … Czechoslovak Field Security, appointment of cook … Distribution of Polish Global Sum in relation to other Allied commitments – now we’re getting warm … Case of Corporal Altmann, legal costs in alleged rape – that’s moving away … Luxembourg shoulder flashes  – right out… Here we are … Polish Women’s Corps, soap issue for – that’s the one I wanted a word about.’

‘I really came about the question of restrictions on straw for stuffing hospital palliasses in Scotland.’

Blackhead paused, on the defensive at once.

‘You can’t be expecting an answer on straw already?*

‘We were hoping —’

‘But look here …’

‘It must be a week or ten days.’

‘Week or ten days? Cast your eyes over these, Jenkins.’

Blackhead made a gesture with his pen in the direction of the files stacked on the table amongst which he had been excavating.

‘Barely had time to glance at the straw,’ he said. ‘Certainly not think it out properly. It’s a tricky subject, straw.’

‘Liaison HQ in Scotland hoped for a quick answer.’

‘Liaison HQ in Scotland are going to be disappointed.’

‘What’s so difficult?’

‘There’s the Ministry of Supply angle.’

‘Can’t we ignore them for once?’

‘Ministry of Agriculture may require notification. Straw interests them … We won’t talk about that now. What I want you to tell me, Jenkins, is what Pennistone means by this…’

Blackhead held – thrust – the file forward in my direction.

‘Couldn’t we just cast an eye over the straw file too, if you could find it while I try to solve this one?’

Blackhead was unwilling, but in the end, after a certain amount of search, the file about hospital palliasses was found and also extracted.

‘Now it’s the Women’s Corps I want to talk about,’ he said. ‘Issue of certain items – soap, to be exact, and regulations for same. There’s a principle at stake. I pointed that out to Pennistone. Read this … where my minute begins …’

To define the length of a ‘minute’ – an official memorandum authorizing or recommending any given course – is, naturally, like trying to lay down the size of a piece of chalk. There can be short minutes or long minutes, as there might be a chalk down or a fragment of chalk scarcely perceptible to the eye. Thus a long minute might be divided into sections and sub-headings, running into pages and signed by an authority of the highest rank. On the other hand, just as a piece of chalk might reasonably be thought of as a length of that limestone convenient for writing on a blackboard, the ordinary run of minutes exchanged between such as Pennistone and Blackhead might be supposed, in general, to take a fairly brief form – say two or three, to perhaps ten or a dozen, lines. Blackhead pointed severely to what he had written. Then he turned the pages several times. It was a real Marathon of a minute, even for Blackhead. When it came to an end at last he tapped his finger sharply on a comment written below his own signature.

‘Look at this,’ he said.

He spoke indignantly. I leant forward to examine the exhibit, which was in Pennistone’s handwriting. Blackhead had written, in all, three and a half pages on the theory and practice of soap issues for military personnel, with especial reference to the Polish Women’s Corps. Turning from his spidery scrawl to Pennistone’s neat hand, two words only were inscribed. They stood out on the file:

Please amplify. D. Pennistone. Maj. GS.

Blackhead stood back.

‘What do you think of that?’ he asked.

I could find no suitable answer, in fact had nearly laughed, which would have been fatal, an error from which no recovery would have been possible.

‘He didn’t mention the matter to me.’

‘As if I hadn’t gone into it carefully,’ said Blackhead.

‘You’d better have a word with Pennistone.’

‘Word with him? Not before I’ve made sure about the point I’ve missed. He wouldn’t have said that unless he knew. I thought you’d be able to explain, Jenkins. If he thinks I’ve omitted something, he’d hardly keep it from you.’

‘I’m at a loss – but about the palliasse straw —’

‘What else can he want to know?’ said Blackhead. ‘It’s me that’s asking the questions there, not him.’

‘You’ll have to speak together.’

‘Amplify, indeed,’ said Blackhead. ‘I spent a couple of hours on that file.’

Blackhead stared down at what Pennistone had written. He was distraught; aghast. Pennistone had gone too far. We should be made to suffer for this frivolity of his. That was, if Blackhead retained his sanity.

‘What would you like me to do about it?’

Blackhead took off his spectacles and pointed the shafts at me.

‘I’ll tell you what,’ he said. ‘I could send it to F 17 (b) for comments. They’re the
only ones,
in my view, who might take exception to not being consulted. They’re a touchy lot. Always have been. I may have slipped up in not asking them, but I’d have never guessed Pennistone would have spotted that.’

‘The thing we want to get on with is the straw.’

‘Get on with?’ said Blackhead. ‘Get on with? If Pennistone wants to get on with things, why does he minute me in the aforesaid terms? That’s what I can’t understand.’

‘Why not talk to him when he comes back. He’s at Polish GHQ at the moment. Can’t we just inspect the straw file?’

Blackhead had been put so far off his balance that his usual obstinacy must have become impaired. Quite unexpectedly, he gave way all at once about the straw. We discussed the subject of palliasses fully, Blackhead noting in the file that ‘a measure of agreement had been reached’. It was a minor triumph. I also prepared the way for papers about the evacuation, but this Blackhead could hardly take in.

‘I can’t understand Pennistone writing that,’ he said. ‘I’ve never had it written before –
please amplify
– not in all my service, all the years I’ve worked in this blessed building. It’s not right. It suggests a criticism of my method.’

I left him gulping the chill dregs of his tea. Finn would probably be back in his room now, ready to hear the substance of what Q (Ops.) Colonel had said.

Rounding the corner of the passage just beyond the two pictures of George V, I saw Finn’s door was open. A tall, stoutish officer, wearing khaki and red tabs, though not for some indefinable reason a British uniform, was taking leave of him. It seemed best to let them finish their conversation, then, when the foreign officer, probably a newly appointed military attaché, had left, catch Finn between interviews. This was never easy, because a steady flow perennially occupied him. He looked up the passage at that moment, and, seeing me, jerked his head as a summons. The red-tabbed officer himself turned. Dark complexioned, hook nose – though that feature was nothing to the size of Finn’s – he had something of the air of a famous tenor. More on account of recent photographs in the press, than because of having seen him before, I recognized Prince Theodoric. The story of the escape he had made from his own country at the moment of its invasion (he was said to have shot dead a Gestapo agent) had been given a lot of publicity when he arrived in England.

‘Nicholas,’ said Finn. ‘I want to present you. One of my officers, sir – he will see you to the door, sir.’

Prince Theodoric held out his hand.

‘You’ve been too kind already, Colonel Finn,’ he said.

‘Allowing me to take up your precious time with our small concerns. I certainly mustn’t impose myself further by requisitioning the services of your officers, no doubt as overworked as yourself. I may have shown myself in the past inexperienced in methods of tactical withdrawal – as you know too well from the newspapers, I left the palace without shaving tackle – but at least let me assure you, my dear Colonel, that I can find my way unaided from this building.’

Theodoric talked that precise, rather old-fashioned English, which survives mainly outside the country itself. His manner, very consciously royal, had probably been made more assertive and genial by recent hazards undergone, because he had entirely overcome the self-conscious embarrassment I remembered from former brief contacts with him. Now, he added to that total ease and directness of royalties, who have never doubted for a second the validity of their rank and station, the additional confidence of a man who has made his own way in the world, and a dangerous way at that. Finn began to assure the Prince that we were all at his service at any moment of the day.

‘Finn’s in many ways an unworldly man,’ Pennistone used to say. ‘He likes to hobnob with people like Bernhard of the Netherlands, Olaf of Norway, Felix of Luxembourg. Snobbish, if you like, in one sense. On the other hand, he wouldn’t for a second allow any such taste to influence an official decision – nor would he walk across the passage to ingratiate himself with anyone, military or civil, for material reasons. In that respect, Finn is quite unlike Farebrother. Farebrother will get right up the arse of anyone he thinks likely to help him on. After all, everyone’s got to choose their own approach to life.’

In any case, if Finn were ceremonious in his treatment of Theodoric, the Prince – as Templer had remarked – had always shown himself profoundly anti-Nazi and a friend of this country. There was reason to accord courtesy. At this moment Farebrother himself appeared. He had evidently just made some contact required in our building and was marching along the passage, wearing his cap, a stick tucked under his arm. He came to halt where we stood and saluted, immediately beginning to dispense round him what Stringham used to call ‘several million volts of synthetic charm’.

‘This is well met, sir,’ he said dramatically.

He addressed himself to Theodoric, at the same time putting his hand on Finn’s shoulder.

‘I was coming to look in on my old friend here, after paying another visit, and now I find Your Royal Highness present too, just when I had made a mental note to telephone your equerry and ask for an interview.’

‘Oh, I’ve nothing so grand as an equerry these days,’ said Theodoric. ‘But my staff-officer will arrange an appointment, Colonel Farebrother, any time that suits you.’

‘There are several things I hoped to discuss, sir.’

‘Why, of course, Colonel —’

Finn began to look rather disturbed. However much he might admire Farebrother’s ‘charm’, he was not at all anxious to have some plot hatched on his doorstep. He must now have scented danger of circuitous arrangements being made through himself, because he suddenly assumed the expression of countenance that gave notice his deafness was about to come into play forthwith. At the same time, he twisted round his head and leant forward slightly.

‘Can’t hear all you say, Sunny, in this passage,’ he said. ‘Come into my room just for a moment or two. I’d like a word about Belgian arrangements, so far as they affect us both. I can just fit you in before General Asbjornsen arrives. Don’t keep the Prince waiting, Nicholas.’

‘Why, Nicholas?’ said Farebrother, feigning to recognize me only at that moment. ‘You and I must have a talk, too, about yesterday’s meeting …’