War Story (10 page)

A bit of bread struck Paxton in the face, and made him recoil. “I just asked you,” said Piggott,”in English, which is the language we use around here, whether you'd be willing to organise a boxing tournament.”

“No.” Too brusque; far too brusque. “Not my sport,” he added.

“No boxing,” Milne said. “I don't like boxing.” He took his fist away from his face. Tim Piggott was surprised to see how old he looked. His eyes were pouchy and there were unhappy brackets dragging down the corners of his mouth. The old man looked thirty if he looked a day. “Tell you what I think we ought to do,” Milne said. “We ought to get in a tender and drive to the nearest decent
estaminet
and celebrate something. I know: we'll celebrate my birthday.” They liked that. It earned some pounding on the table.

“Your birthday's not until October,” the adjutant said.

“Oh, Uncle,” Milne told him. “What a bore you are.”

Of the ‘C' Flight pilots at the Fourth of June dinner, only the flight commander, Frank Foster, looked at all like the popular conception of an Old Etonian: tall, slim, dark-haired, handsome if you like the long nose and broad upper lip of the British aristocracy. He managed to appear aloof and languid at the same time. His title – he was the Honourable Frank Foster – was a piece of social baggage he carried around but never used. The adjutant had once suggested that it might buck up the tone of the squadron if he used it, but Foster, gently straightening the adjutant's tie, had said, in a voice as grave as a hanging judge, “Those who know me, don't care, and those who don't know me, don't matter. There now, that's better. You really must learn to look after yourself, Uncle, even if you do spring from humble peasant stock, I mean that's not your fault. Just look at poor Spud Ogilvy here. Born out of wedlock to a pair of Irish charcoal-burners, never wore shoes until he was nineteen, yet he's a credit to the squadron, isn't he? Do up your flies, Spud, there's a good chap. You're not in Connemara now.”

In fact Ogilvy's father was Master of the Hunt in Galway and one of the richest barristers in London; but it was true, Spud did look a bit like a gypsy: wavy black hair that flopped forward, high cheekbones, a quick smile that seemed too big for his face. James Yeo, by contrast, had left Eton a shy, somewhat lazy schoolboy and gone through the subalternfactory to emerge transformed into the classic young English
officer, upright and alert and privately very grateful for his luck in being born at exactly the right time to fit into a big war. Soldiering was the perfect life for Yeo; it gave him everything he wanted – comradeship, excitement, purpose – and he was happy to do it for ever. He especially enjoyed the chance to do a lot of flying and win a few medals before peace came and put a damper on the glory.

Charlie Essex saw things differently. It was not true that he had been sent down from Cambridge in his first year because he was no good at sums or spelling; plenty of stupider undergraduates than Essex strolled through their nine terms (and many got a degree). The truth was that he had gone to Cambridge because he wanted to win a boxing Blue. It was Essex's bad luck that there were a lot of good boxers in his weight that year. He lost more contests than he won. Finally he got his nose very thoroughly broken, and he knew he would never be good enough to get a Blue, so he quit. He didn't much care. He'd learned that everything was a matter of luck, anyway.

“That can't be Bunny Bradley, can it?” he asked. “Over in the corner. Scratching his ear.”

“Quite impossible,” said Yeo, without looking. “Bunny had a stutter, if you remember.”

They ate cold poached salmon. Essex considered what Yeo had said. He drank some
Blanc de Blancs
and stopped chewing while he considered it again. “I don't see how that stops him scratching his ear.”

“Oh yes. Bunny was at Mons in 1914, eating a beef sandwich, when he said to his sergeant-major, ‘Those chaps look like b-b-b-b-b …' So the sergeant-major said ‘Beg pardon, sir?' and before Bunny could answer, the Boches had shot him.”

Essex stared at him. Yeo shrugged. Waiters removed their plates.

“So who's that in the corner, then?” Charlie Essex wondered, frowning. Ogilvy selected a crusty bread roll and threw it, hard. They watched its fall. “D'you mean him?” he asked.

Essex shook his head. “No. Why? D'you know that chap?”

“Never hit him before in my life.”

“He looks a bit annoyed. In fact he looks hopping mad.”

“Probably just concussed. It'll wear off.”

Foster stopped a waiter. “Be so kind as to bring us another bottle of this appalling filth,” he said. “In fact, bring two.”

A bread roll whizzed past Ogilvy, he fended off a second, but the third struck him in the face. He licked some crumbs off his lip. “Not concussed after all,” he said. He collected the rolls and hurled them back. Somewhere nearby a dinner-plate shattered. No heads turned. “Bunny would have liked this,” Yeo said.

“Hey,” Essex said. They all looked. “Wait a minute,” he said. They waited. “How do you know,” he asked Yeo,”that Bunny was going to say ‘Boches', if he got pipped before he could say it?”

Foster pointed with his fork and called, “Look out!” A wine glass came sailing over a chandelier and, amazingly, bounced off their table. Behind the top table, on a platform, the band of the Coldstream Guards struck up
Gilbert the Filbert, the Kernel of the Knuts.
On the far side of the room, waiters dodged as two staff officers began fighting each other with chairs. “Ripping tune, that,” Foster said.

Kellaway had been billeted with Paxton and O'Neill. He was lying on his bed, bloated with pork and roast potatoes, listening to Paxton describe the way Ross-Kennedy had crashed, when O'Neill poked his head through the window and interrupted. “The tender's ready,” he said. “Get your bonnets on.”

“I'm awfully sorry,” Kellaway said. “I didn't think I was included.”

“Everybody goes on a CO's party. It's like the Sunday School's annual trip to the seaside: good clean fun and all the lemonade you can drink. I can't remember the last time anyone got raped at a CO's party. You won't need your boilerplate drawers, Dexter.”

Paxton turned his back on him and said: “I happen to be Orderly Officer.”

“So what?”

“The men's letters have to be censored.”

O'Neill blew a long, descending raspberry. “Give Corporal Lacey five bob and he'll censor them. That's what everybody else does.”
Paxton uttered a high-pitched snort of contempt. “Do they, now? Well, I was taught not to shirk my duties.”

“Well, you're a fart.”

“And you're a clod.”

Kellaway said goodbye and went out. Watching from the corner of his eye, Paxton saw O'Neill leave. “Swine,” he whispered; but that was not enough and he looked around for something to kick, saw nothing suitable and so eventually shouted “Clod!” quite loudly.

“I do most honestly and sincerely believe,” said Frank Foster,”that after cricket and Salisbury cathedral, England's greatest gift to the world has been roly-poly suet pudding.”

“Shut up and eat,” Ogilvy said. “We're all waiting.”

“My parents got married in Salisbury cathedral,” James Yeo said. “Quite pretty inside, so my father said, but a bit cramped. You had to keep your elbows well tucked-in.”

“Rather like the trenches,” said Essex.

“Finished.” Foster spooned up the last fragment. “Ready.”

They all raised their plates. “One-two-three-go!” said Ogilvy. The plates were smashed against each other. “Cheese!” Ogilvy shouted to a waiter. The bits of plate they held were tossed over their shoulders, to join a layer of debris that made a constant crunching under the waiters' feet.

“I think it's significant,” Foster told them,“that more men get elbowed to death in the trenches than are struck by lightning on Tuesday afternoons in Maidenhead.”

“You think too much,” said Essex.

“The fruits of a good education.”

“I'll drink to that,” said Ogilvy. “To the education of good fruits!” They all drank.

Rufus Milne drove the tender, which was unusual, and he drove it at a furious pace, which was surprising. The roads were cobbled and the wheels were shod in solid rubber; traffic was fairly heavy and Milne's right foot danced from accelerator to brake and back again.

It took them fifteen boneshaking minutes to get to a small town called Montvilliers. Milne let the tender trundle around the main square, its headlights washing over a drifting
population of troops – a few French, some Australians, but mostly British. Only the occasional French soldier wore red and blue; otherwise khaki was everywhere. Khaki puttees, khaki breeches, khaki tunic, khaki cap. The world was brown. A French civilian, all white moustaches and rusty black clothes, looked wrong, looked foreign. “That's for us,” Milne said, and parked outside a bar-café called
Le Trictrac.
”Are we late for something?” Appleyard asked; but Milne was already out of the cab and heading for the bar.

“What's the panic?” Tim Piggott said, rubbing his backside. “He nearly got us up to flying speed, for God's sake.”

“Beats me, old boy,” the adjutant said. “I've never seen him like this before.”

The airmen trailed into the bar. The atmosphere was a warm stew of tobacco smoke, wine fumes and noise. Milne had found an empty table, and a waitress who looked about twelve years old was bringing him bottles and glasses.

“You are a sweet little thing,” he said, kissing her hand,”and later on I shall devour you in one bite with an apple in your mouth. Sit down, you sluggards. Have a drink. You're just in time for the cabaret.”

“The way you drove, we were nearly in time for eternity,” Goss said.

“If it's built to do sixty miles an hour,” said Milne,”it's obviously meant to do sixty miles an hour.”

Jimmy Duncan was gazing about the room. “I don't see any cabaret,” he said.

“Who speaks Russian?” Milne was pouring wine by running the bottle up and down a row of glasses. Nobody answered. “All right, who speaks anything? Cheers.”

They all drank. “I've got a bit of Spanish,” said an observer called Mayo.

“That'll do. Remember to wave your arms.” Milne climbed onto the table and shouted for silence. Eventually the gentle roar of talk faded to nothing. “Gentlemen, tonight we are privileged,” he announced. Derision came back like an echo. “We are indeed privileged,” he cried,”because here tonight is a member of the Russian royal family, none other than His Highness Prince Boris Romanoff!” Milne led the applause. Mayo reluctantly stood, waved once, and would have sat
down if Milne had not seized his shoulder. “Prince Boris would like to say a few words in his native tongue,” he said. “I shall translate.”

Mayo clambered onto the table. He didn't look like a Russian prince. He was short and stocky, slightly bow-legged, with very wide shoulders and a heavy black moustache. He looked more like a gamekeeper or a ghillie.

” Buenas noches”,
he mumbled.
“El menu, por favor”.

“His highness says you are the bravest of the brave!” Milne cried. “Everyone in Russia is thrilled by your deeds of tremendous courage. People stop each other in the street to exchange tales of the glorious Gloucesters, the wonderful Warwicks, the invincible Irish Rifles, the incomparable Cameron Highlanders…” Men from each regiment cheered at the sound of its name until the combined din made Milne pause. “Together we shall squeeze the Huns from east and west until their eyeballs pop out,” Milne told the troops. Huge cheer.

“Guadalahara”
, Mayo announced.

“Prince Boris recommends to you a traditional Russian drinking game known as the Boat Race,” Milne said. “Each team has eight drinkers. Kindly pick your team! Prince Boris has generously agreed to buy the drink for everyone.”

“Caramba!”
Mayo said; but in the storm of applause his voice was lost.

The waiters had retired. The King's health had been drunk. The smoke from three hundred cigars rose and mingled and mellowed the light from the chandeliers. Decanters of port slid softly from hand to hand. A great, cathedral hush possessed the room, with only a rare and well-cushioned belch to point up the silence. Lord Trafford, swaying slightly, making an occasional irrelevant gesture but without a note to assist him, was delivering his presidential speech, as tradition required, in Latin. He was reaching the end of his second joke.

“Omne ignotum pro magnifico,”
he said,
“et certe errare est humanum”
. He paused to let that sink in, but only briefly; his main thrust was yet to come.
” Et fortasse virtus incendit vires, sed non licet in bello bis peccare.”

Everyone saw the point. It was a show-stopper, and Trafford knew he had ample time to sip his wine, while their laughter surged and sank and surged again, until it was crowned with warm applause. Trafford smiled at the friendly blur which, without his glasses and with a mixed litre of wine inside him, was all that he could see. He knew there were three jokes still to come, each one a sure-fire crackerjack.

“Prince Boris will start the Boat Race by dropping his handkerchief,” Milne announced. “Are you ready?”

“Enchilada”
,Mayo told him.

“Not you, fathead,” Milne muttered. “Them.”

Eight teams were lined up: four from infantry regiments, two lots of sappers, one set of gunners, and an entry from Hornet Squadron. Each team had eight men standing on a bench, and each man held a tumbler brimful of red wine. As Mayo raised his handkerchief there came a shout and a crash from the back of the team of the Warwickshire Regiment. “Sorry, sir,” their leader said. “We just lost a bloke. No head for heights, see.”