CUDITitril UP all 1111Li

By KINGSLEY AMIS

OU free for a bit this afternoon, Jock?' Major Raleigh asked me in the Mess ante-room one lunch- time in 1944.

`I think so, Major,' I said. 'Provided I can get away about half-three. I've got some line-tests laid on for then. What's it all about, anyway?'

`Here, let me top that up for you, old boy.' Raleigh seized a passing second-lieutenant by the elbow. 'Ken, run and get my batman to bring me one of my bottles of Scotch, will you? Oh, and incidentally what's become of your vehicle tool-kit deficiency return? It was supposed to be on my desk by ten-hundred this morning. Explanation?'

During this, I first briefly congratulated myself on being directly responsible to the CO (the most incurious officer in the whole unit) rather than coming under Raleigh's command. Then 1 wondered what was in store for me after lunch. Perhaps a visit to another binoculars establishment or camera warehouse the Major had discovered. My alleged technical proficiency had made me in some demand for such expeditions.

The Major returned, smiling deprecatingly and looking more than ever like a moustached choirboy in battledress. Now this business this afternoon,' he said. 'Young Archer's made another nonsense.'

`What's he done this time?'

`Lost a charging-engine. Left it behind on the last move, and naturally when he sent a party back the natives had removed it. Or so he says. I reckon that sergeant of his— Parnell, isn't it?—held a wayside auction and flogged it for a case of brandy. Anyway, it's gone.'

`Wait a minute, Major—wouldn't it have been one of those wee 1,260-watt affairs that take about a fortnight to charge half a dozen batteries? The ones nobody ever uses?'

`I wouldn't go all the way with you there, old boy.' The Major rarely went all the way with anyone anywhere. Very often he went no distance at all.

`Aren't they obsolete?' I persisted. 'And wouldn't I be right in thinking they're surplus too?'

Th at's irrelevant. This one was on young Archer's charge. The Quartermaster has his signature. Ah, here we are. Give me your glass, Jock.'

`Thanks. . . . Well, where do I come into this, Sir? Will I hold Archer for you while you beat him up, or what?'

Major Raleigh smiled again, fixedly this time. 'Good idea. Seriously, though, I've had enough of young Archer. 1 want you to serve on the Court of Inquiry with me and Jack Rowney, if you will. In my office I'll take you over after lunch.'

`Court of Inquiry? But couldn't we get this thing written off? There's surely no need . .

`I'd get someone else if I could, but everybody's on duty except you.' He looked me in the eye, and since I knew him well I could see he was wondering whether to add some• thing like : 'How nice it must be to live a life of leisure. Instead, he waved to someone behind me, called : 'Hallo, Bill, you old chiseller,' and went to greet the Adjutant, just arrived, presumably, on a goodwill mission from Unit HQ. There was much I wanted to ask Raleigh, but now it would have to keep.

At lunch, while the Adjutant. resplendent in a new Canadian battledress, chaffed Raleigh in his quacking voice, I thought about young Archer and one or two of his non• senses. The trailer nonsense had been .a good instance of the bad luck he seemed to attract. The trailer had had a puncture on a long road convoy led by him and, since trailers carried no spare wheel, had clearly been unable to proceed farther But if General Dempsey's staff were going to be able, to corn municate with their lower formations that day it was as clearly essential that the convoy should proceed farther, and soon• With rather uncharacteristic acumen, Archer had had the trailer unloaded and then jacked up with both its wheels removed, reasoning that it would take very energetic inter' vention to steal the thing in that state. But someone did.

Then there had been the telephone-exchange-vehicle non• sense. On another convoy Archer had gone off without it, an action threatening even graver disservice to General Dempsey's staff. Fortunately one of my sergeants, happening to see Archer's wagon-train lumbering out, had gone and kicked out of bed the driver of the exchange vehicle, promising violence if his wheels were not turning inside ten minutes. Taxing Archer with this afterwards, I wrung from him the admission that the dipsomaniacal Sergeant Parnell had been the culprit. He had been ordered to warn all drivers overnight, but half a bottle of calvados, plus the thought of the other half wait ing in his tent, had impaired his efficiency. 'Why don't you sack that horrible dummy of yours?' I had asked Archer In exasperation. 'You must expect things like that to happen while he's around. Raleigh would get him posted for you like a shot.'

`I can't do that,' Archer had moaned, accentuating his habitual lost look. 'Couldn't run the section without him.'

`To hell, man; better have no sergeant at all than him. All he ever does is talk, about India and cock things up.'

`I'm not competent, Jock. He knows how to handle the blokes, you see.'

That was typical. Archer was no less competent, or no more incompetent, than most of us, though with Raleigh, the Adjutant and Captain Rowney (the second-in-command of the company) taking turns to dispute this with him, his chronic lack of confidence was hardly surprising. And it was obvious to me that his men loathed their sergeant, whereas Archer himself, thanks to his undeviating politeness to them on all occasions, was the only officer in the entire company they could stand. Without their desire to give him personal support in return, anything might have happened every other day to General Dempsey's staff, even, conceivably, to the campaign as a whole. According to Raleigh and the Adjutant, that was perhaps the most wonderful thing of all about Signals : junior officers got as much responsibility as the red-tab boys. But not as much pay, 1 used to mutter.

It was a fine afternoon. and I said as much to the Adjutant as, his goodwill mission completed, he passed me in the portico and got into his jeep without a word. Soon Raleigh, carrying a short leather-covered cane, joined me and walked across the car park to his office, pausing only to exhort a driver, supine under the differential of a three-tonner, to get his hair cut.

Archer was in the outer room of the office, sitting silently with the appalling Parnell among the clerks and orderlies. He looked more lost than usual, and younger than his twenty- one years, much too young to be deemed a competent officer. He was yawning a lot.

`Look, Frank.' 1 said in an undertone : 'don't worry about this. This Court has no standing at all. Raleigh hasn't the powers to convene it; the company's not on detachment. It's a complete farce—just a bit of sabre-rattling.'

`Yes, I know,' he said. 'Can 1 see you afterwards, Jock?'

`I'll come over to your section.' The line-tests could wait.

1 went into the inner room. Rowney swept me a bow. `Ah, Captain D. A. Watson, Royal Signals, in person,' he fluted. `Nice of you to look us up.'

`I always like to see how you administrators live.'

`Better than you technical wizards, I'll be bound.'

`Materially, perhaps. Spiritually, no.'

`Och aye, mon, ye're maybe nae sae far from the truth.'

`Shall we get on, chaps?' Raleigh asked in his on-parade voice. 'Don't want to be all night over this.' He opened a the and nodded to me. 'Get Parnell in, will you?'

I got Parnell in. He smelt hardly at all of drink. He pro- ceeded to give an oral rendering of his earlier written report : Raleigh had passed me a copy. At the relevant time he, Parnell, had been explaining the convoy's route to the drivers. Then he had got into the cab of his usual lorry. Then they had moved off. Soon after arrival at the other end, Mr. Archer had said the charging-engine was missing and he, Parnell, must go back for it. Going back for it and returning empty- handed had taken eleven hours. In reply to questions, Parnell said yes. he had looked in the right place; no, nobody had been hanging about there; no, neither he nor, as far as he knew, anyone else had been detailed to look after the charging- engine; and yes, he would wait outside.

Archer came in and saluted the Court smartly. He started on a rigmarole similar to Parnell's, then stopped and gazed at the Major. 'Look, Sir,' he said, biting his lips. 'Can I put this quite simply?'

Raleigh.frowned. 'How do you mean, Frank?' `I mean I lost the charging-engine, and that's all there is to it. 1 should have made sure it was put on board and didn't. I just forgot. I should have gone round afterwards and had a look to make sure we'd left nothing behind. But I forgot. It's as simple as that. Just a plain, straightforward case of negligence and inefficiency. And all 1 can say is I'm very sorry.' Rowney started to ask a question, but Raleigh restrained him. `Go on, Frank,' he said softly.

Archer was trembling. He said : 'What makes me so ashamed is that I've let the company down. Completely. And 1 don't see what I can do about it. There just isn't any way of putting it right. I don't know what to do. It's no use saying I'm sorry, I know that. I'll pay for the thing, if you like. So much a month. Would that help at all? God, I am a fool.'

By this time he was shaking a good deal and throwing his hands about. 1 wondered very much whether he was going to cry. When he paused, blushing violently, I glanced at the other members of the Court. The head of the second-in- command was bent over the paper-fastener he was playing with, but Raleigh was staring hard at Archer, and on his face was a blush that seemed to answer Archer's own. At that moment they looked, despite Raleigh's farcical moustache, equally young and very alike. I felt my eyes widen. Was that it? Did Raleigh enjoy humiliating Archer for looking young and unsure of himself because he too at one time had been humiliated for the same reason? Hardly, for Raleigh was not enjoying himself now; of that I was certain.

Still holding his gaze, Archer burst out : 'I'm so sorry to have let you down, Major Raleigh. That's what gets me, failing in my duty by you, Sir. When you've always been so decent to me about everything, and backed me up, and . . . and encouraged me.'

This last, at any rate, was a flagrant lie. Had it not been, Archer would not have been where he was now. And surely he must know he had lied.

Raleigh turned his head away. 'Any questions, Jack?'

`No, Major.'

`You, Jock?'

`No, thank you, Sir.'

Raleigh nodded. With his head still averted, he said : 'All right, thank you, Frank. Hang on a moment outside, will you? You can tell Parnell to get back to the section.'

Archer saluted and was gone.

'Well, thanks a million for inviting me along to your little show, Major,' Rowney said, stretching. 'Plenty of the old drama, what? And very ably produced, if I may say so.'

Ignoring him, Raleigh turned to me. 'Well, Jock, what do you think?'

`About what exactly, Sir?'

I gave the more militarily relevant of my views and Rowney did the same. Within the next twenty seconds the Court had found that engine, charging, 1,260-watt, one, on charge to Lieutenant F. N. Archer, Royal Signals, had been lost by that officer in circumstances indicating negli- gence. Lieutenant F. N. Archer, Royal Signals, was hereby reprimanded. So that was that.

After an expressionless Archer had been acquainted with the findings and had left, 1 stopped at the door to chat to Rowney. I had never much cared for him, but I was grateful to him this afternoon for having, in his own way, given his opinion of the Major's little show. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Raleigh crumple up the Court of Inquiry documents and stuff them into his trousers pocket.

Later, in Archer's section office, I apologised to him for having been a member of the Court. He sat inattentively on a crate containing a spare teleprinter, finally rousing himself to take a cigarette off me and to say : 'Funny thing about that charging-engine, you know. One of the things about it was that it wouldn't go. And then the tool-kit was missing. And no spare parts. And it was obsolete anyway, so it was no use indenting for spares. So it never would have gone.'

Did you tell Raleigh that?'

`Yes. He said it was irrelevant.' 'I see.'

`Another funny thing was that the Quartermaster's got one nobody wants in his store. He offered it to me. In running order. With tools. And a complete set of spares.'

`Did Raleigh say that was irrelevant, too?'

`Yes. It wasn't the one I'd lost, you see. Oh, thanks very much, Corporal Martin, that's extremely kind of you.'

This was said to a member of Archer's section who had carried in a mug of tea for him, though not, I noticed aggrievedly, one for me.

Archer sipped his tea for some time. Then he said : 'Not a bad act I put on, I thought, in front of that ragtime bloody Court of Inquiry. Sorry, I know you couldn't help being on it.'

`An act, then, was it?'

`Of course, you owl. You didn't need to tell me the thing had no standing. But I had to pretend I thought it had, don't you see? and behave like a hysterical schoolgirl. That was what Raleigh wanted. If I'd stood up for my rights or any- thing, he'd just have stepped up his little war of nerves in other ways. I think I even made him feel he'd gone too far. That crack about him always backing me up was rich, I thought. Well, we live and learn.'

Archer no longer looked lost. Nor did he look particularly young. It was true, I thought, that the Army would lick any- one into shape. You could even say that iLmade a man of you.