Simon Called Peter by Robert Keable

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"No," said the Major, "unless they keep 'em at the base."

"Plenty down at Rouen, anyway," said Donovan. "A sporting little blighter
I met at the Brasserie Opera told me he hadn't anything to do, anyway."

"I shall be a padre in the next war," said Jenks, stretching out his
legs. "A parade on Sunday, and you're finished for the week. No orderly
dog, no night work, and plenty of time for your meals. Padres can always
get leave too, and they always come and go by Paris."

Donovan laughed, and glanced sideways at Peter. "Stow it, Jenks," he
said. "Where you for, padre?" he asked.

"I've got to report at Rouen," said Peter. "I was wondering if you were
there."

"No such luck now," returned the other. "But it's a jolly place. Jenko's
there. Get him to take you out to Duclair. You can get roast duck at a
pub there that melts in your mouth. And what's that little hotel near the
statue of Joan of Arc, Jenks, where they still have decent wine?"

Peter was not to learn yet awhile, for at that moment the little door
opened and a waiter looked in. "Breakfast, gentlemen?" he asked.

"Oh, no," said Jenks. "Waiter, I always bring some rations with me; I'll
just take a cup of coffee."

The man grinned. "Right-o, sir," he said. "Porridge, gentlemen?"

He disappeared, leaving the door open and, Donovan opening a newspaper,
Graham stared out of window to wait. From the far corners came scraps of
conversation, from which he gathered that Jenks and the Major were going
over the doings of the night before. He caught a word or two, and stared
the harder out of window.

Outside the English country was rushing by. Little villas, with
back-gardens running down to the rail, would give way for a mile or two
to fields, and then start afresh. The fog was thin there, and England
looked extraordinarily homely and pleasant. It was the known; he was
conscious of rushing at fifty miles an hour into the unknown. He turned
over the scrappy conversation of the last few minutes, and found it
savoured of the unknown. It was curious the difference uniform made. He
felt that these men were treating him more like one of themselves than
men in a railway-carriage had ever treated him before; that somehow even
his badges made him welcome; and yet that, nevertheless, it was not he,
Peter Graham, that they welcomed, or at least not his type. He wondered
if padres in France were different from priests in England. He turned
over the unknown Drennan in his mind. Was it because he was a good priest
that the men liked him, or because they had discovered the man in the
parson?

The waiter brought in the breakfast--porridge, fish, toast, and the
rest--and they fell to, a running fire of comments going on all the time.
Donovan had had Japanese marmalade somewhere, and thought it better than
this. The Major wouldn't touch the beastly margarine, but Jenks thought
it quite as good as butter if taken with marmalade, and put it on nearly
as thickly as his toast. Peter expanded in the air of camaraderie, and
when he leaned back with a cigarette, tunic unbuttoned and cap tossed up
on the rack, he felt as if he had been in the Army for years. He
reflected how curious that was. The last two or three years or so of Boy
Scouts and hospitals and extra prayer-meetings, attended by the people
who attended everything else, seemed to have faded away. There was hardly
a gap between that first war evening which he remembered so clearly and
this. It was a common experience enough, and probably due to the fact
that, whereas everything else had made little impression, he had lived
for this moment and been extraordinarily impressed by that Sunday. But he
realised, also, that it was due as much to his present companions. They
had, seemingly, accepted him as he had never been accepted before. They
asked practically no questions. So far as he could see, he made no
difference to them. He felt as if he were at last part of a great
brotherhood, in which, chiefly, one worried about nothing more important
than Japanese marmalade and margarine.

"We're almost there, boys," said Bevan, peering out of window.

"Curse!" ejaculated Jenks. "I hate getting my traps together in a train,
and I loathe the mob on the boat."

"I don't see why you should," said Donovan. "I'm blest if I bother about
anything. The R.T.O. and the red-caps do everything, and you needn't even
worry about getting a Pullman ticket this way over. Hope it's not rough,
though." He let a window down and leaned out. "Looks all right," he
added.

Peter got up with the rest and began to hang things about him. His
staringly new Sam Browne irritated him, but he forgot it as the train
swung round the curve to the landing-stage.

"Get a porter and a truck, Donovan," said the Major, who was farthest
from the door.

They got out nonchalantly, and Peter lit a cigarette, while the others
threw remarks at the man as to luggage. Then they all trooped off
together in a crowd that consisted of every variety of rank and regiment
and section of the British Empire, plus some Waacs and nurses.

_The Pride of Folkestone_ lay alongside, and when they got there she
seemed already full. The four of them got jammed at the gangway and
shoved on board, handing in and receiving papers from the official at the
head as they passed him. Donovan was in front, and as he stepped on deck
he swung his kit-bag back to Peter, crying:

"Lay hold of that, padre, and edge across the deck. Get up ahead of the
funnel that side. I'll get chairs. Jenko, you rotter, get belts, and drop
eyeing the girl!"

"Jolly nice bit of fluff," said Jenks meditatively, staring fixedly
across the deck.

"Where?" queried the Major, fumbling for his eyeglass.

"Get on there, please, gentlemen," called a ship's official.

"Damn it! mind my leg!"

"Cheerio, old son, here we are again!"

"I say, Tommy, did you get to the Alhambra last night, after all? What?
Well, I couldn't see you, anyhow."

To which accompaniment, Peter pushed his way across the deck. "Sorry,
padre," said a V.A.D. who blocked the way, bending herself back to let
him pass, and smiling. "Catch hold," called out Donovan, swinging a
couple of chairs at him. "No, sir, it's not my chair"--to a Colonel
who was grabbing at one already set out against the rail.

The Colonel collected it and disappeared, Jenks appearing a moment later,
red-faced, through the crush. "You blamed fool," he whispered, "it's that
girl's. I saw her put one here and edged up on it, only some fool got in
my way. Still (hopefully), perhaps she'll come back."

Between them they got four chairs into a line and sat down, all, that is,
save Jenks, who stood up, in a bland and genial way, as if to survey the
crowd impartially. How impartially soon appeared. "Damn!" he exploded.
"She's met some other females, weird and woolly things, and she's sitting
down there. No, by Jove! she's looking this way."

He made a half-start forward, and the Major kicked his shins. "Blast!" he
exploded; "why did you do that, you fool?"

"Don't be an infant, Jenko, sit down. You can't start a flirtation across
the blooming deck. Here, padre, can't you keep him in order?"

Peter half raised himself from his chair at this, and glanced the way the
other was looking. Through the crush he saw, clearly enough for a minute,
a girl of medium height in a nurse's uniform, sideways on to him. The
next second she half-turned, obviously smiling some remark to her
neighbour, and he caught sight of clear brown eyes and a little fringe
of dark hair on the forehead of an almost childish face. The eyes met
his. And then a sailor blundered across his field of vision.

"Topping, isn't she?" demanded Jenks, who had apparently been pulled down
into his chair in the interval.

"Oh, I don't know," said Graham, and added deliberately: "Rather
ordinary, I thought."

Jenks stared at him. "Good Lord, padre," he said, "where are your eyes?"

Peter heard a little chuckle behind, and glanced round to see Donovan
staring at him with amusement written all across his face. "You'll do,
padre," he said, taking a pipe from his pocket and beginning to fill it.
Peter smiled and leant back. Probably for the first time in five years he
forgot for a moment what sort of a collar it was around his neck.

Sitting there, he began to enjoy himself. The sea glittered in the
sun and the Lees stretched out opposite him across the shining gulf.
Sea-birds dipped and screamed. On his left, Major Bevan was talking to
a flying man, and Peter glanced up with him to see an aeroplane that
came humming high up above the trees on the cliff and flew out to sea.

"Damned fine type!" said the boy, whose tunic, for all his youth, sported
wings. "Fritz can't touch it yet. Of course, he'll copy it soon enough,
or go one better, but just at present I think it's the best out. Wish
we'd got some in our circus. We've nothing but ..." and he trailed off
into technicalities.

Peter found himself studying Donovan, who lay back beyond Jenks turning
the pages of an illustrated magazine and smoking. The eyes interested
him; they looked extraordinarily clear, but as if their owner kept hidden
behind them a vast number of secrets as old as the universe. The face was
lined--good-looking, he thought, but the face of a man who was no novice
in the school of life. Peter felt he liked the Captain instinctively. He
carried breeding stamped on him, far more than, say, the Major with the
eyeglass. Peter wondered if they would meet again.

The siren sounded, and a bustle began as people put on their life-belts.
"All life-belts on, please," said a young officer continually, who, with
a brassard on his arm, was going up and down among the chairs. "Who's
that?" asked Peter, struggling with his belt.

"Some poor bloke who has been roped in for crossin' duty," said Jenks.
"Mind my chair, padre; Bevan and I are going below for a wet. Coming,
skipper?"

"Not yet," said Donovan; "the bar's too full at first for me. Padre and
I'll come later."

The others stepped off across the crowded deck, and Donovan pitched his
magazine into Bevan's chair to retain it.

"You're from South Africa?" queried Peter.

"Yes," replied the other. "I was in German West, and came over after on
my own. Joined up with the brigade here."

"What part of Africa?" asked Peter.

"Basutoland, padre. Not a bad place in a way--decent climate, topping
scenery, but rather a stodgy crowd in the camps. One or two decent
people, but the majority mid-Victorian, without a blessed notion except
the price of mealies, who quarrel about nothing half the time, and talk
tuppenny-ha'penny scandal the rest. Good Lord! I wish we had some of the
perishers out here. But they know which side of the bread the butter is.
Bad time for trade, they say, and every other trader has bought a car
since the war. Of course, there's something to be said for the other
side, but what gets my goat is their pettiness. I'm for British East
Africa after the war. There's a chap written a novel about Basutoland
called 'The Land of To-morrow,' but I'd call it 'The Land of the Day
before Yesterday.' I suppose some of them came over with an assortment of
ideas one time, but they've struck no new ones since. I don't advise you
to settle in a South African dorp if you can help it, padre."

"Don't suppose I shall," said Peter. "I've just got engaged, and my
girl's people wouldn't let her out of England."

"Engaged, are you? Thank your stars you aren't married. It's safer not to
be out here."

"Why?"

Donovan looked at him curiously. "Oh, you'll find out fast enough,
padre," he said. "Wonder what you'll make of it. Rum place just now,
France, I can tell you. There's the sweepings of half the world over
there, and everything's turned upside down. Fellows are out for a spree,
of course, and you can't be hard on a chap down from the line if he goes
on the bust a bit. It's human nature, and you must allow for it; don't
you think so?"

"Human nature can be controlled," said Peter primly.

"Can it?" retorted the other. "Even the cloth doesn't find it too easy,
apparently."

"What do you mean?" demanded Peter, and then added: "Don't mind telling
me; I really want to know."

Donovan knocked out his pipe, and evaded. "You've got to be broad-minded,
padre," he said.

"Well, I am," said Peter. "But ..."

"Come and have a drink then," interrupted the other. "Jenko and the Major
are coming back."

"Damned poor whisky!" said the latter, catching the rail as the boat
heaved a bit, "begging your pardon, padre. Better try brandy. If the war
lasts much longer there'll be no whisky worth drinking this side. I'm off
it till we get to the club at Boulogne."

Peter and Donovan went off together. It was a new experience for Peter,
but he wouldn't have owned it. They groped their way down the saloon
stairs, and through a crowd to the little bar. "What's yours?" demanded
Donovan.

"Oh, I'll take the Major's advice," said Peter. "Brandy-and-soda for me."

"Soda finished, sir," said the bar steward.

"All right: two brandies-and-water, steward," said Donovan, and swung a
revolving seat near round for Graham. As he took it, Peter noticed the
man opposite. His badge was a Maltese Cross, but he wore a flannel collar
and tie. Their eyes met, but the other stared a bit stonily. For the
second time, Peter wished he hadn't a clerical collar. The next he was
taking the glass from the South African. "Cheerio," said Donovan.

"Here's to you," said Peter, and leaned back with an assumption of ease.

He had a strange sense of unreality. No fool and no Puritan, he had
naturally, however, been little in such an atmosphere since ordination.
He would have had a drink in Park Lane with the utmost ease, and he would
have argued, over it, that the clergy were not nearly so out of touch
with men as the papers said. But down here, in the steamer's saloon,
surrounded by officers, in an atmosphere of indifference to him and his
office, he felt differently. He was aware, dimly, that for the past five
years situations in which he had been had been dominated by him, and that
he, as a clergyman, had been continually the centre of concern. Talk,
conduct, and company had been rearranged when he came in, and it had
happened so often that he had ceased to be aware of it. But now he was
a mere unit, of no particular importance whatever. No one dreamed of
modifying himself particularly because a clergyman was present. Peter
clung to the belief that it was not altogether so, but he was
sufficiently conscious of it. And he was conscious of liking it, of
wanting to sink back in it as a man sinks back in an easy-chair. He
felt he ought not to do so, and he made a kind of mental effort to
pull himself together.

Up on the deck the world was very fair. The French coast was now clearly
visible, and even the houses of the town, huddled together as it seemed,
but dominated by a church on the hill. Behind them, a sister ship
containing Tommies ploughed steadily along, serene and graceful in the
sunlight, and above an airship of silvery aluminum, bearing the
tricoloured circle of the Allies, kept pace with the swift ship without
an effort. Four destroyers were visible, their low, dark shapes ploughing
regularly along at stated intervals, and someone said a fifth was out of
sight behind. People were already beginning to take off their life-belts,
and the sailors were clearing a place for the gangway. Peter found that
Donovan had known what he was about, for his party would be close to the
gangway without moving. He began to wonder uneasily what would be done
on landing, and to hope that Donovan would be going his way. No one had
said a word about it. He looked round for Jenks' nurse, but couldn't see
her.

It was jolly entering the port. The French houses and fishing-boats
looked foreign, although one could hardly say why. On the quay was a big
notice: "All officers to report at once to the M.L.O." Farther on was a
board bearing the letters "R.T.O." ... But Peter hardly liked to ask.

In fact, everything went like clockwork. He presently found himself
in a queue, behind Donovan, of officers who were passing a small
window like a ticket office. Arriving, he handed in papers, and was
given them back with a brief "All right." Beyond, Donovan had secured
a broken-down-looking one-horse cab. "You'll be coming to the club,
padre?" he asked. "Chuck in your stuff. This chap'll take it down and
Bevan with it. Let's walk. It isn't far."

Jenks elected to go with his friend the Major, and Donovan and Peter
set off over the cobbles. They joined up with another small group, and
for the first time Peter had to give his name as he was introduced. He
forgot the others, as soon as he heard them, and they forgot his. A big
Dublin Fusilier officer with a tiny moustache, that seemed ludicrous
in his great face, exchanged a few sentences with him. They left the
quay and crossed a wide space where a bridge debouched towards the
railway-station. Donovan, who was walking ahead, passed on, but the
Fusilier suggested to Peter that they might as well see the R.T.O. at
once about trains. Entering the station gates, the now familiar initials
appearing on a row of offices before them to the left, Peter's companion
demanded the train to Albert.

"Two-thirty a.m., change at Amiens, sir," said a clerk in uniform within,
and the Fusilier passed on.

"What time is the Rouen train?" asked Peter in his turn, and was told
9.30 p.m.

"You're in luck, padre," said the other. "It's bally rotten getting in at
two-thirty, and probably the beastly thing won't go till five. Still, it
might be worse. You can get on board at midnight, and with luck get to
sleep. If I were you, I'd be down here early for yours--crowded always,
it is. Of course, you'll dine at the club?"

Peter supposed he would.

The club entrance was full up with officers, and more and more kept
pouring in. Donovan was just leaving the counter on the right with some
tickets in his hand as they pushed in. "See you later," he called out.
"I've got to sleep here, and I want to leave my traps."

Peter wondered where, but was too much occupied in keeping well behind
the Fusilier to think much. At a kind of counter a girl in a W.A.A.C.
uniform was serving out tickets of one sort and another, and presently
the two of them were before her. For a few francs one got tickets for
lunch, dinner, bed, a bath, and whatever else one wanted, but Peter
had no French money. The Fusilier bought him the first two, however,
and together they forced their way out into the great lounge. "Half
an hour before lunch," said his new companion, and then, catching sight
of someone: "Hullo, Jack, you back? Never saw you on the boat. Did
you ..." His voice trailed off as he crossed the room.

Peter looked around a little disconsolately. Then he made his way to a
huge lounge-chair and threw himself into it.

All about him was a subdued chatter. A big fire burned in the stove,
and round it was a wide semicircle of chairs. Against the wall were
more, and a small table or two stood about. Nearly every chair had its
occupant--all sorts and conditions of officers, mostly in undress, and he
noticed some fast asleep, with muddied boots. There was a look on their
faces, even in sleep, and Peter guessed that some at least were down
from the line on their way to a brief leave. More and more came in
continuously. Stewards with drinks passed quickly in and out about them.
The Fusilier and his friend were just ordering something. Peter opened
his case and took out a cigarette, tapping it carefully before lighting
it. He began to feel at home and lazy and comfortable, as if he had been
there before.

An orderly entered with envelopes in his hand. "Lieutenant Frazer?" he
called, and looked round inquiringly. There was no reply, and he turned
to the next. "Captain Saunders?" Still no reply. "Lieutenant Morcombe?"
Still no reply. "Lieutenant Morcombe," he called again. Nobody took any
interest, and he turned on his heel, pushed the swing-door open, and
departed.

Then Donovan came in, closely followed by Bevan. Peter got up and made
towards them. "Hullo!" said Bevan. "Have an appetiser, padre. Lunch will
be on in twenty minutes. What's yours, skipper?"

The three of them moved on to Peter's chair, and Bevan dragged up
another. Peter subsided, and Donovan sat on the edge. Peter pulled
out his cigarette-case again, and offered it. Bevan, after one or two
ineffectual attempts, got an orderly at last.

"Well, here's fun," he said.

"Cheerio," said Peter. He remembered Donovan had said that in the saloon.

CHAPTER III

Jenks being attached to the A.S.C. engaged in feeding daily more than
100,000 men in the Rouen area, Peter and he travelled together. By the
latter's advice they reached the railway-station soon after 8.30, but
even so the train seemed full. There were no lights in the siding, and
none whatever on the train, so that it was only by matches that one could
tell if a compartment was full or empty, except in the case of those from
which candle-light and much noise proclaimed the former indisputably. At
last, however, somewhere up near the engine, they found a second-class
carriage, apparently unoccupied, with a big ticket marked "Reserved" upon
it. Jenks struck a match and regarded this critically. "Well, padre," he
said, "as it doesn't say for whom it is reserved, I guess it may as
well be reserved for us. So here goes." He swung up and tugged at the
door, which for some time refused to give. Then it opened suddenly, and
Second-Lieutenant Jenks, A.S.C., subsided gracefully and luridly on the
ground outside. Peter struck another match and peered in. It was then
observed that the compartment was not empty, but that a dark-haired,
lanky youth, stretched completely along one seat, was regarding them
solemnly.

"This carriage is reserved," he said.

"Yes," said Jenks cheerfully, "for us, sir. May I ask what you are doing
in it?"

The awakened one sighed. "It's worked before, and if you chaps come in
and shut the door quickly, perhaps it will work again. Three's not too
bad, but I've seen six in these perishing cars. Come in quickly, for the
Lord's sake!"

Peter looked round him curiously. Two of the four windows were broken,
and the glory had departed from the upholstery. There was no light, and
it would appear that a heavier body than that designed for it had
travelled upon the rack. Jenks was swearing away to himself and trying
to light a candle-end. Peter laughed.

"Got any cards?" asked the original owner.

"Yes," said Jenks. "Got any grub?"

"Bath-olivers and chocolate and half a water-bottle of whisky," replied
the original owner. "And we shall need them."

"Good enough," said Jenks. "And the padre here has plenty of sandwiches,
for he ordered a double lot."

"Do you play auction, padre?" queried what turned out, in the
candle-light, to be a Canadian.

Peter assented; he was moderately good, he knew.

This fairly roused the Canadian. He swung his legs off the seat, and
groped for the door. "Hang on to this dug-out, you men," he said, "and
I'll get a fourth. I kidded some fellows of ours with that notice just
now, but I know them, and I can get a decent chap to come in."

He was gone a few minutes only; then voices sounded outside. "Been
looking for you, old dear," said their friend. "Only two sportsmen here
and a nice little show all to ourselves. Tumble in, and we'll get
cheerful. Not that seat, old dear. But wait a jiffy; let's sort things
out first."

* * * * *

They snorted out of the dreary tunnel into Rouen in the first daylight of
the next morning. Peter looked eagerly at the great winding river and the
glory of the cathedral as it towered up above the mists that hung over
the houses. There was a fresh taste of spring in the air, and the smoke
curled clear and blue from the slow-moving barges on the water. The bare
trees on the island showed every twig and thin branch, as if they had
been pencilled against the leaden-coloured flood beneath. A tug puffed
fussily upstream, red and yellow markings on its grimy black.

Jenks was asleep in the corner, but he woke as they clattered across the
bridge. "Heigh-ho!" he sighed, stretching. "Back to the old graft again."

Yet once more Peter began to collect his belongings. It seemed ages since
he had got into the train at Victoria, and he felt particularly grubby
and unshaven.

"What's the next move?" he asked.

Jenks eyed him. "Going to take a taxi?" he queried.

"Where to?" said Peter.

"Well, if you ask me, padre," he replied, "I don't see what's against a
decent clean-up and breakfast at the club. It doesn't much matter when I
report, and the club's handy for your show. I know the A.C.G.'s office,
because it's in the same house as the Base Cashier, and the club's just
at the bottom of the street. But it's the deuce of a way from the
station. If we can get a taxi, I vote we take it."

"Right-o," agreed Peter. "You lead on."

They tumbled out on the platform, and produced the necessary papers at
the exit labelled "British Officers Only." A red-capped military
policeman wrote down particulars on a paper, and in a few minutes they
were out among the crowd of peasantry in the booking-hall. Jenks pushed
through, and had secured a cab by the time Peter arrived. "There isn't a
taxi to be got, padre," he said, "but this'll do."

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