Simon Called Peter by Robert Keable

R >> Robert Keable >> Simon Called Peter

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25

A young man, smoking a cigarette and reading a magazine, glanced
up at him. Peter observed in time that he had two stars only on his
shoulder-strap. Before he could speak, the other said cheerily: "Well,
padre, and what can I do for you?"

Peter deprecatingly told him. He had waited ten days, etc., and had at
last gone out, and the movement order had come with...

The other cut him short: "Oh, you're the chap who failed to report, are
you? Blighted rotters they are at these Group H.Q.'s. Chuck us over the
chit."

Peter brightened up and obeyed. The other read it. "I know," ventured
Peter, "but I got the dickens of a strafe from the Colonel. He said he
had no idea when I could get away, and had better see you. What can I
do?"

"Silly old ass! You'd better go to-night. There are plenty of trains,
and you're all alone, aren't you? I might just alter the date, but I
suppose now you had better go to his nibs the Deputy Assistant Officer
controlling Transport. He's in the Rue de la Republique, No. 153; you can
find it easily enough. Tell him I sent you. He'll probably make you out
a new order."

Peter felt enormously relieved. He relaxed, smiled, and got out a
cigarette, offering the other one. "Beastly lot of fuss they make
over nothing, these chaps," he said.

"I know," said the R.T.O.; "but they're paid for it, my boy, and probably
your old dear had been strafed himself this morning. Well, cheerio; see
you again to-night. Come in time, and I'll get you a decent place."

The great man's office was up two flights of wooden stairs in what looked
like a deserted house. But Peter mounted them with an easy mind. He had
forgiven Lear, and the world smiled. He still didn't realise he was
acting in _Punch_.

Outside a suitably labelled door he stood a moment, listening to a
well-bred voice drawling out sarcastic orders to some unfortunate. Then,
with a smile he entered. A Major looked up at him, and heard his story
without a word. Peter got less buoyant as he proceeded, and towards the
end he was rather lame. A silence followed. The great man scrutinised
the order. "Where were you?" he demanded at last, abruptly.

It was an awkward question. Peter hedged. "The O.C. of my camp asked me
to go out with him," he said at last, feebly.

The other picked up a blue pencil and scrawled further on the order.
"We've had too much of this lately," he said icily. "Officers appear to
think they can travel when and how they please. You will report to the
D.A.Q.M.G. at Headquarters, 3rd Echelon." He handed the folded order
back, and the miserable Peter had a notion that he meant to add: "And
God have mercy on your soul."

He ventured a futile remonstrance. "The R.T.O. said you could perhaps
alter the date."

The Major leaned back and regarded him in silence as a remarkable
phenomenon such as had not previously come his way. Then he sighed,
and picked up a pen. "Good-morning," he said.

Peter, in the street, contemplated many things, including suicide. If
Colonel Chichester had been in Rouen he would have gone there; as it was,
he did not dare to face that unknown any more than this other. In the end
he set out slowly for H.Q., was saluted by the sentry under the flag,
climbed up to a corridor with many strangely labelled doors, and finally
entered the right one, to find himself in a big room in which half a
dozen men in uniform were engaged at as many desks with orderlies moving
between them. A kind of counter barred his farther passage. He stood at
it forlornly for a few minutes.

At last an orderly came to him, and he shortly explained his presence and
handed in the much-blued order. The man listened in silence, asked him to
wait a moment, and departed. Peter leaned on the counter and tried to
look indifferent. With a detached air he studied the Kirschner girls on
the walls. These added a certain air to the otherwise forlorn place, but
when, a little later, W.A.A.C.'s were installed, a paternal Government
ordered their removal. But that then mattered no longer to Peter.

At the last the orderly came back. "Will you please follow me, sir?" he
said.

Peter was led round the barrier like a sheep to execution, and in
at a small door. He espied a General Officer at a desk by the window,
telephone receiver in one hand, the fateful order in the other. He
saluted. The other nodded. Peter waited.

"Ah, yes! D.A.Q.M.G. speaking. That 10th Group Headquarters? Oh yes;
good-morning, Mallony. About Captain Graham's movement order. When was
this order applied for at your end?... What? Eighteenth? Humph! What time
did your office receive it?... Eh? Ten a.m.? Then, sir, I should like to
know what it was doing in your office till six p.m. This officer did not
receive it till six-thirty. What? He was out? Yes, very likely, but it
reached his mess at six-thirty: it is so endorsed.... Colonel Lear has
had the matter under consideration? Good. Kindly ask Colonel Lear to come
to the telephone."

He leaned back, and glanced up at Graham, taking him in with a grave
smile. "I understand you waited ten days for this, Captain Graham," he
said. "It's disgraceful that it should happen. I am glad to have had an
instance brought before me, as we have had too many cases of this sort of
thing lately...." He broke off. "Yes? Colonel Lear? Ah, good-morning,
Colonel Lear. This case of the movement order of Captain Graham has just
been brought to me. This officer was kept waiting ten days for his order,
and then given an impossibly short time to report. Well, it won't do,
Colonel. There must be something very wrong in your orderly-room; kindly
see to it. Chaplains have other things to do than sit around in camps
waiting the convenience of Group Headquarters. The application for this
order reached us on the 27th, and was sent off early next morning, in
ample time for the officer to travel. I am very displeased about it. You
will kindly apply at once for a fresh order, and see that it is in
Captain Graham's hands at least six hours before he must report. That
is all. Good-morning."

Peter could hardly believe his ears, but he could barely keep a straight
face either. The D.A.Q.M.G. hung up the receiver and repeated the latter
part of the message. Peter thanked him and departed, walking on air. A
day later an orderly from the group informed him at 11 a.m. that the
order had been applied for and might be expected that day, and at 1
o'clock he received it. Such is the humour of the high gods who control
the British Army. But he never saw Colonel Lear again, and was thankful.

Peter reached his new base, then, early in March in a drizzle of rain. He
was told his camp and set off to find it, and for an hour walked through
endless docks, over innumerable bridges, several of which, being open to
admit and let out ships, caused him pretty considerable delay. It was a
strange, new experience. The docks presented types of nearly every
conceivable nationality and of every sort of shipping. French marines and
seamen were, of course everywhere, but so were Chinese, South African
natives, Egyptians, Senegalese, types of all European nationalities,
a few of the first clean, efficient-looking Americans in tight-fitting
uniforms, and individual officers of a score of regiments.

The old town ended in a row of high, disreputable-looking houses that
were, however, picturesque enough, and across the _pave_ in front of them
commenced the docks. One walked in and out of harbours and waterways, the
main stretch of harbour opening up more and more on the right hand, and
finally showing two great encircling arms that nearly met, and the grey
Channel beyond. Tossing at anchor outside were more than a dozen ships,
waiting for dark to attempt the crossing. As he went, a seaplane came
humming in from the mists, circled the old town, and took the harbour
water in a slither of foam. He had to wait while a big Argentine ship
ploughed slowly in up a narrow channel, and then, in the late afternoon,
crossed a narrow swing foot-bridge, and found himself on the main outer
sea-wall.

Following directions, he turned to the right and walked as if going out
to the harbour mouth a mile or so ahead. It seemed impossible that his
camp should be here, for on the one hand he was close to the harbour, and
on the other, over a high wall and some buildings, was plainly to be
espied the sea. A few hundred yards on, however, a crowd of Tommies were
lined up and passing embarkation officers for a big trooper, and Peter
concluded that this was the leave boat by which he was to mark his camp
across the road and more or less beyond it.

He crossed a railway-line, went in at a gate, and was there.

The officers' quarters had a certain fascination. You stepped out of
the anteroom and found yourself on a raised concrete platform at the
back of which washed the sea. Very extensive harbour works, half
completed, ran farther out in a great semicircle across a wide space of
leaden water, over which gulls were circling and crying; but the thin
black line of this wall hardly interrupted one's sense of looking
straight out to sea, and its wide mouth away on the right let in the
real invigorating, sea-smelling wind. The camp itself was a mere strip
between the railway-line and the water, a camp of R.E.'s to which he was
attached. He was also to work a hospital which was said to be close by.

It was pointed out to him later. The railway ran out all but to the
harbour mouth, and there ended in a great covered, wide station. Above
it, large and airy, with extensive verandahs parallel to the harbour,
was the old Customs, and it was this that had been transformed into a
hospital. It was an admirable place. The Red Cross trains ran in below,
and the men could be quickly swung up into the cool, clean wards above.
These, all on one level, had great glass doors giving access to the
verandahs, and from the verandahs broad gangways could be placed, running
men, at high tide, on to the hospital ship alongside. The nurses'
quarters were beyond, and their sitting-room was perched up, as it
were, sea on one side and harbour on the other.

At present, of course, Peter did not know all this. He was merely
conducted by an orderly in the dusk to the anteroom of the mess, and
welcomed by the orderly-officer, who led him into a comfortable room
already lit, in a corner of which, near a stove, four officers sat at
cards.

"Hearts three," said one as Peter came in.

"Pass me," said another, and it struck Peter that he knew the tone.

The four were fairly absorbed in their game, but the orderly officer led
Peter towards the table. At that they looked up, and next minute one had
jumped up and was greeting him.

"By all that's wonderful! It's you again," he said.

"Donovan!" exclaimed Peter, "What: are you doing here?"

The South African held out his hand. "I've got attached to one of our
nigger outfits," he said, "just up the dock from here. But what are you
doing?"

"Oh, I've been moved from Rouen," said Peter, "and told to join up here.
Got to look after the hospital and a few camps. And I was told," he
added, "I'd live in this camp."

"Good enough," said Donovan. "Let me introduce you. This is Lieutenant
Pennell, R.E.--Lieutenant Pennell, Captain Graham. This is a bird of your
kidney, mess secretary and a great man, Padre Arnold, and this is one
Ferrars, Australian Infantry. He tried to stop a shell," went on Donovan
easily, "and is now recovering. The shock left him a little insane, or so
his best friends think; hence, as you may have heard, he has just gone
three hearts. And that's all anyone can do at present, padre, so have a
cigarette and sit down. I hope you haven't changed your old habits, as
you are just in time for a sun-downer. Orderly!"

He pulled up a large easy-chair, and Peter subsided into it with a
pleasant feeling of welcome. He remembered, now, having heard that
Donovan was at Havre, but it was none the less a surprise to meet him.

Donovan played a good hand when he liked, but when he was not meeting
his mettle, or perhaps when the conditions were not serious enough, he
usually kept up a diverting, unorthodox run of talk the whole time. Peter
listened and took in his surroundings lazily. "Come on," said his friend,
playing a queen. "Shove on your king, Pennell; everyone knows you've got
him. What? Hiding the old gentleman, are you? Why, sure it's myself has
him all the time"--gathering up the trick and leading the king. "Perhaps
somebody's holding up the ace now...." and so on.

Pennell played well too, but very differently. He was usually bored with
his luck or the circumstances, and until you got to know him you were
inclined to think he was bored with you. He was a young-looking man of
thirty-five, rather good-looking, an engineer in peace-time who had
knocked about the world a good deal, but hardly gave you that impression.
The Australian played poorly. With curly dark hair and a perpetual pipe,
his face was almost sullen in repose, but it lit up eagerly enough at
any chance excitement. Arnold was easily the eldest, a short man with
iron-grey hair and very kindly eyes, a man master of himself and his
circumstances. Peter watched him eagerly. He was likely to see a good
deal of him, he thought, and he was glad there would be a padre as well
in camp.

Donovan and Ferrars won the game and so the rubber easily, and the former
pushed his chair back from the table. "That's enough for me, boys," he
said. "I must trek in a minute. Well, padre, and what do you think of the
Army now?"

"Mixed biscuits rather," Peter said. "But I had a rum experience getting
here. You wouldn't have thought it possible," and he related the story
of the movement order. At the close, Pennell nodded gloomily. "Pack of
fools they are!" he said. "Hardly one of them knows his job. You can
thank your lucky stars that the D.A.Q.M.G. had a down on that Colonel
What's-his-name, or it would have taken you another month to get here,
probably--eh, Donovan?"

"That's so, old dear," said that worthy, "But I'm hanged if I'd have
cared. Some place, Rouen. Better'n this hole."

"Well, at Rouen they said this was better," said Peter.

Arnold laughed. "That's the way of the Army," he said. "It's all much the
same, but you would have to go far to beat this camp."

Pennell agreed. "You're right there, padre," he said. "This is as neat a
hole as I've struck. If you know the road," he went on to Peter, "you can
slip into town in twenty-five minutes or so, and we're much better placed
than most camps. There's no mud and cinders here, is there, Donovan? His
camp's built on cinders," he added.

"There are not," said that worthy, rising. "And you're very convenient to
the hospital here, padre. You better get Arnold to show you round; he's a
dog with the nurses."

"What about the acting matron, No. 1 Base?" demanded Arnold. "He has tea
there every Sunday," he explained to Peter, "and he a married man, too."

"It's time I went," said Donovan, laughing; "all the same, there's a
concert on Tuesday in next week, a good one, I believe, and I've promised
to go and take some people. Who'll come? Pennell, will you?"

"Not this child, thanks. Too many nurses, too much tea, and too much talk
for me. Now, if you would pick me out a pretty one and fix up a little
dinner in town, I'm your man, old bean."

"Well, that might be managed. It's time we had a flutter of some sort.
I'll see. What about you, Graham? You game to try the hospital? You'll
have to get to know the ropes of them all, you know."

"Yes, I'll come," said Peter--"if I can, that is." He looked inquiringly
at Arnold.

"Oh, your time is more or less your own," he replied--"at least, it is
our side of the house. Are you C.G. or P.C.?"

"Good God, padre!" said the Australian, getting up too, "what in the
world do you mean?"

"Chaplain-General's Department or Principal Chaplain's Department, Church
of England or Nonconformist. And it's sixpence a swear in this mess."
Arnold held out a hand.

Donovan caught his friend by the arm. "Come on out of it," he said. "You
won't get back in time if you don't. The padre's a good sort; you needn't
mind him. So long everybody. Keep Tuesday clear, Graham. I'll call for
you."

"Well, I'd better fix you up, Graham," said Arnold. "For my sins I'm mess
secretary, and as the president's out and likely to be, I'll find a place
for you."

He led Peter into the passage, and consulted a board on the wall. "I'd
like to put you next me, but I can't," he said. "Both sides occupied.
Wait a minute. No. 10 Pennell, and No. 11's free. How would you like
that? Pennell," he called through the open door, "what's the next room to
yours like? Light all right?"

"Quite decent," said Pennell, coming to the door. "Going to put him
there, padre? Let's go and see." Then the three went off together down
the passage.

The little room was bare, except for a table under the window, Arnold
opened it, and Peter saw he looked out over the sea. Pennell switched on
the light and found it working correctly, and then sauntered across the
couple of yards or so of the cubicle's width to look at the remains of
some coloured pictures pasted on the wooden partition.

"Last man's made a little collection from _La Vie Parisienne_ for you,
padre," he said, "Not a very bright selection, either. You'll have to
cover them up, or it'll never do to bring your A.C.G. or A.P.C., or
whatever he is, in here. What a life!" he added, regarding them. "They
are a queer people, the French.... Well, is this going to do?"

Graham glanced at Arnold, "Very well," he said, "if it's all right for me
to have it."

"Quite all right," said Arnold. "Remember, Pennell is next door left, so
keep him in order. Next door right is the English Channel, more or less.
Now, what about your traps?"

"I left them outside the orderly-room," said Peter, "except for some
that a porter was to bring up. Perhaps they'll be here by now. I've got
a stretcher and so on."

"I'll go and see," said Pennell, "and I'll put my man on to get you
straight, as you haven't a batman yet." And he strolled off.

"Come to my room a minute," said Arnold, and Peter followed him.

Arnold's room was littered with stuff. The table was spread with mess
accounts, and the corners of the little place were stacked up with a
gramophone, hymn-books, lantern-slides, footballs, boxing-gloves, and
such-like. The chairs were both littered, but Arnold cleared one by the
simple expedient of piling all its contents on the other, and motioned
his visitor to sit down. "Have a pipe?" he asked, holding out his pouch.

Peter thanked him, filled and handed it back, then lit his pipe, and
glanced curiously round the room as he drew on it. "You're pretty full
up," he said.

"Fairly," said the other. "There's a Y.M.C.A. here, and I run it more or
less, and Tommy likes variety. He's a fine chap, Tommy; don't you think
so?"

Peter hesitated a second, and the other glanced at him shrewdly.

"Perhaps you haven't been out long enough," he said.

"Perhaps not," said Peter. "Not but what I do like him. He's a cheerful
creature for all his grousing, and has sterling good stuff in him. But
religiously I don't get on far. To tell you the truth, I'm awfully
worried about it."

The elder man nodded. "I guess I know, lad," he said. "See here. I'm
Presbyterian and I reckon you are Anglican, but I expect we're up against
much the same sort of thing. Don't worry too much. Do your job and talk
straight, and the men'll listen more than you think."

"But I don't think I know what to tell them," said Peter miserably, but
drawn out by the other.

Arnold smiled. "The Prayer Book's not much use here, eh? But forgive me;
I don't mean to be rude. I know what you mean. To tell you the truth, I
think this war is what we padres have been needing. It'll help us to find
our feet. Only--this is honest--if you don't take care you may lose them.
I have to keep a tight hold of that"--and he laid his hand on a big
Bible--"to mind my own."

Peter did not reply for a minute. He could not talk easily to a stranger.
But at last he said: "Yes; but it doesn't seem to me to fit the case. Men
are different. Times are different. The New Testament people took certain
things for granted, and even if they disagreed, they always had a common
basis with the Apostles. Men out here seem to me to talk a different
language: you don't know where to begin. It seems to me that they have
long ago ceased to believe in the authority of anyone or anything in
religion, and now to-day they actually deny our very commonplaces. But
I don't know how to put it," he added lamely.

Arnold puffed silently for a little. Then he took his pipe out of his
mouth and regarded it critically. "God's in the soul of every man still,"
he said. "They can still hear Him speak, and speak there. And so must we
too, Graham."

Peter said nothing. In a minute or so steps sounded in the passage, and
Arnold looked up quickly. "Maybe," he said, "our ordinary life prevented
us hearing God very plainly ourselves, Graham, and maybe He has sent us
here for that purpose. I hope so. I've wondered lately if we haven't come
to the kingdom for such a time as this."

Pennell pushed the door open, and looked in. "You there, Graham?" he
asked. "Oh, I thought I'd find him here, padre; his stuff's come."

Peter got up. "Excuse me, Arnold," he said; "I must shake in. But I'm
jolly glad you said what you did, and I hope you'll say it again, and
some more."

The older man smiled an answer, and the door closed. Then he sighed a
little, and stretched out his hand again for the Bible.

CHAPTER VI

The great central ward at No. 1 Base Hospital looked as gay as possible.
In the centre a Guard's band sat among palms and ferns, and an
extemporised stage, draped with flags, was behind, with wings constructed
of Japanese-figured material. Pretty well all round were the beds,
although many of them had been moved up into a central position, and
there was a space for chairs and forms. The green-room had to be outside
the ward, and the performers, therefore, came and went in the public
gaze. But it was not a critical public, and the men, with a plenitude
of cigarettes, did not object to pauses. On the whole, they were
extraordinarily quiet and passive. Modern science has made the
battlefield a hell, but it has also made the base hospital something
approaching a Paradise.

There were women in plenty. The staff had been augmented by visitors from
most of the other hospitals in the town, and there was a fair sprinkling
of W.A.A.C.'s, Y.M.C.A. workers, and so on, in addition. Jack Donovan
and Peter were a little late, and arrived at the time an exceedingly
popular subaltern was holding the stage amid roars of laughter. They
stood outside one of the many glass doors and peered in.

Once inside, one had to make one's way among beds and chairs, and the
nature of things brought one into rather more than the usual share of
late-comers' scrutiny, but nothing could abash Donovan. He spotted at
once a handsome woman in nurse's indoor staff uniform, and made for her.
She, with two others, was sitting on an empty bed, and she promptly made
room for Donovan. Graham was introduced, and a quiet girl moved up a bit
for him to sit down; but there was not much room, and the girl would not
talk, so that he sat uncomfortably and looked about him, listening with
one ear to the fire of chaff on his right. Donovan was irrepressible. His
laugh and voice, and the fact that he was talking to a hospital
personage, attracted a certain amount of attention. Peter tried to smile,
but he felt out of it and observed. He stared up towards the band, which
was just striking up again.

Suddenly he became conscious, as one will, that someone was particularly
looking at him. He glanced back over the chairs, and met a pair of eyes,
roguish, laughing, and unquestionably fixed upon him. The moment he saw
them, their owner nodded and telegraphed an obvious invitation. Peter
glanced at Donovan: he had not apparently seen. He looked back; the eyes
called him again. He felt himself getting hot, for, despite the fact that
he had a kind of feeling that he had seen those eyes before, he was
perfectly certain he did not know the girl. Perhaps she had made a
mistake. He turned resolutely to his companion.

"Jolly good band, isn't it?" he said.

"Yes," she replied.

"But I suppose at a hospital like this you're always hearing decent
music?" he ventured.

"Not so often," she said.

"This band is just back from touring the front, isn't it? My friend said
something to that effect."

"I believe so," she said.

Peter could have cursed her. It was impossible to get anything out of
her, though why he had not a notion. The answer was really simple, for
she wanted to be next Donovan, and wasn't, and she was all the while
scheming how to get there. But Peter did not tumble to that; he felt an
ass and very uncomfortable, and he broke into open revolt.

He looked steadily towards the chairs. The back of the girl who had
looked at him was towards him now, for she was talking sideways to
somebody; but he noted an empty chair just next her, and that her uniform
was not that of the nurses of this hospital. He felt confident that she
would look again, and he was not disappointed. Instantly he made up his
mind, nodded, and reached for his cap. "I see a girl I know over there,"
he said to his neighbour. "Excuse me, will you?" Then he got up and
walked boldly over to the vacant chair. He was fast acclimatising to war
conditions.

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25