Fanny Goes to War Part 15

A sound that set all my nerves singing And ran down the length of my spine, A great pack of hounds as they're flinging Themselves on a new red-hot line!

A bit of G.o.d's country is stretching As far as the hawk's eye can see, The bushes are leafless, like etching, As all good dream fences should be.

There isn't a bitter wind blowing But a soft little southerly breeze, And instead of the grey channel flowing A covert of scrub and young trees.

The field of course is just dozens Of people I want to meet so-- Old friends, to say nothing of cousins Who've been killed in the war months ago.

Three F.A.N.Y.s are riding like fairies Having drifted right into my dreams, And they're riding their favourite "hairies"

That have been dead for years, so it seems.

A ditch that I've funked with precision For seasons, and pa.s.sed by in fear, I now leap with a perfect decision That never has marked my career.

For a dream-horse has never yet stumbled; Far away hounds don't know how to flag.

A dream-fence would melt ere it crumbled, And the dream-scent's as strong as a drag.

Of course the whole field I have pounded Lepping high five-barred gates by the score, And I don't seem the least bit astounded, Though I never have done it before!

At last a glad chorus of yelling, Proclaims my dream-fox has been viewed-- But somewhere some stove smoke is smelling Which accounts for my feeling half stewed-- And somewhere the F.A.N.Y.s are talking And somebody shouts through the din: "What a horrible habit of snoring-- Hit her hard--wake her up--the train's in."

CHAPTER XV

CONVOY PETS, COMMANDEERING, AND THE "FANTASTIKS"

We took turns to go out on "all-night duty"; a different thing from night guards, and meant taking any calls that came through after 9 p.m.

and before 8 a.m. next morning.

They were usually from outlying camps for men who had been taken ill or else for stranded Army Sisters arriving at the Gare about 3 a.m. waiting to be taken to their billets.

It was comparatively cheery to be on this job when night guards were in progress, as there were four hefty F.A.N.Y.s sitting up in the cook-house, your car warm and easy to crank, and, joy of joys, a hot drink for you when you came back!

In the ordinary way as one scrambled into warm sweaters and top coats the dominant thought was, would the car start all right out there, with not a hand to give a final fillip once the "getting loose" process was accomplished?

Luckily my turns came round twice during night guards, and the last time I had to go for a pneumonia case to Beau Marais. It was a bright moonlight night, almost as light as day, with everything glittering in the frozen snow. Susan fairly hopped it! After having found the case, which took some doing, and deposited him in No. 30 hospital, I sped back to camp.

As I crossed the Place d'Armes and drove up the narrow Rue de la Mer, Susan seemed to take a sudden header and almost threw a somersault! I had gone into an invisible hole in the ice, two feet deep, extending half across the street. For some reason it had melted (due probably to an underground bakery in the vicinity). I reversed anxiously and then hopped out to feel Susan's springs as one might a horse's knees. Thank goodness they had not snapped, so backing all the way down the street again, relying on the moon for light, I proceeded cautiously by another route and got back without further mishap.

Our menagerie was gradually increasing. There were now three dogs and two cats in camp, not to mention a magpie and two canaries, more of which anon. There was Wuzzy, of course, and Archie (a naughty looking little Sealyham belonging to Heasy) and a mongrel known as G.K.W. (G.o.d knows what) that ran in front of a visiting Red Cross touring car one day and found itself in the position of the young lady of Norway, who sat herself down in the doorway! I did not witness the untimely end, but I believe it was all over in a minute.

One cat belonged to Eva, a plain-looking animal, black with a half-white face, christened "Miss Dip" (an inspiration on my part suggested by the donor's name, on the "Happy Family" principle). She was the apple of her eye, nevertheless, and nightly Eva could be heard calling "Dip, Dip, Dip," all over the camp to fetch her to bed. Incidentally it became quite an Angelus for us.

Considering the way she hunted all the meat shops for t.i.t bits, that cat ought to have been a show animal--but it wasn't. One day as our fairy Lowson was lightly jumping from a window-sill she inadvertently "came in contact" with Dip's tail, the extreme tip of which was severed in consequence! In wrathful indignation Eva rushed Dip down to the Casino in an ambulance, where one of the foremost surgeons of the day operated with skill and speed and made a neat job of it, to the entire satisfaction of all concerned. If her tail still remains square at the end she can tell her children she was _blessee dans la guerre_. The other cat was a tortoisesh.e.l.l and appropriately called "Melisande in the Wood," justified by the extraordinary circ.u.mstances in which she was discovered. One day at No. 35 hut hospital I saw three of the men hunting in a bank opposite, covered with undergrowth and small shrubs.

They told me that for the past three days a kitten had been heard mewing, but in spite of all their efforts to find it, they had failed to do so. I listened, and sure enough heard a plaintive mew. The place was a network of clinging roots, but presently I crawled in and found it was just possible to get along on hands and knees. It was most mysterious--the kitten could be heard quite loud one minute, and when we got to the exact spot it would be some distance away again. (It reminded me of the Dutch ventriloquist's trick in Lamarck). It was such a plaintive mew I was determined to find that kitten if I stayed there all night. At last it dawned on me, it must be in a rabbit hole; and sure enough after pushing and pulling my way along to the top of the bank, I found one over which a fall of earth had successfully pushed some wire netting from the fence above. I waited patiently, and in due time caught sight of a little black, yellow, and white kitten; but the minute I made a grab for it, it bolted. I pulled the netting away, but the hole was much too deep for so small a creature to get out by itself, and it was much too frightened to let me catch it. With great difficulty I extricated myself and ran to the cookhouse, where I soon enlisted Bridget's aid. We got some small pieces of soft raw meat and crawled to the top of the bank again. After long and tedious coaxing I at last grabbed the little thing spitting furiously while Bridget gave it some food, and in return for my trouble it bit and scratched like a young devil! It was terribly hungry and bolted all we had brought. When we got her to the cook-house she ran round the place like a mad thing, and turned out to be rather a fast cat altogether when she grew up. We tossed for her, Bridget won, and she was duly christened with a drop of tinned milk on her forehead, "Melisande in the Wood."

The magpie belonged to Russell, and came from Peuplinghe. Magpies are supposed to be unlucky birds. This one certainly brought no luck to its different owners. Shortly after its arrival Russell was obliged to return to England for good. Before going, however, she presented Jacques to Captain White at Val de Lievre. Sure enough after some time he was posted to the Boche prisoner camp at Marquise--a job he did not relish at all. I don't know if he took Jacques with him, but the place was bombed shortly after and the Huns killed many of their own men, and presumably Jacques as well. So he did his bit for France.

The canaries belonged to Renny--at least at first she had only one. It happened in this wise. The man at the disinfector (where we took our cars and blankets to be syringed after an infectious case), had had a canary given him by his "best girl" (French). He did not want a canary and had nowhere to keep it, but, as he explained, he did not know enough of the language to say so, and thought the easiest way out of the difficulty was to accept it. "Give me the bird, proper, she 'as," he added.

The trouble was he did not reckon on her asking after it, which she most surely did. He could hardly confess to her that he had pa.s.sed the present on so instead he conveyed the news to her, somehow, that the "pore little bird had gone and died on 'im." She expressed her horror and forthwith produced a second!

"Soon 'ave a bloomin' aviary at this rate," he remarked as he handed the second one over! No more appeared, however, and the two little birds, both presumably dead, twittered and sang merrily the length of the "cues."

As the better weather arrived so our work increased again, and in March the Germans began a retreat in the west along a front of 100 miles. We worked early and late and reached the point of being able to drive almost asleep. An extraordinary sensation--you avoid holes, you slip the clutch over b.u.mps, you stop when necessary, and go on ditto, and at the same time you can be having dreams! More a state of coma than actual sleep, perhaps. I think what happened was one probably slept for a minute and then woke up again to go off once more.

I became "Wuzzy's" adopted mother about now and, whenever I had time, combed and brushed his silver curls till they stood out like fluff. He could spot Susan miles away, and though it was against rules I sometimes took him on board. As we neared camp I told him he must get down, but he would put on an obstinate expression and deliberately push himself behind my back, in between me and the canvas, so that I was almost on the steering wheel. At other times he would listen to me for awhile, take it all in, and then put his head on my shoulder with such an appealing gesture that I used to risk being spotted, and let him remain.

He simply adored coming out if I was going riding, but I disliked having him intensely, for he ran about under the horses, nibbling at them and making himself a general nuisance. He would watch me through half shut eyes the minute I began polishing my riding boots; and try as I would to evade him he nearly always came in the end.

He got so crafty in time he would wait for me at the bottom of the drive and dash out from among the shrubs just as I was vanishing. One day we had trotted some distance along the Sangatte road, and I was just congratulating myself I had given him the slip, when looking up, there he was sitting on a gra.s.sy knoll just ahead, positively laughing and licking his chops with self-satisfied glee. I gave it up after that, I felt I couldn't cope with him, and yet there were those who called him stupid! I grant you he had his bad days when he was referred to as my "idiot son," but even then he was only just "peculiar"--a world of difference.

One job we had was termed "lodgers" and consisted of meeting the "sitting" cases from an ambulance train, taking them to the different hospitals for the night, and then back to the quay early next morning in time to catch the hospital ship to England. The stretcher cases had been put on board the night before, but there was no sleeping accommodation for so many "sitters." An ordinary evacuation often took place as well, so that before breakfast we had sometimes carried as many as thirty-five sitting cases, and done journeys with twelve stretchers. One day at No.

30 hospital I saw several of the girls beside a stretcher, and there was the "Bovril king" lying swathed in blankets, chatting affably! He was the cook at No. 30, a genial soul, who always rushed out in the early hours of the morning when one was feeling emptiest, with a cup of hot soup. He called it doing his bit, and always referred to himself proudly as the "Bovril king." Alas, he was now being invalided home with bronchitis!

Hope came back from leave and told me she had been pursued half way down Regent Street by a fat old taxi driver who asked after me. It was dear old Stone, of course, now returned to civil life and his smart taxi with the silver "vauses!" I have hunted the stands in vain for his smiling rosy face, but hope to spot him some day and have my three days' joy ride.

One precious whole afternoon off, a very rare event, I went out for a ride with Captain D. He rode "Baby," a little bay mare, and I rode a grey, a darling, with perfect manners and the "sweetest" mouth in the world. He was devoted to "Baby," and wherever she went he went too, as surely as Mary's little lamb.

We struck off the road on to some gra.s.s and after cantering along for some distance found we were in a network of small ca.n.a.ls--the ground was very spongy and the ca.n.a.l ahead of us fortunately not as wide as the rest. We got over safely, landing in deep mud on the other side, and decided our best plan was to make for the road again. We espied a house at the end of the strip we were in with a road beyond, and agreed that there must be a bridge or something leading to it. Captain D. went off at a canter and I saw Baby break into a startled gallop as a train steamed up on the line beyond the road. They disappeared behind the house and I followed on at a canter. I turned the corner just in time to see them almost wholly immersed in a wide ca.n.a.l and the gallant Captain crawling over Baby's head on to the bank! It was one of those deceptive spots where half the water was overgrown with thick weeds and cress, making the place appear as narrow again.

The grey was of course hot on Baby's track. Seeing her plight I naturally pulled up, but he resented this strongly and rose straight on his hind legs. Fearing he would over-balance, I quickly slacked the reins and leant forward on his neck. But it was too late; that slippery mud was no place to try and regain a foothold, and over he came. I just had time to slip off sideways, promptly lost my foothold and collapsed as well. How I laughed! There was Captain D. on one side of the ca.n.a.l vainly trying to capture his "wee red tourie" floating down stream, and Baby standing by with the mud dripping from her once glossy flanks; and on the other was I, sitting laughing helplessly in the mud, and the grey (now almost brown) softly nosing my cap and eyeing his beloved on the further bank with pained surprise!

To crown all, the train, which had come to a standstill, was by the irony of fate full of Scottish soldiers on their way up the line. Such a bit of luck in the shape of a free cinema show had rarely come their way and they were bent on enjoying it to the fullest extent. The fact that the officer now standing ruefully on the bank was in Tartan riding "troos" of course added to the piquancy of the situation.

The woman had come out of her cottage by this time and kept exclaiming at intervals, "Oh, la-la, Oh, la-la," probably imagining that this mudbath was only a new pastime of the mad English. She at last was kind enough to open the gate; and thither I led the grey and then across a plank bridge beyond, previously hidden from sight.

We sc.r.a.ped the mud off the saddles under a running fire of witty comments from the train. I knew the whole thing had given them so much enjoyment that I bore them no illwill. I could see their point of view so well, it must have been such fun to watch! "Hoots, mon," they called to the now thoroughly embarra.s.sed D., as we mounted, "are ye no going to lift the la.s.sie oop?" I was glad we were "oop" and away before the train started again, and as we trotted along the road, cries of "Guid luck to ye!" "May ye have a happy death!" (which is a regular north-country wish, and a very nice one when you come to think of it), followed us.

The batman eyed us suspiciously as we reached Fontinettes where he was waiting for the horses, and remarked that they seemed to have had a "bit roll." My topcoat I'm glad to say covered all traces of the "bit roll" I had indulged in on my own. It was a great ride entirely.

One night for some reason I was unable to sleep--a rare occurrence--and bethought me of an exciting spy book, called the _German Submarine Base_, I had begun weeks before but had had no time to finish. All was dead quiet with the exception of the distant steady boom of the guns, which one of course hardly noticed. I had just got to the most thrilling part and was holding my breath from sheer excitement when whiz! sob!

bang! and a sh.e.l.l went spinning over the huts. For a moment I thought I must be dreaming or that the book was bewitched. Next minute I was out of bed like a rabbit, and turning off the light, dashed outside just as the second went over. I naturally looked skyward, but there was not a sign of anything and, stranger still, not even the throb of an engine. A third went over with a loud screech, and my hair was blown into the air by the rushing wind it caused. I saw a flash from the sea and Thompson said she was wakened by my voice calling, "I say, come out and see this new stunt." Soon everyone was up and the sh.e.l.ls came on steadily, blowing our hair about, and making the very pebbles rush rattling along the ground, hitting against our feet with such force we thought at first it must be spent shrapnel. Some of those sh.e.l.ls screeched and some miauled like huge cats hurtling through the air to spring on their prey.

These latter made a cold shiver run down my spine; the noise they made was so blood-curdling. One could cope with the ordinary ones, but frankly, these were beastly. Luckily they only went over about every tenth. It was something quite new getting sh.e.l.ls of this calibre from such a short range, and "side-ways," too, as someone expressed it; quite a different sensation from on top. The noise was deafening; and then one struck the bank our camp was built on. We had no dug-out and seemingly were just waiting to be potted at. We got the cars ready in case we were called up, and the sh.e.l.ls whizzed over all the time. There was another explosion--one had landed in our incinerator! Good business! Another hit the bank again! Once more the fact of being so near the danger proved our safety, for with these three exceptions, they all pa.s.sed over into the town beyond. The smell of powder in the air was so strong it made us sneeze. It was estimated roughly that 300 sh.e.l.ls were lobbed into the town, and all pa.s.sing over us on the way.

It was a German destroyer that had somehow got down the coast unchallenged, and was--we heard afterwards--only at a distance of 100 yards! What a chance for good shooting on our part; but it was a pitch black night and somehow she got away in the velvet darkness. Sounds of firing at sea--easily distinguishable from those on land because of the "plop" after them--continued throughout the night and we thought a naval battle was in progress somewhere; however, it proved to be one of the bombardments of England, according to the papers next day. To our great disappointment, our little "drop in the bucket" of 300 odd sh.e.l.ls was not even mentioned.

There was much eager scratching in the bank for bits of sh.e.l.ls the next day. One big piece was made into a paper-weight by the old Scotch carpenter, and another was put on the "narrow escape" shelf among the other bits that had "nearly, but not quite!"

Wild rumours had got round the camps and town that the "lady drivers had got it proper," been "completely wiped out," in fact not one left alive to tell the lurid tale. So that wherever we drove the next morning we were greeted with cheery nods and smiles by everyone. The damage to the town was considerable, but the loss of life singularly small. The Detail Issue Stores had gone so far as to exchange bets as to whether we would appear to draw rations that morning, and as I drove up with Bridget on the box we were greeted right royally. One often found large oranges in one's tool box, or a bag of nuts, or something of the kind, popped in by a kindly Tommy who would pa.s.s the car and merely say: "Don't forget to look in your tool-box when you get to camp, Miss," and be gone before you could even thank him! All the choicest "cuts" were also reserved for us by the butcher and we were altogether spoilt pretty generally.

Tommy is certainly a nailer at what he terms "commandeering." I was down at the M.T. yard one day and as I left, was told casually to look in the box when I got to camp. I did so, and to my horror saw a wonderful foot pump--the pneumatic sort. I had visions of being hauled up before a Court of Enquiry to produce the said pump, which was a brand new one and painted bright red. On my next job I made a point of going round by the M.T. yard to return the "present." I found my obliging friend, who was pained in the extreme at the mere mention of a pump. "Never 'eard of one," he affirmed stoutly. "Leastways," he said reminiscently, looking at me out of the corner of his eye, "I do seem to remember something about a stawf car bein' in 'ere this morning when yours was"--and he smiled disarmingly. "Look 'ere," he continued, "you forget all about it, Miss. I 'ates to see yer puffing at the tyres with them old-fashioned ones, and anyway," with a grin, "that car's in Abbeville now!"

Another little example of similar "commandeering" was when my friend of the chopped sticks turned up one day with a small Primus stove: "I 'eard you was askin' for one, and 'ere it is," and with that he put it down and fled. After the pump episode I was full of suspicions about little things that "turned up" from nowhere, but for a long time I had no opportunity of asking him exactly where the gift had come from. One night, however, one of the doctors from the adjacent hut hospital was up in camp, and Primus stoves suddenly cropped up in the conversation.

"Most extraordinary thing," said he, "my batman is as honest as the day, and can't account for the disappearance of my stove at all. No one went into my hut, he declares, and yet the stove is gone, and not so much as a sign of it. One thing is I'd know it if I saw it again." I started guiltily at this, and got rather pink--"Look here," I said, "come into my hut a moment." He did so. "By Jove! that's my stove right enough," he cried, "I know the scratches on it. How on earth did you get it?" "That I can't tell you," I replied, "but you can have it back" (graciously), "and look here, it wasn't _your_ batman, so rest easy." He was too wise to ask unnecessary questions (one didn't in France), and only too thankful to get his Primus, which he joyfully carried back in state. It was a pity about it, because they were impossible to get at that time, and our huts had already been raided for electric kettles.

Gothas came frequently to visit us at night and terrible scenes took place, during which we were ordered out amid the dropping bombs to carry the injured to hospital, but more often than not to collect the dead, or what was left of them.

One morning I was in great distress, for I lost my purse through the lining of my wolf-coat. It was not the loss of the purse that worried me, but the fact that I always kept the little medal of the Virgin and Child in there, given me by the old Scotch nun in Paris "for protection." "Eva," I called, "I've lost my luck--that little charm I had given me in 1915--I do wish I hadn't. I'm not superst.i.tious in the ordinary way, but I kind of believe in that thing;" she only laughed however. But I took the trouble to advertise for it in the local paper--unfortunately with no result. I was very distressed.

Our concert party got really quite a slap-up show going about this time.

We also had a drop scene behind--a huge white linen sheet on which we _appliqued_ big black b.u.t.terflies fluttering down to a large sunflower in the corner, the petals of which were the same yellow as the bobbles on our dresses. We came to the conclusion that something of the sort was necessary, for as often as not we had to perform in front of puce-coloured curtains that hardly showed us up to the best advantage.

One of the best shows we ever gave I think was for the M.T. _depot_.

They did so much for us one way and another repairing cars (not to mention details like the foot pump episode), that we were only too glad to do something for them in return. The _piece de resistance_ (at least, d.i.c.ky and I thought so) was a skit we got up on one of "Lena's" concert party stars--a ventriloquist stunt. We thought of it quite suddenly and only had time for one rehearsal before the actual performance. I paid a visit to Corporal Coy of the mortuary (one of the local low comedians, who, like the coffin-cart man at Lamarck, "had a merry eye!" and was a recognized past-master in the art of make-up), and borrowed his little bowler hat for the occasion. He listened solemnly to the scheme, and insisted on making me a fascinating little Charlie Chaplin moustache (the requisites for which he kept somewhere in the mortuary with the rest of his disguises!) and he then taught me to waggle it with great skill!

d.i.c.ky was the "doll" with round shiny patches of red on her cheeks and a Tommy's cap and hospital blue coat. She supplied the gla.s.sy stare herself most successfully. For these character stunts we simply put on caps and coats over our "Fantastik" kit and left the rest to the imagination of the audience who was quick (none quicker) to grasp the implied suggestion. I was "Mr. Lenard Ashwell" in aforementioned bowler, moustache, and coat. We made up the dialogue partly on the basis of the original performance, and added a lot of local colour. I asked the questions, and was of course supposed to ventriloquize the answers, and, thanks to the gla.s.sy stare of my doll, her replies almost convinced the audience I was doing so.