Fanny Goes to War Part 8

We went on board at nine, after a good breakfast, and decided to stay on deck. A sailor went round with a megaphone, shouting, "All lifebelts on," and we were under way.

I confided "Tuppence" to the care of the ship's carpenter and begged him to find a spare lifebelt for him, so that if the worst came to the worst he could use it as a little raft!

We watched the two destroyers pitching black against the dashing spray as they sped along on either side convoying us across.

We arrived at Boulogne in time for lunch, and then set off for our convoy camp thirty kilometres away, in a British Red Cross touring car borrowed from the "Christol Hotel."

We arrived there amid a deluge of rain, and the camp looked indeed a sorry spectacle with the tents all awry in the hurricane that was blowing.

Bell tents flanked one side of the large open s.p.a.ce where the ambulances stood. A big store tent occupied another and the cook-house was in a shed at the extreme corner, with the Mess tent placed about as far from it as possible! I fully appreciated this piece of staff work later.

There were also a lot of bathing machines, which made me vaguely wonder if a Snark had once inhabited the place.

"The fourth (viz. sign of a Snark) is its fondness for bathing machines Which it constantly carries about, And believes that they add to the beauty of scenes-- A sentiment open to doubt."

My surmises were brought to an abrupt end.

"Pat, dear old Pat. I say, old bird, you won't mind going into the cook-house for a bit, will you, till the real cook comes? You're so good-natured (?) I know you will, old thing."

Before I could reply, someone else said:

"That's settled then; it's perfectly ripping of you."

"Splendid," said someone else. Being the chief person concerned, I hadn't had a chance to utter word of protest one way or the other!

When I _could_ gasp out something, I murmured feebly that I _had_ thought I was going to drive a car, and had spent most of my leave sitting in a garage with that end in view.

"Oh, yes, of course you are, old thing, but the other cook hasn't turned up yet. Bridget (Laidlay) is worked off her feet, so we decided you'd be a splendid help to her in the meantime!"

There was nothing else for it.

I discovered I was to share a tent with Quin, and dragged my kit over to the one indicated. I found her wringing out some blankets and was greeted with the cheery "h.e.l.lo, had a good leave? I say, old thing, your bed's a pool of water."

I looked into the tent and there it was sagging down in the middle with quite a decent sized pond filling the hollow! "What about keeping some gold fish?" I suggested, somewhat peevishly.

Whatever happened I decided I couldn't sleep there that night, and with Quin's help tipped it up and spread it on some boxes outside, as the sun had come out.

That night I spent at Lamarck on a stretcher--it at least had the virtue of being dry if somewhat hard.

When I appeared at the cook-house next morning with the words, "Please mum, I've come!" Bridget literally fell on my neck. She poured out the difficulties of trying to feed seventeen hungry people, when they all came in to meals at different hours, especially as the big stove wouldn't "draw." It had no draught or something (I didn't know very much about them then). In the meantime all the cooking was done on a huge Primus stove and the field kitchen outside. I took a dislike to that field kitchen the moment I saw it, and I think it was mutual. It never lost an opportunity of "going out on me" the minute my back was turned.

We were rather at a loss to know how to cope with our army rations at first. We all worked voluntarily, but the army undertook to feed and house (or rather tent) us. We could either draw money or rations, and at first we decided on the former. When, however, we realised the enormous price of the meat in the French shops we decided to try rations instead, and this latter plan we found was much the best. Unfortunately, as we had first drawn allowances it took some days before the change could be effected, and Bridget and I had the time of our lives trying to make both ends meet in the meantime. That first day she went out shopping it was my duty to peel the potatoes and put them on to boil, etc. Before she left she explained how I was to light the Primus stove. Now, if you've never lit a Primus before, and in between the time you were told how to do it you had peeled twenty or thirty potatoes, got two scratch breakfasts, swept the Mess tent and kept that field kitchen from going out, it's quite possible your mind would be a little blurred. Mine was.

When the time came, I put the methylated in the little cup at the top, lit it, and then pumped with a will. The result was a terrific roar and a sheet of flame reaching almost to the roof! Never having seen one in action before, I thought it was possible they always behaved like that at first and that the conflagration would subside in a few moments. I watched it doubtfully, arms akimbo. Bridget entered just then and, determined not to appear fl.u.s.tered, in as cool a voice as possible I said: "Is that all right, old thing?" She put down her parcels and, without a word, seized the stove by one of its legs and threw it on a sand heap outside! Of course the field kitchen had gone out--(I can't think who invented that rotten inadequate grating underneath, anyway), and I felt I was not the bright jewel I might have been.

Our Mess was a huge Indian tent rather out of repair, and, though it had a bright yellow lining, dusk always reigned within. The mugs, tin plates, and the oddest knives and forks const.i.tuted the "service." It was windy and chilly to a degree, and one of the few advantages of being in the cook-house was that one had meals in comparative warmth.

My real troubles began at night when, armed with a heavy tray, I set off on the perilous journey across the camp to the Mess tent to lay the table. There were no lights, and it was generally raining. The chief things to avoid were the tent ropes. As I left the cook-house I decided exactly in my own mind where the bell-tent ropes extended, ditto those of the store tent and the Mess, but invariably, just as I thought I was clear, something caught my ankle as securely as any snake, and down I crashed on top of the tray, the plates, mugs, and knives scattering all around. Luckily it was months since the latter had been sharp, or a steel proof overall would have been my only hope. Distances and the supposit.i.tious length of tent ropes are inclined to be deceptive in the dark. Nothing will make me believe those ropes were inanimate--they literally lay in wait for me each night! When any loud crash was heard in camp it was always taken for granted it was "only Pat taking another toss."

The wind, too, seemed to take a special delight in doing his bit. Our camp was situated on the top of a small hill quite near the sea, and some of the only trees in the neighbourhood flourished there, protected by a deep thorn hedge. This, however, ended abruptly where the drive led down to the road. It was when I got opposite the opening where the wind swept straight up from the sea my real tussle began. As often as not the tin plates were blown off the tray high into the air! It was then I realized the value of a chin. Obviously it was meant to keep the lid on the soup tureen and in this acrobatic att.i.tude, my feet dodging the tent ropes, I arrived breathless and panting at the door of the Mess tent.

The oil lamp swinging on a bit of wire over the table was as welcome a sight as an oasis in the desert.

We had no telephone in those days, and orderlies came up from the Casino hospital and A.D.M.S. with buff slips when ambulances were wanted. At that time the cars, Argylls, Napiers, Siddeley-Deaseys, and a Crossley, inscribed "Frank Crossley, the Pet of Poperinghe," were just parked haphazard in the open square, some with their bonnets one way and some another--it just depended which of the two drives up to camp had been chosen. It will make some of the F.A.N.Y.s smile to hear this, when they think of the neat rows of cars precisely parked up to the dead straight, white-washed line that ultimately became the order of things!

The bathing machines had their uses, one near the cook-house acting as our larder, another as a store for spare parts, while several others were adopted by F.A.N.Y.s as their permanent abodes. One bore the inscription, "The Savoy--Every Modern Inconvenience!"

Some R.E.'s came to look at the big cook-house stove and decided it must be put on a raised asphalt sort of platform. Of course this took some time, and we had to do all the cooking on the Primus. The field kitchen (when it went) was only good for hot water. We were relieved to see tins of bully beef and large hunks of cheese arriving in one of the cars the first day we drew rations, "Thank heaven that at least required no cooking." It was our first taste of British bully, and we thought it "really quite decent," and so it was, but familiarity breeds contempt, and finally loathing. It was the monotony that did it. You would weary of the tenderest chicken if you had it every other day for months. As luck would have it, Bridget was again out shopping when, the day following, a huge round of raw beef arrived. How to cope, that was the question? (The verb "to cope" was very much in use at that period.) Obviously it would not fit into the frying pan. But something had to be done, and done soon, as it was getting late. "They must just have chops," I said aloud, in desperation, and bravely seizing that round of beef I cut seventeen squares out of it (slices would have taken too long; besides, our knife wasn't sharp enough).

They fried beautifully, and no one in the Mess was heard to murmur. When you've been out driving from 7.30 a.m. hunger covers a mult.i.tude of sins, and Bridget agreed I'd saved the situation.

The beef when I'd finished with it looked exactly as if it had been in a worry. No _wonder_ cooks never eat what they've cooked, I thought.

To our great disappointment an order came up to the Convoy that all cameras were to be sent back to England, and everyone rushed round frantically finishing off their rolls of films. Lowson appeared and took one of the cook-house "staff" armed with kettles and more or less covered with s.m.u.ts. It was rightly ent.i.tled, "The abomination of desolation"--when it came to be gummed into my War Alb.u.m!

Quin was a great nut with our tent ropes at night, and though she had not been in camp before the war, a.s.sured me she knew all about them.

Needless to say, I was only too pleased to let her carry on.

When I rolled in at night after washing up in the cook-house she would say: "You must come out and tighten the tent ropes with this gale blowing, it won't be funny if the whole thing blows over in the night."

But none of the horrors she depicted ever persuaded me to turn out once I was safely tucked up in my "flea bag" with "Tuppence" acting as a weight to keep the top blankets in place. In the morning when I awoke after a sound night's sleep, I would exclaim triumphantly: "There you are, 'Squig,' what price the tent blowing down? It's as safe as a rock and hasn't moved an inch!"

"No?" the long-suffering "Squig" would reply bitterly, "it may interest you to hear I've only been up _twice_ in the night hammering in the pegs and fixing the ropes!"

The only time I didn't bless her manipulation of these things was when I rose at 6.30 a.m., by which time they had been frozen stiff and shrunk to boot. The ones lacing the flap leading out of the tent were as hard to undo as if they had been made of iron. On these occasions "Tuppence,"

who had hardly realized the seriousness of war, would wake up and want me instantly to go out, half dressed as I was, and throw stones for his benefit! That dog had no sense of the fitness of things. If I did not comply immediately he sat down, threw his head in the air, and "howled to the moon!" The rest of the camp did not appreciate this pastime; but if they had known my frenzied efforts with the stiffened ropes "Squig"

had so securely fixed over-night, their sympathies would have been with, rather than against, me.

One night we had a fearful storm (at least "Squig" told me of it in the morning and I had no reason to doubt her word), and just as I was rolling out of bed we heard yells of anguish proceeding from one of the other tents.

That one had collapsed we felt no doubt, and, rushing out in pyjamas just as we were, in the wind and rain, we capered delightedly to the scene of the disaster. The Sisters Mudie-Cooke (of course it would be their tent that had gone) were now hidden from sight under the heavy ma.s.s of wet canvas on top of them. The F.A.N.Y.s, their hair flying in the wind, looking more like Red Indians on a scalping expedition than a salvage party, soon extricated them, and they were taken, with what clothes could be rescued, to another tent. Their fate, "Squig" a.s.sured me, would have a.s.suredly been ours had it not been for her!

Madame came into existence about this time. She was a poor Frenchwoman whom we hired to come and wash the dishes for us. She had no teeth, wispy hair, and looked very underfed and starved. Her "man" had been killed in the early days of the war. Though she looked hardly strong enough to do anything, Bridget and I, who interviewed her jointly, had not the heart to turn her away, and she remained with us ever after and became so strong and well in time she looked a different woman.

The Mess tent was at last moved nearer the cook-house (I had fallen over the ropes so often that, quite apart from any feelings I had left, it was a preventive measure to save what little crockery we possessed).

The cars were all left in a pretty rotten condition, and the petrol was none too good. How Kirkby, the one mechanic, coped at that time, always with a cheery smile, will never be known. As Winnie aptly remarked, "In these days there are only two kinds of beings in the Convoy--a "Bird"

and a "Blighter"!"[12] Kirkby was decidedly in the "Bird" cla.s.s.

"Be a bird, and do such and such a thing," was a common opening to a request. Of course if you refused you were a "blighter" of the worst description.

As you will remember, I was only in the cook-house as a "temporary help," and great was my joy when Logan (fresh from the Serbian campaign) loomed up on the horizon as the pukka cook. I retired gracefully--my only regret being Bridget's companionship. Two beings could hardly have laughed as much as we had done when impossible situations had arisen, and when the verb "to cope" seemed ineffective and life just one "gentle" thing after the other.

I was given the little Mors lorry to drive. To say I adored that car would not be exaggerating my feelings about it at all. The seat was my chief joy, it was of the racing variety, some former sportsman having done away with the tool box that had served as one! "Tuppy" also appreciated that lorry, and when we set off to draw rations, lying almost flat, the tips of his ears could just be seen from the front on a line with the top of my cap.

One of my jobs was to take Sergeant McLaughlan to fetch the hospital washing from a laundry some distance out of the town. He was an old "pug," but had grown too heavy to enter the ring, and kept his hand in coaching the promising young boxers stationed in the vicinity. In consequence, what I did not know about all their different merits was not worth knowing, and after a match had taken place every round was described in full. I grew quite an enthusiast.

He could never bear to see another car in front without trying to pa.s.s it. "Let her rip, Miss," he would implore--"Don't be beat by them Frenchies." Needless to say I did not need much encouragement, and nothing ever pa.s.sed us. (There are no speed limits in France.) There was a special hen at one place we always tried to catch, but it was a wily bird and knew a thing or two. McLaughlan was dying to take it home to the Sergeants' Mess, but we never got her.

One day, as we were rattling down the main street, one of the tyres went off like a "4.2." We drew to the side, and there it was, as flat as a pancake.

There are always a lot of people in the streets of a town who seem to have nothing particular to do, and very soon quite a decent-sized crowd had collected.

"We must do this in record time," I said to McLaughlan, who knew nothing about cars, and kept handing me the wrong spanners in his anxiety to help. "See," exclaimed one, "it makes her nothing to dirty her hands in such a manner."