Our Casualty, and Other Stories Part 13

Haddingly was greatly moved by Maitland's account of the medieval spirit. He took to spending half an hour in the church every morning before breakfast n.o.body knew what he did there. The officers, through feelings of delicacy, never asked him questions about these new devotions. The men, who were getting to know and like Haddingly better and better as time went on, regarded his daily visits to the church as proof that their padre was one who knew his job and did it thoroughly.

One morning--the mess had then been discussing medieval chivalry for about a fortnight--Maitland read out a pa.s.sage from Mallory about a visit paid by Sir Galahad to a lonely chapel among the mountains, "where he found n.o.body at all for all was desolate." Haddingly had just spent his lonely half hour in the church of St John in the Wilderness. He sighed. He found n.o.body there in the mornings, and could not help wishing that the battalion contained a Galahad. Dalton felt that something must be done to preserve the credit of the mess and the dignity of English manhood. He felt sure that sentiment about desolate chapels was an unwholesome thing. He scoffed:

"All very well for Gallipot," he said, "but----"

"Galahad," said Maitland.

"Galahad, or Gallipot, or Golly-wog," said Dalton. "If a man has a silly name like that, it doesn't matter how you spell it. The point is that it would be simply ridiculous to attempt that sort of thing now. Suppose, for instance---- I put it to you, padre. Suppose you saw Maitland mounted on one of the transport gee-gees trotting tap to that tin cathedral of yours--on a week-day, mind! I'm not talking about Sundays.

Suppose he got down and went inside all by himself, what would you think, padre? There's only one thing you could think, that Maitland had been drinking."

"Sir Galahad," said Maitland, "went in to say his prayers. He was on his way to a battle. They didn't have to wait months and months for a battle in those days. They had a sc.r.a.p of some sort about once a week."

He sighed. The Turks had failed to do what was expected of them, and life in the camp was intolerably dull.

He looked at Haddingly. It was plainly a padre's duty to support a spiritual and romantic view of life against the profane jibes of Dalton.

Haddingly spoke judicially.

"The general tone of society in those days," he said, "seems to have been very different from what it is now. Men had much less difficulty in giving expression to their emotions. No doubt we still feel much as they did, but----"

Haddingly became aware that no one was listening to him. The attention of everyone at the table was attracted by something else. The men sat stiffly, listening intently. Haddingly heard a faint, distant humming sound. It grew louder.

"Jiminy!" said Dalton, "an aeroplane!"

The breakfast table was laid in the open air outside the mess tent The men rose from their seats and stared in the direction of the coming sound. It was the first time that an aeroplane had approached the camp in the desert. Its coming was an intensely exciting event, an unmistakable evidence of activity somewhere; surely a sign that activity everywhere might be expected.

The sound increased in volume. The machine appeared, a distant speck in the clear sky. It grew rapidly larger, flying fast. It was seen to be a biplane. It pa.s.sed directly over the camp, flying so low that the head of the pilot was plainly visible. In a few minutes it pa.s.sed from sight.

The hum of its engines grew fainter. But till the sound became inaudible no one spoke.

Then a babble of inquiry and speculation broke out Where was the thing going? What was it doing? What did its sudden swift voyage mean? For the rest of the day the camp was less sleepy than usual. Men everywhere discussed the aeroplane. Dalton was not the only one who envied the members of the Flying Corps. It seemed a very desirable thing to be able to rush through the air over unknown deserts; to have the chance of seeing strange and thrilling things, Arab encampments, green oases, mirages, caravans and camels; to drop bombs perhaps on Syrian fortresses; to estimate the numbers of Turkish columns on the march, to reckon their strength in artillery; to take desperate risks; to swerve and dart amid clouds of bursting shrapnel. How much more gloriously exciting such a life than that of men baking slowly in the monotony of a desert camp.

Maitland, stimulated by his reading to an unnatural effort of imagination, recognized in the men of the Flying Corps the true successors of Mallory's adventurous knight-errants. For them war still contained romance. Chivalry was still possible. Haddingly caught the thought and expanded it Knights of old had this wonderful spirit, because to them the forests through which they roamed were unknown wastes, where all strange things might be expected. Then when all the land became familiar, mapped, intersected with roads, covered thick with towns, sailors inherited the spirit of romance. Afterwards all the seas were charted, policed, and ships went to and fro on ocean highways. The romance of adventure was lost to seamen, lost to the world, until the airmen came and found it again by venturing on new ways.

In the evening the aeroplane returned. Once more its engines were heard.

Once more it appeared, a speck, a shape, a recognizable thing. But this time it did not pa.s.s away. On reaching camp it circled twice, and then, with a long swift glide, took the ground outside the camp a few yards beyond Haddingly's church of St. John in the Wilderness. The pilot stepped out of the machine.

"Good man," said Dalton. "Friendly of him dropping in on us like this.

Must want a drink after that fly. Eight hours at least. I'll go and bring him along to the mess. Hope he'll tell us what he's been doing.

Wonder if the Turks potted at him."

The pilot left his machine. He walked stiffly, like a man with cramped limbs, towards the camp.

"Something wrong with the engine, perhaps," said Dalton. "Or he's short of petrol. I'll fetch him along. A whisky and soda in a big tumbler is the thing for him. I dare say he'll stay for dinner."

He started and walked quickly towards the machine. The airman, approaching the camp, reached the church. Instead of pa.s.sing it he stopped, opened the door, and went in. Dalton paused and looked back.

"Must have mistaken your tin cathedral for the mess, padre," he said.

"I'll run on and fetch him out."

"If he's made a mistake," said Haddingly, "he'll find it out for himself and come out without your fetching him."

Dalton stood still. His eyes were on the door of the church. Maitland and Haddingly were gazing at it too. The other officers, gathered in a group outside the mess tent, stood in silence, staring at the church. It seemed as if hours pa.s.sed. In fact, nearly half an hour went by before the door of the church opened and the airman came out. He turned his back on the camp and went towards his machine. Neither Dalton nor anyone else made an attempt to overtake him. The noise of the engine was heard again. The machine raced a few yards along the ground and then rose in steep flight. It pa.s.sed across the camp and sped westwards, its shape sharply outlined for a minute against the light of the setting sun. Then it disappeared.

Maitland took Haddingly by the arm and led him to his tent The two men sat down together on the camp bedstead. Maitland opened Mallory's "Morte d'Arthur," and read aloud:

"Then Sir Galahad came unto a mountain, where he found an old chapel, and found there n.o.body, for all was desolate, and there he kneeled before the altar and besought of G.o.d wholesome counsel."

"I suppose it was just that," said Haddingly.

Dalton put his head into the tent.

"I thought I'd find you here," he said. "I just wanted to ask the padre something. Was that Sir Golliwog come to life again or just some ordinary blighter like me suffering from nerve strain?"

Haddingly had no answer to give for a moment.

"He can't have really wanted to sit in that church for half an hour,"

said Dalton. "What the d.i.c.kens would he do it_ for?_"

"He might have wanted to pray," said Haddingly.

Not even his profession justified the saying of such a thing as that outside church. But every excuse must be made for him. He had been soaked in Mallory for a fortnight Deserts, even when there are camps in them, are queer places, liable to upset men's minds, and the conduct of the airman was certainly peculiar.

"Of course, if you put it that way," said Dalton, "I've nothing more to say. All the same, he might have come into the mess for a drink. I'm not complaining of his doing anything he liked in the way of going to church; but I don't see that a whisky and soda would have hurt him afterwards. He must have wanted it."

IX -- A GUN-RUNNING EPISODE

Sam McAlister walked into my office yesterday and laid down a handful of silver on my desk.

"There you are," he said, "and I am very much obliged to you for the loan."

For the moment I could not recollect having lent Sam any money; though I should be glad to do so at any time if I thought he wanted it. Sam is a boy I like. He is an undergraduate of Trinity College, Dublin, and has the makings of a man in him, though he is not good at pa.s.sing examinations and has never figured in an honours list. Some day, when he takes his degree, he is to come into my office and be made into a lawyer. His father, the Dean, is an old friend of mine.

I looked at the money lying before me, and then doubtfully at Sam.

"If you've forgotten all about it," he said, "it's rather a pity I paid.

But I always was honest. That's one of my misfortunes. If I wasn't---- That's the fine you paid for me."

Then I remembered. Sam got into trouble with the police a few weeks ago.

He and a dozen or so of his fellow-students broke loose and ran riot through the streets of Dublin. All high-spirited boys do this sort of thing occasionally, whether they are junior army officers, lawyers'

clerks, or university undergraduates. Trinity College boys, being Irish and having a large city at their gates, riot more picturesquely than anyone else. Sam had captured the flag which the Lord Mayor flies outside his house, had pushed a horse upstairs into the office of a respectable stockbroker, and had driven a motor-car, borrowed from an unwilling owner, down a narrow and congested street at twenty-five or thirty miles an hour. He was captured in the end by eight policemen, and was very nearly sent to gaol with hard labour. I got him off by paying a fine of one pound, together with 2 4s. 6d. for the damage done by the horse to the stockbroker's staircase and office furniture. The motorcar, fortunately, had neither injured itself nor anyone else.

"I hope," I said, pocketing the money, "that this will be a lesson to you, Sam."

"It won't," he said. "At least, not in the way you mean. It'll encourage me to go into another rag the very first time I get the chance. As a matter of fact, being arrested was the luckiest thing ever happened to me, though I didn't think so at the time."

"Well," I said, "if you like paying up these large sums it's your own affair. I should have thought you could have got better value for your money by spending it on something you wanted."