Simon Called Peter Part 2

He walked ahead of the young man into the hall, and handed him his hat himself. On the steps they shook hands to the fire of small sentences.

"Drop in some evening, won't you? Don't know if I really congratulated you on the sermon; you spoke extraordinarily well, Graham. You've a great gift. After all, this war will give you a bit of a chance, eh? We must hear you again in St. John's.... Good-afternoon."

"Good-afternoon, Mr. Lessing," said Graham, "and thank you for all you've said."

In the street he walked slowly, and he thought of all Mr. Lessing had not said as well as all he had. After all, he had spoken sound sense, and there was Hilda. He couldn't lose Hilda, and if the old man turned out obstinate--well, it would be all but impossible to get her. Probably things were not as bad as he had imagined. Very likely it would all be over by Christmas. If so, it was not much use throwing everything up.

Perhaps he could word the letter to the Bishop a little differently. He turned over phrases all the way home, and got them fairly pat. But it was a busy evening, and he did not write that night.

Monday always began as a full day, what with staff meeting and so on, and its being Bank Holiday did not make much difference to them. But in the afternoon he was free to read carefully the Sunday papers, and was appalled with the swiftness of the approach of the universal cataclysm.

After Evensong and supper, then, he got out paper and pen and wrote, though it took much longer than he thought it would. In the end he begged the Bishop to remember him if it was really necessary to find more chaplains, and expressed his readiness to serve the Church and the country when he was wanted. When it was written, he sat long over the closed envelope and smoked a couple of pipes. He wondered if men were killing each other, even now, just over the water. He pictured a battle scene, drawing from imagination and what he remembered of field-days at Aldershot. He shuddered a little as he conceived himself crawling through heather to reach a man in the front line who had been hit, while the enemies' guns on the crest opposite were firing as he had seen them fire in play. He tried to imagine what it would be like to be hit.

Then he got up and stretched himself. He looked round curiously at the bookcase, the Oxford group or two, the hockey cap that hung on the edge of one. He turned to the mantelpiece and glanced over the photos.

Probably Bob Scarlett would be out at once; he was in some Irish regiment or other. Old Howson was in India; he wouldn't hear or see much.

Jimmy--what would Jimmy do, now? He picked up the photograph and looked at it--the clean-shaven, thoughtful, good-looking face of the best fellow in the world, who had got his fellowship almost at once after his brilliant degree, and was just now, he reflected, on holiday in the South of France. Jimmy, the idealist, what would Jimmy do? He reached for a hat and made for the door. He would post his letter that night under the stars.

Once outside, he walked on farther down Westminster way. At the Bridge he leaned for a while and watched the sullen, tireless river, and then turned to walk up past the House. It was a clear, still night, and the street was fairly empty. Big Ben boomed eleven, and as he crossed in front of the gates to reach St. Margaret's he wondered what was doing in there. He had the vaguest notion where people like the Prime Minister and Sir Edward Grey would be that night. He thought possibly with the King, or in Downing Street. And then he heard his name being called, and turned to see Sir Robert Doyle coming towards him.

The other's face arrested him. "Is there any news, Sir Robert?" he asked.

Sir Robert glanced up in his turn at the great shining dial above them.

"Our ultimatum has gone or is just going to Germany, and in twenty-four hours we shall be at war," he said tersely. "I'm just going home; I've been promised a job."

CHAPTER II

At 7.10 on a foggy February morning Victoria Station looked a place of mystery within which a mighty work was going forward. Electric lights still shone in the gloom, and whereas innumerable units of life ran this way and that like ants disturbed, an equal number stood about apparently indifferent and unperturbed. Tommies who had found a place against a wall or seat deposited rifle and pack close by, lit a pipe, and let the world go by, content that when the officers' leave train had gone someone, or some Providence, would round them up as well. But, for the rest, porters, male and female, rushed up with baggage; trunks were pushed through the crowd with the usual objurgations; subalterns, mostly loud and merry, greeted each other or the officials, or, more subdued, moved purposefully through the crowd with their women-folk, intent on finding a quieter place farther up the platforms.

There was no mistaking the leave platform or the time of the train, for a great notice drew one's attention to it. Once there, the Army took a man in hand. Peter was entirely new to the process, but he speedily discovered that his fear of not knowing what to do or where to go, which had induced him (among other reasons) to say good-bye at home and come alone to the station, was unfounded. Red-caps pa.s.sed him on respectfully but purposefully to officials, who looked at this paper and that, and finally sent him up to an officer who sat at a little table with papers before him to write down the name, rank, unit, and destination of each individual destined that very morning to leave for the Army in France.

Peter at last, then, was free to walk up the platform, and seek the rest of his luggage that had come on from the hotel with the porter. He was free, that is, if one disregarded the kit hung about his person, or which, despite King's Regulations, he carried in his hands. But free or not, he could not find his luggage. At 7.30 it struck him that at least he had better find his seat. He therefore entered a corridor and began pilgrimage. It was seemingly hopeless. The seats were filled with coats or sticks or papers; every type of officer was engaged in bestowing himself and his goods; and the general atmosphere struck him as being precisely that which one experiences as a fresher when one first enters hall for dinner at the 'Varsity. The comparison was very close.

First-year men--that is to say, junior officers returning from their first leave--were the most enc.u.mbered, self-possessed, and a.s.serting; those of the second year, so to say, usually got a corner-seat and looked out of window; while here and there a senior officer, or a subaltern with a senior's face, selected a place, arranged his few possessions, and got out a paper, not in the Oxford manner, as if he owned the place, but in the Cambridge, as if he didn't care a d.a.m.n who did.

Peter made a horrible hash of it. He tried to find a seat with all his goods in his hands, not realising that they might have been deposited anywhere in the train, and found when it had started, since, owing to a particular dispensation of the high G.o.ds, everything that pa.s.sed the barrier for France got there. He made a dive for one place and sat in it, never noting a thin stick in the corner, and he cleared out with enormous apologies when a perfectly groomed Major with an exceedingly pleasant manner mentioned that it was his seat, and carefully put the stick elsewhere as soon as Peter had gone. Finally, at the end of a carriage, he descried a small door half open, and inside what looked like an empty seat. He pulled it open, and discovered a small, select compartment with a centre table and three men about it, all making themselves very comfortable.

"I beg your pardon," said Peter, "but is there a place vacant for one?"

The three eyed him stonily, and he knew instinctively that he was again a fresher calling on the second year. One, a Captain, raised his head to look at him better. He was a man of light hair and blue, alert eyes, wearing a cap that, while not looking dissipated, somehow conveyed the impression that its owner knew all about things--a cap, too, that carried the Springbok device. The lean face, with its humorous mouth, regarded Peter and took him all in: his vast expanse of collar, the wide black edging to his shoulder-straps, his brand-new badges, his black b.u.t.tons and stars. Then he lied remorselessly:

"Sorry, padre; we're full up."

Peter backed out and forgot to close the door, for at that moment a shrill whistle was excruciatingly blown. He found himself in the very cab of the Pullman with the gla.s.s door before him, through which could be seen a sudden bustle. Subalterns hastened forward from the more or less secluded spots that they had found, with a vision of skirts and hats behind them; an inspector pa.s.sed aggressively along; and--thanks to those high G.o.ds--Peter observed the hurrying hotel porter at that moment. In sixty seconds the door had been jerked open; a gladstone, a suit-case, and a kit-bag shot at him; largesse had changed hands; the door had shut again; the train had groaned and started; and Peter was off to France.

It was with mixed feelings that he groped for his luggage. He was conscious of wanting a seat and a breakfast; he was also conscious of wanting to look at the station he was leaving, which he dimly felt he might never see again; and he was, above all, conscious that he looked a fool and would like not to. In such a turmoil he lugged at the gladstone and got it into a corner, and then turned to the window in the cleared s.p.a.ce with a determination. In turning he caught the Captain's face stuck round the little door. It was withdrawn at once, but came out again, and he heard for the second time the unfamiliar t.i.tle:

"Say, padre; come in here. There's room after all."

Peter felt cheered. He staggered to the door, and found the others busy making room. A subaltern of the A.S.C. gripped his small attache case and swung it up on to the rack. The South African pulled a British warm off the vacant seat and reached out for the suit-case. And the third man, with the rank of a Major and the badge of a bursting bomb, struck a match and paused as he lit a cigarette to jerk out:

"d.a.m.ned full train! We ought to have missed it, Donovan."

"It's a good stunt that, if too many blighters don't try it on," observed the subaltern, reaching for Peter's warm. "But they did my last leave, and I got the devil of a choking off from the bra.s.s-hat in charge. It's the Staff train, and they only take Prime Ministers, journalists, and trade-union officials in addition. How's that, padre?"

"Thanks," said Peter, subsiding. "It's jolly good of you to take me in. I thought I'd got to stand from here to Folkestone."

H.P. Jenks, Second-Lieutenant A.S.C., regarded him seriously. "It couldn't be done, padre," he said, "not at this hour of the morning. I left Ealing about midnight more or less, got sandwiched in the Metro with a Brigadier-General and his blooming wife and daughters, and had to wait G.o.d knows how long for the R.T.O. If I couldn't get a seat and a break after that, I'd be a casualty, sure thing."

"It's your own fault for going home last night," observed the Major judiciously. (Peter noticed that he was little older than Jenks on inspection.) "Gad, Donovan, you should have been with us at the Adelphi!

It was some do, I can tell you. And afterwards..."

"Shut up, Major!" cut in Jenks. "Remember the padre."

"Oh, he's broad-minded I know, aren't you, padre? By the way, did you ever meet old Drennan who was up near Poperinghe with the Canadians? He was a sport, I can tell you. Mind you, a real good chap at his job, but a white man. Pluck! By jove! I don't think that chap had nerves. I saw him one day when they were dropping heavy stuff on the station, and he was getting some casualties out of a Red Cross train. A sh.e.l.l burst just down the embankment, and his two orderlies ducked for it under the carriage, but old Drennan never turned a hair. 'Better have a f.a.g,' he said to the Scottie he was helping. 'It's no use letting Fritz put one off one's smoke.'"

Peter said he had not met him, but could not think of anything else to say at the moment, except that he was just going out for the first time.

"You don't say?" said Donovan dryly.

"Wish I was!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Jenks.

"Good chap," replied the Major. "Pity more of your sort don't come over.

When I was up at Loos, September last year, we didn't see a padre in three months. Then they put on a little chap--forget his name--who used to bike over when we were in rest billets. But he wasn't much use."

"I was in hospital seven weeks and never saw one," said Jenks.

"Good heavens!" said Graham. "But I've been trying to get out for all these years, and I was always told that every billet was taken and that there were hundreds on the waiting list. Last December the Chaplain-General himself showed me a list of over two hundred names."

"Don't know where they get to, then, do you, Bevan?" asked Jenks.

"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 Bra.s.serie 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?"