The Soldier's Art (21 page)

General
Liddament had to be faced on the subject of my own missed
Free French opportunities. The matter was not one of sufficient importance – at
the General’s end – to ask for an interview through
Greening, so I had to wait until the Divisional Commander was to
be found alone.
As I rarely saw him during daily
routine, this took place once again on an exercise. Defence
Platoon duties usually
brought me to breakfast first on those mornings, even before
Cocksidge, otherwise in the vanguard of the rest of
the staff. The General varied in his habits, sometimes early,
sometimes late. That morning, he had appeared at table before
Cocksidge himself, who, as it turned out later,
had been delayed by breaking a bootlace or cutting his rubber-like
face shaving. When the General had drunk some tea, I
decided to tackle him.

“I saw Major
Finn in London, sir.’

“Finn?”

“Yes, sir.”

“How was he?”

“Very well,
sir. Sent his respects. He said my French was not up to liaison work at
battalion level.”

“Ah.”

That was
General Liddament’s sole comment. He drank more tea in huge gulps, while he
studied a map. The fact that Cocksidge entered the room a minute or two later
did not, I think, affect the conversation in any way; I mean so far as further
discussion of my own affairs by the General might have taken place. That was
already at an end. Cocksidge was quite overcome by finding the Divisional
Commander already almost at the end of breakfast.

“Excuse me,
sir,” he said, “but I do believe they’ve given you the chipped cup. I’ll change
it at once, sir. I wonder how often I’ve spoken to the Mess Sergeant about that
cup, sir, and told him never to give it to a senior officer, and above all not
yourself, sir. I’ll make sure it never happens again, sir.”

Military
action in Syria had been making it clear why there had been call for more
British liaison officers with the Free French overseas. I thought of the 9th
Regiment of Colonial Infantry being harangued by someone with better command of
the language – and more histrionic talent – than myself. Then the Germans
attacked in Crete. The impression was that things were not going too well
there. Meanwhile, the Division continued to train; policies, units, began to
take more coherent shape, to harden: new weapons were issued: instructors
improved. The Commanding Officer of the Reconnaissance Unit remained
unappointed. I asked Widmerpool if he had progressed further in placing his own
candidate. The question did not please him.

“Difficulties
have arisen.”

“Someone else
getting the command?”

“I can’t quite
understand what is happening,” said Widmerpool.
“There has been no opportunity to go into the matter lately. This Diplock case
has been taking up so much of my time. The more I investigate, the more incriminated
Diplock seems to be. There’s going to be hell to pay.
Hogbourne-Johnson is behaving very badly, making himself offensive to me
personally, and doing his best to shield the man and cause obstruction. That is
quite useless. I am confident I shall be able to show that Diplock’s behaviour
has been not merely irregular, but criminal. Pedlar is almost equally unwilling
to believe the worst, but at least Pedlar approaches the matter with a
reasonably open mind, even if a slow one.”

“Does the
General know about Diplock?”

“Hogbourne-Johnson
says there is not sufficient evidence yet to lay before him.”

In the matter
of Diplock, I believed Widmerpool to be on the right track. Few things are more
extraordinary in human behaviour than the way in which old sweats like this
chief clerk Warrant Officer will suddenly plunge into serious misdoing – usually
on account of a woman. Diplock might well have a career of petty dishonesty
behind him, but this looked like something far more serious.

“Talking of
the Recce Unit,” said Widmerpool, “there’s still some sorting out to be done
about the officer establishment. At least one of the captaincies assigned to
that unit, before it came into existence, is still – owing to some whim of the
General’s – in use elsewhere as a local rank. That is one of the things I want
you to go into among the stuff I am leaving to-night.”

“Establishments
without troops always make one think of
Dead Souls.
A military Chichikov could first
collect battalions, then brigades, finally a Division – and be promoted
major-general.”

I said that to
tease Widmerpool, feeling pretty certain be had never read a line of Gogol,
though he would rarely if ever admit to failure in recognising an allusion,
literary or otherwise. On this occasion he merely nodded his head several
times; then returned to the fact that, contrary to his usual practice, he would
not be working after dinner that evening.

“For once I
shall cut office hours to-night,” he said. “I’m giving dinner to that fellow – for
the moment his name escapes me – from the Military Secretary’s branch, who is
doing a tour of duty over here.”

“Is this in
the interests of the Recce Unit appointment?”

Widmerpool
winked, a habit of his only when in an exceptionally good temper.

“More
important than that,” he said.

“Yourself?”

“Dinner may
put the finishing touches to something.”

“Promotion?”

“Who knows? It’s
been in the air for some time, as a matter of fact.”

Widmerpool
rarely allowed himself a night off in this manner. He worked like an automaton.
Work, civil or military, was his sole interest. If it came to that, he never
gave his assistant a night off either, if he could help it, because everyone
who served under him was expected to do so to the fullest extent of his powers,
which was no doubt reasonable enough. The result was that a great deal of work
was completed in the D.A.A.G.’s office, some useful, some less useful. On the
whole the useful work, it had to be admitted, made up for a fair percentage of
time and energy wasted on Widmerpool’s pet projects, of which there were
several. I was thinking of such things while stowing away papers in the safe
that night, preparatory to leaving Headquarters for bed. I shut the safe and
locked it. The time was ten o’clock or thereabouts. The telephone bell began to
ring.

“DAA.G.’s office.”

“Nick?”

The voice was
familiar. All the same, I could not immediately place it. No officer at Div.
H.Q. used just that intimate inflexion when pronouncing my name.

“Speaking,”

“It’s Charles.”

That took me
no further. So far as I could remember, none of the local staff were called “Charles.”
It must be someone recently arrived in the place, who knew me.

“Charles who?”

“Private
Stringham, sir – pardon the presumption.”

“Charles – yes
– sorry.”

“Bit of luck
catching you in.”

“I’m just
leaving, as a matter of fact. How did you know I was here?”

“I rang up F
Mess first – in the character of General Fauncefoot-Fritwell’s A.D.C.”

“Who on earth
is General Fauncefoot-Fritwell?”

“Just a name
that occurred to me as belonging to the sort of officer of senior rank who
would own an A.D.C. – so don’t worry if Captain Biggs, who I think answered the
telephone, mentions the General to you. He will say there was no message.
Captain Biggs, if it was indeed he, sounded quite impressed, even rather
frightened. He told me you were probably still working, unless on your way back
now. I must say, you officers are kept at it.”

“But, Charles,
what is all this about?”

I thought he
must be drunk, and began to wonder how best to deal with him. This was just the
sort of embarrassment Widmerpool had envisaged. It could be awkward. I
experienced one of those moments – they cropped up from time to time – of
inwardly agreeing there was something to be said for Widmerpool’s point of
view. However Stringham sounded perfectly sober; though to sound sober was not
unknown as one of the characteristics he was apt to display after a great deal
to drink. That was especially true of the period immediately preceding his
going under entirely. I felt apprehensive.

“Yes, I must
come to the point, Nick,” he said. “I’m getting dreadfully garrulous in old
age. It’s barrack-room life. Look, forgive me for ringing up at this late hour,
which I know to be contrary to good order and discipline. The fact is I find
myself with a problem on my hands.”

“What’s
happened?”

“You know my
officer, Mr. Bithel?”

“Of course.”

“You will
therefore be aware that – like my former un-regenerate self – he is at times
what our former mentor, Mr. Le Bas, used to call a devotee of Bacchus?”

“Bithel’s
drunk?”

“Got it in
one. Rather overdone the Dionysian rites.”

“Passed out?”

“Precisely.”

“Whereabouts?”

“I’ve just
tripped over his prostrate form on the way back to bed. When I was suddenly,
quite unexpectedly, whisked away from F Mess, and enlisted under Mr. Bithel’s
gallant command, he behaved very kindly to me on arrival. He has done so ever
since. I therefore feel grateful towards him. I thought – to avoid further
danger to himself, physical or moral – you might have some idea of the best way
of getting him back without undue delay to wherever he belongs. Otherwise some
interfering policeman, civil or military, will feel it his duty to put the
Lieutenant in the cooler. I’m not sure where he’s housed. G Mess, is it?
Anyway, I can’t manage him all on my own-io, as the Edwardian song used to say.
I wondered if you had any suggestions.”

This emergency
had noticeably cheered Stringham. That was plain, even on the telephone. There
was only one thing to do.

“I’ll come
along. What about yourself? Are you all right for time?”

“I’m on a late
pass.”

“And where are
you exactly?”

Stringham
described a spot not far from where we had met in the street on that earlier
occasion. The place was about ten minutes’ walk from Headquarters; rather more
from G Mess, where Bithel slept.

“I’ll stand
guard over Mr. B. until you arrive,” Stringham said. “At the moment he’s
propped up out of harm’s way on the steps of a bombed house. Bring a torch, if
you’ve got one. It’s as dark as hell and stinks of something far worse than
cheese.”

By some
incredibly lucky concatenation of circumstances, Bithel had managed, though
narrowly, to escape court-martial over the affair of the bouncing cheque that
had worried him the night of the biggish raid of several weeks before. However,
Widmerpool had now stated categorically he was on the point of removing Bithel
from the Mobile Laundry command as soon as he could negotiate that matter
satisfactorily with the authority to whom the Laundry was ultimately
responsible. That might be a judgment from which there was no appeal, but, even
so, gave no reason to deny a hand in getting Bithel as far as his own bed that
night, rather than leave him to be picked up by the Provost Marshal or local
constabulary. It was even possible that definite official notification of his
final sacking might have brought about this sudden alcoholic downfall; until
now kept by Bithel within reasonable bounds. He would certainly be heartbroken
at losing the command of the Mobile Laundry, of which he was, indeed, said to
have made a fair success. If this intimation bad reached him, he might be
additionally upset because dismissal would almost certainly mark the first
stage of final ejection from the army. Bithel was proud of being in the army;
it also brought him a livelihood. Apart from any of that, Stringham had to be
backed up in undertaking Bithel’s rescue. That was how things looked. I made a
last inspection of the office to make sure no papers had been left outside the
safe that should have been locked away, then left Headquarters.

Outside in the
street, it was impossible to see a yard ahead without a torch. In spite of
that, I found the place without much difficulty. Stringham, hands in his
pockets, was leaning against the wall of a house that had been burnt out by an
incendiary bomb a week or two before. He was smoking a cigarette.

“Hallo, Nick.”

“Where’s
Bithel?”

“At the top of
these steps. I pulled him up there out of the way. He seemed to be coming-to a
moment ago. Then he sank back again. Let’s go and have a look at him.”

Bithel was
propped up under a porch against the front door of the house, his legs
stretched down the steps, head sunk on one shoulder. This was all revealed by a
flash of the torch. He was muttering a little to himself. We examined him.

“Where’s he
got to go?” asked Stringham.

“G Mess. That’s
not too far from here.”

“Can we carry
him feet first?”

“Not a very
tempting prospect in the blackout. Can’t we wake him up and force him to walk?
Everyone must realise they have to make a special effort in wartime. Why should
Bithel be absolved from that?”

“How severe
you always are to human weakness, Nick.”

We shook
Bithel, who was again showing slight signs of revival, at least in so much that
protests were wrong from him by this rough treatment.

“…  Don’t
shake us, old man … don’t shake us like that … whatever are you doing it for? …
makes me feel awful… I’ll throw up … I will really …”

“Bith, you’ve
got to pull yourself together, get back to your billet.”

“What’s that
you’re saying …”

“Can you stand
up? If so, we’ll hold you on either side.”

“… Can’t
remember your name, old man … didn’t see you in that last pub … couldn’t see
any officers there … rather glad of that . . prefer talking to those young
fellows without a lot of majors poking their noses in … keep in touch with the
men … never go far wrong if you do that … take an interest in them off duty …  then
it got late …  couldn’t find the way home…”