Tom Bedlam

by George Hagen

  During the days, the doctor took strolls along the deck as the soldiers went about their drills. They were a cocky bunch, proud of their new uniforms, proud of their country, proud to be soldiers. One fellow noted Tom's tender smile and joked, “You could still enlist, sir.”

  “My son is with the South African Heavy Artillery, a bombardier.”

  “My brother's a pilot in 84 Squadron.”

  “My uncle's in Palestine,” said somebody else.

  “My cousin's fighting in Flanders!”

  “I think my son's going to France—” The doctor paused, suddenly aware of the emotion in his voice. “I hope to see him before he leaves.”

  He took down the soldier's name and his brother's name (and the name of his second cousin) and gave Arthur's in return. This ritual was repeated many times as Tom met other soldiers; the impersonal throng was transformed into a web of acquaintances. One evening, kept awake by the deep grind of the engines, Tom imagined the millions of such exchanges among these boys, small acts of defiance against the war's fundamental purpose—to transform millions of vital souls into mere numbers of winners or losers.

  At Portsmouth, Tom disembarked and took a room in a hotel for the night. In the morning he boarded a train to London, arriving at Victoria Station in time to see newsboys hawking the headlines of the day.

  “Ship torpedoed off Cornwall!” cried one. “Forty drowned! Allerton Castle sunk by U-boat!”

  His own ship had been sunk off Bishop Rock on its way to join a southbound convoy. Tom sat down on his bags in the center of the station, surrounded by the warm glow of its new incandescent lights, and wept for the random slaughter and the stark incongruity of his survival.

  AS TOM EMERGED from the bustling terminus, he was seized with shock. Motorcars sputtered past, issuing clouds of blue smoke. The rare clatter of hooves on cobbled streets was drowned by the cacophonic roar of trucks and motorcycles. Above the London skyline, he counted fifteen balloons suspended like enormous teardrops.

  Where were the gas lamps and the lamplighters with their ladders and sticks? Where were the barrows pushed by fruit sellers, the carts, and the rich smell of manure? All gone. This wasn't the London of his youth; this was a city in the grip of progress. The window glass of a nearby shop rattled as a biplane flew overhead, the hostile throb of its engine reminding him that the air had joined earth and water as a venue for battle.

  Electric lightbulbs surrounded the theater marquees—Chu, Chin, Chow was playing at His Majesty's, The Maid of the Mountains at Daly's Theatre. The women queuing for tickets wore slender, unflattering clothes and seemed, in Tom's view, underdressed. Gone were the full skirts, the bustles, the leg-of-mutton sleeves, and wide hats. Perhaps war shortages meant that women could no longer claim yards of fabric for fashion. This was an austere new world. How provincial Gantrytown had been—the styles there were years out of date, and judging from a group of women in WAAC uniforms, so were the views on women's service.

  Outside the public houses, young men in uniform clustered in groups. Every one resembled Arthur, in Tom's eyes. Then, in Trafalgar Square, the doctor noticed groups of people marching together in black coats with lavender piping on their lapels and sleeves. A banner sported an alarmingly familiar slogan: THE END IS NEAR. REJOICE!

  The Pendletons seemed to have taken over the city. Groups of them greeted young people, and bands paraded the streets singing “Glory, glory, hallelujah” with bass drums and trumpets. Tom anxiously surveyed the marchers' listless faces. He hoped for a glimpse of Charity— she'd not written in months.

  Several times, he stopped people to inquire about his daughter. One young woman told him there were thousands of Pendletons in London. “I'm sure she's here,” she said. “It's almost time, you know.”

  “Time?”

  “Judgment Day.” She smiled.

  If Judgment Day was indeed less than two months away, Tom thought it would be quite normal for those who believed so to weep, to mourn, to tear out their hair, and to rend their garments in compassion for the end of humanity. The serenity of the Pendletons, however, chilled him. Surely, even if they thought themselves worthy of ascendance, they must feel some misgiving about the annihilation of friends and family. As they marched past him in their smart uniforms and straight rows, he found it curious that their spiritual joy was expressed in a ritual so similar to that of warfare.

  THE MAYFAIR HOTEL was a brick building with blue shutters, run by a small Portuguese proprietress with tightly bound hair and deep worry lines on her forehead. She asked if he had any friends in London, to which he replied, “I don't know.” This prompted her sympathy. As Tom lay down for a nap, a boy appeared at his door and presented him with a cup of tea and a slice of Madeira cake.

  He fell asleep that evening holding the items he would need for the next day: the address of the War Ministry and an envelope bearing Eve Mansworth's letter. He considered visiting his father's house but decided his duty to his son came first.

  THE NEXT MORNING, the rosy-faced sergeant at the Civilian Queries desk was ready for the gaunt, anxious-looking fellow before him. “We regret we cannot report the whereabouts of individual soldiers, sir. I'm sure you understand the risks to the lives of our fighting men.”

  “I'm only asking whether he has been sent to the front,” replied the doctor. He realized that it was too late to excuse Arthur from service for being underage—the boy was eighteen and a half—all he wanted was to ascertain where Arthur was stationed, and to assure himself that the boy was alive.

  The sergeant became contemptuous. “There are hundreds of thousands of men at the front, sir!”

  “And every one of them with a concerned father,” the doctor replied. “Where is your compassion?”

  This wiped the sergeant's smirk away. People began to peer around from their places in line behind Tom.

  “Look,” said Tom, “would you please tell me to whom I should speak in order to find my son?”

  “Beg your pardon, sir, but your son knows his duty better than you do!” The sergeant dabbed his forehead with a handkerchief. “Next!”

  Tom was a fish in the wrong current. It was three hours before he learned that there was no department equipped to help a man find such information. Nevertheless, he gave it his best try; over and over he presented his story, then waited for an answer from subsequent links in the chain of authority. As the hours passed, he studied the patterns on the linoleum floors, counted the chips and scuff marks on the wainscoting, and imagined faces in the whorls of wood grain. This ordeal prompted Tom to consider the nature of hell, and he wondered whether, instead of a fire pit, the devil's realm was a banal place filled with bureaucrats and scuffed furniture. Eventually he found a fellow sympathetic enough to give him the names of Arthur's company and commanding officer.

  THE NEXT MORNING, Tom returned to the War Ministry. He had decided to go to the top floor. The oak wainscoting there was neither scuffed nor dented; the boards were varnished to a shine. Two police officers flanked the young woman seated at the threshold of the minister's office.

  “May I help you, sir?”

  “Yes, I'm an old friend of the minister,” said Tom.

  “Have you an appointment?” She smiled.

  “No,” replied Tom. “I'm afraid not.”

  “He's terribly busy this morning, sir.” But to Tom's surprise, she grasped the telephone earpiece and prepared to dial. “May I tell the minister your name, sir?”

  “Doctor—” Tom realized that Geoffrey Mansworth would recognize him only by his old name. “Dr. Tom Bedlam,” he replied.

  A policeman must have sensed his hesitation. He stepped forward. “Would you have a card, sir?” Tom noticed that the other policeman was now standing behind him.

  Tom produced his wallet, then paused. “I must explain that my name has changed since I last saw the minister.” He attempted a smile. “We were boys at school together.”

  “What is your legal name, sir?”

 
“Chapel.”

  “I see. Chapel? Not Bedlam, sir?”

  One wrong answer changed their expressions, and all other courtesies. In moments, Tom had been escorted out of the building, held firmly by two hands above his elbows. His papers were examined, along with his hotel receipt, by the policeman who then questioned Tom's purpose in being on English soil.

  “I'm trying to get my son out of the army,” he insisted.

  “Well, I suggest you stay out of the War Ministry, sir,” advised the policeman. “People like you can say what they want at Speakers' Corner.” He gave him a wink and strode back into the building.

  “For heaven's sakes, I'm not some lunatic!” Tom cried, realizing that his words provoked just such an idea in the faces of passersby.

  AT ABOUT TWO O'CLOCK in the afternoon, Tom alighted from a cab alongside a row of houses in Bedford Park. A town house of crimson brickwork stood on a placid, sun-drenched lawn fringed by beeches and oaks. His heart beat faster as he approached the door and knocked. He half-expected to be met by another pair of police officers, but instead a maid greeted him. This time he asked for Mrs. Mansworth, gave his name, and prepared to offer his card, but the maid left without asking for anything. He heard her footsteps retreat across a marble floor and passed the time listening to a little girl somewhere across the grounds, uttering squeals of delight.

  Tom paced the foyer and noticed, at the foot of the stairs, a table bearing a silver-framed photograph of a family. Eve's features were no less striking, her raven dark hair parted in the center, eyes glowing with familial pride. Her left hand rested in the crook of her husband's arm, while the other encircled her daughter's waist. At first glance, Tom imagined he saw himself in the picture. But soon he made out a pasty complexion and the petulant bulge of Geoffrey Mansworth's upper lip. The daughter, however, might have passed for Margaret at the age of eight—the resemblance was uncanny.

  When the maid returned, she was polite but firm. “Mrs. Mansworth cannot see you now.”

  “I've come a very long way. Did you tell her who I was?”

  “I did, sir, but Mrs. Mansworth has guests.”

  Tom rose to leave, but the maid made one more remark as he turned. “Most visitors use the telephone to avoid disappointment.” It seemed that this was an instruction from Mrs. Mansworth, for the maid placed a card in his hand.

  On the back of the card was written: “Please telephone me.”

  LA BOURSE

  A NEW COMMANDING OFFICER, MAJOR WARRICK, TOOK CHARGE OF Arthur's group at Scotton Camp. Warrick was less of a patriarch, more of a bureaucrat. Anything that reduced the size of his stack of papers appealed to him. When Arthur requested a transfer to the Officers' Cadet Battalion, Warrick was happy to oblige. “Want to go to France, Chapel? Very well. You'll go with the next draft in three days.”

  Supplied with gas mask, steel helmet, and a tunic with field dressings stitched into the linings, Arthur found himself with several hundred men aboard a troopship heading across the channel for Le Havre. Judging from the young faces around him, Major Warrick considered any boy who could wear boots an adequate man for the job.

  One lad, Markham, was enormous—a barrel-chested fellow with hands that could span a dinner plate—though clumsy and awkward, he was clearly still a boy in a man's body. He kept company with another lanky giant, Cargill, who made comical noises to earn a laugh. The two became a sideshow, playing practical jokes on each other, but the other soldiers derided them; nobody was as naïve or foolish as Cargill and Markham.

  “Fools,” remarked Arthur's sergeant, who explained that it was no virtue to be tall under fire in the trenches—one became a choice candidate for a sniper's bullet. He constantly berated the two for their juvenile behavior.

  Arthur's shoulders were broad, and his hair had darkened from the ginger of his youth; he was happier when listening rather than talking. His loping walk dipped in midstride—something he had picked up from the other men with whom he had carried hundred-pound shells at Scot-ton for practice in loading the howitzers. Because of Arthur's relative maturity the sergeant assigned him the job of escorting two deserters while he was on board ship.

  The prisoners were named Gibson and Sweet; they were being sent back to their battery in France as punishment. Both were incredibly polite fellows who had managed to get across the channel by exercising their charm and reached Folkestone before they were unmasked as deserters. Gibson was earnest and eager to be understood.

  “I'm not a coward,” he insisted. “Neither is Sweet.”

  “Not unless going on thirty-two patrols in no-man's-land is cowardice,” added Sweet.

  “Not unless bringing back dozens of wounded men under enemy fire is cowardice,” said Gibson.

  “Not unless choking from gas till my buttons were green and still charging a German munitions bunker is cowardice,” continued Sweet.

  “Then why were you deserting?” asked Arthur.

  “Well, it's hopeless, isn't it?” said Gibson, raising his palms. “The army's full of officers who don't know their filthy arses from the Pope's.” He raised a finger to quiet an anticipated dissent. “Look, I've fought alongside idiots—no matter; they're my countrymen, you see, and God made them stupid for his own reasons—but I will not take orders from a fool in a lieutenant's uniform.”

  “Or a captain's, or a major's,” said Sweet.

  They told Arthur of a botched assault on a village east of Haze-brouck and blamed the loss of forty men on an overzealous commanding officer.

  “Young man,” explained Gibson, “a few months in officer training doesn't prepare one to send so many good men to their deaths.”

  Arthur must have looked surprised at the idea of an officer being incompetent, because Gibson qualified his assertion: “Mind you, not all officers are stupid fools.”

  “True,” agreed Sweet. “One or two are just idiots.”

  “If you want to get out of this,” whispered Gibson to Tom, “let a sniper shoot you in the arm or leg. Trench foot used to be an easy way out of the front lines, but now they've run inspections to make sure nobody's letting it fester. Lice won't get you back to Blighty either.”

  “Aye, but they might drive you out of your mind,” said Sweet, “which isn't the worst way to get out of the war.” He rolled his eyes upwards, and he lolled his tongue between his teeth in hearty imitation of an imbecile.

  “I recommend shaving for the lice,” said Gibson, brushing off his woolen cap to reveal a bare scalp. “And down below,” he added, gesturing to his crotch.

  “Carefully” added Sweet.

  “Lucky for you, the gas masks are better than they was a few years ago,” Gibson continued.

  “Aye,” said Sweet. “Used to look like the oat bags you give to a nag. Useless.”

  Arthur was shocked and admiring of his charges. They had a philosophy about the war, strong opinions, a sense of self-assurance, while he felt simply ignorant. As Gibson passed a cigarette to Sweet, Arthur observed that the deserters were synchronized both by their cravings for a smoke, or a piece of chocolate, and by their disgust. They told Arthur dark jokes about soldiers' attempts to be sent home by injuring themselves and suddenly remarked wistfully on a pleasant meal of duck they'd shared in some French town just before an assault.

  Their stories contradicted his training at Scotton Camp. There was no united effort, no exaltation, no camaraderie. Trench warfare was terrifying and wretched. Sweet described the stages of putrefaction of a corpse, from the bloated, unrecognizable body of a German that had terrified him during a patrol to the rat-scoured skeletal remains he had kicked to pieces while singing “The Grand Old Duke of York” to pass the time in a bomb crater. Arthur stared from one fellow to the other with wide eyes, trying to make sense of the awful contrast between their experiences and their casual humor.

  “Does the gas kill you?” he asked.

  “Not the tear gas, but the mustard can, or make you as sick as a dog,” said Sweet.

  “J
ust remember that the gas is heavy” said Gibson. “It seeps into holes and trenches. Never let your head be as low as your boots.”

  “Unless you're ready to hop it,” said Sweet, slicing his neck with his forefinger.

  “There's a point where you stop giving a damn,” muttered Gibson, “but that's what the rum's for. After you stop caring about kings and countries and your CO., you'll jump into the fight just for a tot.”

  At this moment the sergeant interrupted. “Can't you two arseholes shut your traps for five ruddy minutes?”

  “Aye, aye,” murmured Gibson, and in tandem, the deserters shifted position, slumped against each other, back to back, and promptly fell asleep.

  AFTER THEY DOCKED at Le Havre, Arthur left his charges at the Harfleur transit camp. They wished him well, gave him chocolate, and advised him to shoot off his trigger finger when he had had enough of the war.

  Arthur received his posting with the South Africans—the 125th Siege Battery of the Royal Garrison Artillery. He was sent with another bombardier to join his unit in a town called La Bourse. His companion, Tom Hartwell, was nineteen; he had been injured a few months before and proudly showed Arthur a shrapnel wound on his shoulder, remarking with disappointment that he had hoped for a bullet wound. “To show the girls,” he explained. They alighted from their train at La Bourse, to be greeted by a couple of explosions. It was the first sound of the enemy Arthur had heard.

  “Six-inch guns,” explained Hartwell. “Fritz is probably trying to shake up the town. Scares the hell out of everyone, but they're not landing anywhere nearby.”

  “How will I know if they're landing nearby?” asked Arthur.

  “Well,” said Hartwell, “first you'd hear a big whistle, and then a pit the size of a truck would suddenly—” He pointed ahead. “Something like that”