by Alan Hackney
At two they began on the intelligence tests. There were twenty minutes of superimposed circles and dots, followed by a series of ninety-eight questions with answers to be underlined.
“Which is inappropriate here?” asked the first one. “PLAICE, CAMEL, RHINOSCEROS, YAK, GRAVY. The answer is, of course, GRAVY. Now go straight on.”
By No. 34 Stanley’s head began to swim.
After this a number of cards were held up for ten seconds at a time. The candidates were told to write down the first thoughts that came into their heads. The first card read: “BEER.”
Stanley thought it would be best to write something like “Ah”. There was, in fact, no time to write anything else. Next card: “HAPPY”.
Cautious, even in exhaustion, Stanley fell back on punctuation.
“CAREFUL. MOTHER. WOUNDED. GIRL”. The thirty cards came and went. Stanley wrote: “??”, or “!!?”, and occasionally “!?!?!?!”.
Then a questionnaire: “From which of the following ailments do you suffer?”
Stanley tried to strike a nice balance between hypochondria and sheer muscularity. He admitted to migraine and intermittent night-blindness.
More forms.
“Write an appreciation of yourself by a good friend.”
“Write another appreciation as though by a sworn enemy.”
Dinner at eight. The nude gazed steadily at Stanley.
Breakfast at eight. Stanley changed his place to the other side of the table and to the far end. He was now faced by skeletal fishing boats beached against a purple sunset. The group testing officer also changed his place and was again opposite. Several times Stanley was on the verge of engaging him in conversation. Each time, however, the officer looked up impassively from his toast to see a contorted open-mouthed face across the table.
Each time the face abruptly deflated.
They went through a further series of tests.
*
In the first, a playing child was to be rescued from an escaped lion. Stanley was detailed to be the child, and a large man from Cambridge the lion.
Stanley played round a tree, whistling unconvincingly and whacking at tufts of grass with a stick. The lion, approaching unnoticed at a gallop, fell on him. Stanley, under the nervous compulsion of putting up a good show, wrenched frantically free, and hung from a low branch, kicking. The rescuers appeared, and under the same compulsion belaboured the lion savagely with dead branches.
“For Christ’s sake,” roared the lion, in some pain.
“Thank you,” said the testing officer, making notes.
A Home Guard ran amok and was recaptured, stunned by a half-brick which hit him in the middle of the back.
The candidates were warming up.
Scheme “A”. Assault course. The two groups paraded in P.T. kit.
“The obstacles are all numbered,” said the sergeant-major. “You have to find them. Being as you’ve no equipment or rifles, you have to take a twig round with you. Behind you.”
The candidates looked round. Two sawn-off telegraph poles lay on the ground.
“We don’t want to be late for lunch. You can start any time, really,” said the sergeant-major casually.
It dawned on them. No leaders were appointed.
“Come on!” somebody shouted.
Stanley’s group got there first, commandeered the shorter and lighter log, and trotted awkwardly away with it.
They got it and themselves over a stream, across a ten-foot wall, through a series of suspended motor tyres, and under a tightly pegged tarpaulin, under which Stanley temporarily left his shorts. Then they came to the Bottomless Chasm. Here they wished they had brought the longer log. Their twig was only three inches longer than the chasm was wide.
The candidates, on their mettle, fell to quarrelling and bickering. In the confusion Stanley actually managed to get a scheme of his adopted and the twig fell into the abyss.
Recrimination.
The officer, as a concession, let them retrieve it. At a second attempt, in which half the group, on the far side, tried to catch the log as it was toppled carefully over, two of the candidates as well as the log disappeared into the eight-foot ditch which served as a chasm. A conceded third attempt found them tottering on the brink of success, when a local subsidence on the edge of the chasm caused Stanley to leap away startled. This immediately disturbed the network of forces acting on the log, so that the whole group of candidates, clinging desperately onto it, plunged suddenly in. From the pit they glared up at the chubby little figure looking apologetically down at them. Soil trickled down.
“I’m frightfully sorry,” said Stanley.
“Thank you,” said the testing officer. “Lunch is in twenty minutes.”
After a miserable and subdued luncheon a selection of names was read out for interviews with the psychiatrist.
*
Major Blunden, the psychiatrist, had a cheerful sunny room on the first floor, and whenever possible kept the windows wide open. This had the incidental effect of adding something sinister, seeming out of keeping with his dark trade, as though a bright new suburban villa, in which one might feel safe, were suddenly found to have a Thing upstairs. He had imported a small bookshelf, filled with the handbooks of his craft, and a very large filing cabinet. He sat, an enormous man in major’s uniform, at his enormous desk, and contemplated Stanley, sitting opposite him, with an unblinking eye. The little figure opposite showed signs of fidgeting, but had nothing to fidget with, and seemed dying to snatch up some of the multiplicity of pencils, date-stamps, ink-bottles and note-pads on his desk for a frantic session of twiddling and doodling.
The psychiatrist leaned forward.
“Tell me about yourself,” he encouraged.
“Where shall I begin?” asked Stanley, embarrassed.
Major Blunden shifted hugely in his swivel chair.
“Where you like,” he said diffidently. “Much as you can remember.”
Stanley sketched his academic career.
Major Blunden waited tensely for some seconds when he had finished, then consulted the papers before him. Stanley caught a glimpse of his complicated punctuation to the BEER-HAPPY cards.
“Were you ever bullied at school?” asked Major Blunden.
“No.”
Major Blunden waited.
“Right,” he said, and looked over the papers again. “Did you play rugger?”
“Yes.”
“For your school?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“I wasn’t at all good enough.”
“In what way?”
“Not expert enough,” said Stanley firmly.
“Any serious illnesses?”
“No.”
Major Blunden paused, eyes fixed on him.
“H’m,” he said. “You wish to stay in the Army?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Why not?”
“I don’t think it would suit me as a career. I want to get back to Oxford.”
“And do what, ultimately?”
“I haven’t really thought it out, I’m afraid,” said Stanley, heart sinking.
Major Blunden consulted the papers.
“Right,” he said briskly. “Thank you. That’s all. Would you tell the next chap …?”
Stanley went out and queued for an interview with the president.
“Windrush?” said Colonel Argent.
“Yes, sir.”
“Take a pew. Right. Now first, why do you want to become an officer?”
Stanley was floored. Why did he?
“Well,” he said, edging about a little, “it’s not that I want a higher standard of living or anything like that. I think it’s—well, I think I could do the job, I imagine.” His voice trailed away.
“Do you think you would make a good officer?” asked Colonel Argent.
“I hope so,” said Stanley inadequately.
“Now,” said Colonel Argent, “do you follow the war new
s? You do? Right, show me Guadalcanal on this map.”
Stanley went to the large wall-map beside the president’s desk, muttering, “The Pacific …”
His finger hovered round Borneo and then plunged obliquely towards the Philippines.
“Here,” he said.
“Where here?” asked the president.
“Here,” said Stanley, shifting his finger three inches to where he had suddenly seen the name.
The interview dragged on.
“Right,” said the colonel. “One last point. If you were commissioned, would you stay on after the war?”
“Yes, I’d love to,” said Stanley hastily. He was fast adopting a merely empirical approach. If there had been an interview with the sergeant-major he might easily have said, “Good God, no. Too frightful.”
*
The last scheme for the day was the competitive erection by the two groups of tents for an imaginary general. They were led out into a clearing in the grounds by the sergeant-major.
“The general will arrive in fifteen minutes,” he said. “He wants a tent up, but he doesn’t like being near trees. You can start any time you feel like it.”
They had been caught that way before and began immediately to look for materials. A search of the shrubbery disclosed two large shapeless tent canvases and a number of poles, all the wrong sizes. Under the bushes were several lengths of flimsy frayed rope. In sum there were about two-thirds of the necessary components for one tent.
Circumstances were against them. To make matters worse, the groups sabotaged each other’s tents for components. As Stanley stood holding in position a knotted support-rope, a large fellow from the competing syndicate snatched it out of his hands and made off with it.
“I say!” said Stanley. He hurried across to the other tent and removed the loose handle of their mallet. This he threw into the bushes.
“No parts must be lost,” announced the sergeant-major, and Stanley had to retrieve it. When he came back the two testing officers were watching.
After twenty minutes the groups stood back and looked at their tents. It was a repulsive sight. Roofs dipped alarmingly and beneath the freely flapping walls could be seen the shifting feet of those left inside, panting and straining to keep the heavy poles vertical. A frayed rope parted and one end of Stanley’s group’s erection folded up. Stanley went gallantly forward and restored its shape by holding one corner, posed like a footman at an opened door.
“Tents away,” said the sergeant-major. Both dropped abruptly to the ground.
*
The third day was notable for a labour which took the entire morning. An enormously heavy tripod, twelve feet high, composed of thick planks and weighty iron piping lashed together, had to be lugged over a series of really formidable obstacles. A candidate was detailed to take charge at each of these obstacles. The first ordered the stripping of the great encumbrance into its components, each of which was still alarmingly heavy. By the time Stanley was put in charge of the group they were all too fatigued to argue, and did his bidding fatalistically, without comment. Stanley began to enjoy a feeling of power. His job was to command. He took no part in the manual work, but stood apart, giving crisp and rarely contradictory orders. At one stage he was on the point of adopting the Napoleonic hand-on-heart stance, but checked himself just in time. The syndicate was too tired to care. Five paces away the testing officer watched the metamorphosis curiously. The obstacle was a minefield and was negotiated with the presumed loss of only one man. This man was Stanley, who stepped back to admire his handiwork onto the taped-off mined area. The officer, however, was looking the other way, and Stanley leapt instantly back again before he turned round.
In the afternoon they played a game of Travelling Companions. One man had chosen Mahatma Gandhi; and Stanley, emboldened by his morning success, volunteered for this role. It was an undistinguished performance.
This was the last of the tests. The candidates, determinedly keeping up their parts to the point of nervous exhaustion, were haled individually, after the next morning’s breakfast, before the whole Board, to repeat their names and the arm of the service in which they sought to be commissioned.
Then it was all over.
The Board came into the drawing-room where they were assembled, and the president genially asked for criticisms. In their assumed cheerful stoicism the candidates offered none.
“Good,” said Colonel Argent. “Grand. Goodbye and good luck to you.”
Within an hour they were away. The sergeant-major negligently supervised them into trucks, and they surged down the avenue of Edwardian poplars and back to Rootbridge.
*
Next morning they were called out on parade. An officer read out two lists of names and got them into two separate groups. Both groups looked apprehensive, for any member of each, looking furtively round at his companions and then at the other group, could see no visible signs of the other lot looking better than his. Both seemed to contain peculiar persons, yet one group would obviously have passed and the other failed.
To Stanley’s dismay the officer walked to the other group and said:
“You people have been accepted for Infantry Rifle commissions.”
Then he came across to Stanley’s group and said: “You people have not been accepted and will move your kit into the Holding-out Company lines.”
He dismissed the parade, and a buzz of muttering broke out. Stanley went over to Egan, who had passed, and congratulated him.
“Thanks very much, old boy,” said Egan. “I’m sorry you didn’t pass. Still.”
He appeared at once jubilant and uneasy at being seen in Stanley’s company. As soon as he decently could he made off to his hut to shine up his cap badge.
Within twenty-four hours the returnees were paraded, handed posting instructions and told to pack. Two hours later they were back at Gravestone.
The words of the prophet came back to Stanley.
“I’ll be in Dicky’s Gardening Squad,” he thought.
CHAPTER FIVE
THE FIRST PERSON he met after reporting at the Guard-Room at Gravestone was Sergeant Morris.
“Cor crummy,” said Sergeant Morris. “Ullo-ullo! I thought you was off to OCTU.”
“I failed the Selection Board,” said Stanley.
“Funny,” said Sergeant Morris. “Now I reckoned you’d be bound to get through.”
“Well,” said Stanley, cheered by this. “Thank you.”
“Yer,” said the sergeant thoughtfully, “I reckoned you’d’ve been sure to have wangled it somehow.”
Stanley went to report to the Depot Company orderly sergeant.
“Get them white tabs off, lad,” he said. “What d’you think you’re on? Right. Time of arrival 1820 hours. Move your kit into ‘F’ Block. P’rade tomorrow 0830 sharp. Make yourself familiar with company detail. Them other returnee geezers coming along, are they?”
In the morning Stanley, knowing no better, joined the parade outside the back of Depot Company Office.
The function of Depot Company, as a permanent transit company, was to perform the fatigues for the entire barracks. The company was divided into platoons of A1 men (who were ultimately to be posted somewhere else), and medically graded men, who tended to stay and become (as was the ambition) “employed”. This me ant being given some regular routine job of a cushy nature—sweeping out the dental centre, for example, which would take them till the Naafi opened at half-past ten. In practice, the exact strength of Depot Company at any given time was not usually known, for, in addition to the constantly fluctuating numbers, interested parties were given to stealing the current nominal roll. The normal incentive of a Friday pay parade often failed to bring the fringes of the company out of obscurity because of a tendency to take advantage of a wartime labour shortage by working at a clandestine civilian job. Two such men used to walk daily out of the gate with rolled denim overalls under their arms, as if employed on detachment with some other unit in the neighb
ourhood, and spend the day as window-cleaners in a nearby town. Another had a milk round, four used to work in the kitchens of various cafés in the town, and on one memorable occasion the military police had rounded up twenty-three who had for some time been employed as skilled tradesmen in the local brewery.
The orderly sergeant emerged from the office and looked suspiciously at the parade.
“Fall out the sick, lame, lazy and employed,” he shouted.
A little over half the parade vanished. The orderly sergeant consulted a list of fatigues.
“Right, now. Six men to sweep out the Naafi. You six. Four to report to ‘A’ Company orderly sergeant. Right, you. Lance-Corporal and eight, coal fatigue.”
Stanley and a little man called Cox were detailed, with an old-stager of Depot Company, to tar a shed on the range. The old-stager (on his arm four of the long-service chevrons known as “dodgers”) was given a chit for three haversack rations to be collected from the cookhouse. To Stanley’s surprise he immediately altered the 3 to 13, and when they had collected the vast quantities of food the old-stager went off to dispose of most of it at the café where he worked.
“The orderly sarnt wants to see me first,” he announced. “I’ll see you two geezers up the old range, only I got to see this orderly sarnt first.”
Stanley and his new comrade went off into the countryside to seek the firing range.
“We won’t see that dodgy bastard again today,” said Cox cheerfully. “You new ’ere, are you?”
“Yes,” said Stanley. “I came here yesterday.”
“OCTU wallah?” said Cox. “I thought so. Personally meself‚ I bin ’ere now gettin’ on for nigh on three months. I got upgraded to A1. Got to do corps training.”
“What’s that?” asked Stanley. “Will they put me on it, too?”
“I expect so. Werl, being infantry, it’s infantry training. You do it up the camp. Ten weeks weapon trainin’, route marches, P.T., all that caper. Then, all of a sudden—ullo, yer posted. Maybe Secont Front, maybe the old banana boat and orf to the old Mystic Orient. Lovely. All them Indian girls. I’m from Brixton. You know it? This is my wife. Smashing, eh? Had that taken in Guildford. What was you in Civvy Street? At college? I ’ad this van. What I did. Took this van round all the markets and my mate used to do the old Dutch auction. ’E ’ad all the patter off. Sometimes it was chocolates, sometimes ornaments. My mate ’ad it all off like a piece-a poetry. See ’im flog those skin ’andbags. ‘Watch! That’s python! That devil was alive last night! We’ll save you money, girls!’ I tried to get in the Service Corps, drivin’, only I wasn’t un’ealthy enough.”
