Albert Edward and I are on detachment just now. I can't mention what
job we are on because Hindenburg is listening. He watches every move
made by Albert Edward and me and disposes his forces accordingly.
Now and again he forestalls us, now and again he don't. On the
former occasions he rings up Ludendorff, and they make a night of it
with beer and song; on the latter he pushes the bell violently for
the old German God.
The spot Albert Edward and I inhabit just now is very interesting;
things happen all round us. There is a tame balloon tied by a string
to the back garden, an ammunition column on either flank and an
infantry battalion camped in front. Aeroplanes buzz overhead in
flocks and there is a regular tank service past the door. One way
and another our present location fairly teems with life; Albert
Edward says it reminds him of London. To heighten the similarity we
get bombed every night.
Promptly after Mess the song of the bomb-bird is heard. The
searchlights stab and slash about the sky like tin swords in a stage
duel; presently they pick up the bomb-bird--a glittering flake of
tinsel--and the racket begins. Archibalds pop, machine guns chatter,
rifles crack, and here and there some optimistic sportsman browns the
Milky Way with a revolver. As Sir I. Newton's law of gravity is
still in force and all that goes up must come down again, it is
advisable to wear a parasol on one's walks abroad.
In view of the heavy lead-fall Albert Edward and I decided to have a
dug-out. We dug down six inches and struck water in massed
formation. I poked a finger into the water and licked it. "Tastes
odd," said I, "brackish or salt or something."
"We've uncorked the blooming Atlantic, that's what," said Albert
Edward; "cork it up again quickly or it'll bob up and swamp us."
That done, we looked about for something that would stand digging
into. The only thing we could find was a molehill, so we delved our
way into that. We are residing in it now, Albert Edward, Maurice and
I. We have called it "_Mon Repos_," and stuck up a notice saying we
are inside, otherwise visitors would walk over it and miss us.
The chief drawback to "_Mon Repos_" is Maurice. Maurice is the
proprietor by priority, a mole by nature. Our advent has more or
less driven him into the hinterland of his home and he is most
unpleasant about it. He sits in the basement and sulks by day,
issuing at night to scrabble about among our boots, falling over
things and keeping us awake. If we say "Boo! Shoo!" or any harsh
word to him he doubles up the backstairs to the attic and kicks earth
over our faces at three-minute intervals all night.
Albert Edward says he is annoyed about the rent, but I call that
absurd. Maurice is perfectly aware that there is a war on, and to
demand rent from soldiers who are defending his molehill with their
lives is the most ridiculous proposition I ever heard of. As I said
before, the situation is most unpleasant, but I don't see what we can
do about it, for digging out Maurice means digging down "_Mon
Repos_," and there's no sense in that. Albert Edward had a theory
that the mole is a carnivorous animal, so he smeared a worm with
carbolic tooth-paste and left it lying about. It lay about for days.
Albert now admits his theory was wrong; the mole is a vegetarian, he
says; he was confusing it with trout. He is in the throes of
inventing an explosive potato for Maurice on the lines of a
percussion grenade, but in the meanwhile that gentleman remains in
complete mastery of the situation.
The balloon attached to our back garden is very tame. Every morning
its keepers lead it forth from its abode by strings, tie it to a
longer string and let it go. All day it remains aloft, tugging
gently at its leash and keeping an eye on the War. In the evening
the keepers appear once more, haul it down and lead it home for the
night. It reminds me for all the world of a huge docile elephant
being bossed about by the mahout's infant family. I always feel like
giving the gentle creature a bun.
Now and again the Boche birds come over disguised as clouds and spit
mouthfuls of red-hot tracer-bullets at it, and then the observers hop
out. One of them "hopped out" into my horse lines last week. That
is to say his parachute caught in a tree and he hung swinging, like a
giant pendulum, over my horses' backs until we lifted him down. He
came into "_Mon Repos_" to have bits of tree picked out of him. This
was the sixth plunge overboard he had done in ten days, he told us.
Sometimes he plunged into the most embarrassing situations. On one
occasion he dropped clean through a bivouac roof into a hot bath
containing a Lieutenant-Colonel, who punched him with a sponge and
threw soap at him. On another he came fluttering down from the blue
into the midst of a labour company of Chinese coolies, who
immediately fell on their faces, worshipping him as some heavenly
being, and later cut off all his buttons as holy relics. An eventful
life.