The air was thick with smoke, and a half-circle of officers sat
clustered round the stove in the smoking-room. True--there was no fire
in the stove, but that did not count. A stove was a place you sat around
and jerked cigarette ash at, or, if you were long enough, rested your
heels on. The party consisted of six ship's officers and a guest. A few
feet away a Bridge-party was in progress. It was the usual Naval party,
and was composed of one man who could play, two who thought they could,
and one who had come in in response to urgent demands to "make up a
four," and who held no illusions about his own play or his partner's.
However, he argued well, which was a help. The game appeared to go in
spasms--a few minutes' peace punctuated only by subdued oaths, and then
a cross-fire of abuse and recriminations--usually opened by the fourth
player, who had somewhere learnt the wonderful feminine art of getting
in first accusation, and then dodging his opponents' salvoes behind a
smoke-screen of side-issues.
The group by the stove were not in the least disturbed by the game
behind them. They had heard Naval Bridge played before, and knew that
it was only when the players became polite that trouble was in the
offing. The talk, as always, was of the War, and swung with startling
suddenness from one queer aspect to another. The Senior Engineer was
leaning back in his chair, his pipe between his teeth, listening to
the mixture of views and voices from either side of him.
"What do they want this saluting order at all for? They're making
everybody salute everybody in London now, and they say it isn't safe
to walk down the Haymarket to the Admiralty, because the traffic
stands to attention for you."
"All damn nonsense. There's too much saluting--that sort, I mean--and
there's too little of the other sort. Let's have an order that every
civilian must salute a wounded man, or a man with a wound stripe, and
then I'll take Provost-Marshal and see it done."
"They'd chuck their hands in. They're all talking of Democracy now,
and a wounded man would count as a gilded autocrat."
"Democracy, my foot! I know their sort of Democracy. It's like
Russia's special brand--do as you please, and make all you can for
yourself. A civilian's no good till he's a conscript or done his time
in the Territorials. If they want democracy they can come here. This
is the most democratic Service in the world."
"But you can't run down civilians over this war; why--the whole Army's
civilian now. They haven't done so badly, though they had to wait for
war before they moved."
"Whose fault was it they didn't help before? It wasn't ours. But
that's just what I'm saying. They're all right once they've been
drilled, but no damn good till they have been. We ought to put the
whole lot through a short course of drill and a week of trench work,
and let them go again."
The guest's voice broke in--"You mean, I take it, that the people who
are going to make the peace are the people who have not yet learnt
discipline?"
"Yes, sir--that's about it. They haven't learnt to think for their
side instead of their own private ends."
"Call 'em politicians and have done with it, Pongo!"
"Well, they are--aren't they? They get the politicians they like, and
they appoint men of their own sort, so they are all politicians really."
"Well, I think that's being rather hard on them. They have to take the
men the party whips gave them. I think they're a poor lot, but I
wouldn't call them politicians."
The guest moved uneasily. "I don't quite see your point," he said. "Is
the term 'politician' one of reproach or praise? I once stood for my
local constituency and----"
The young officer with his heels on the stove gave a sudden snort.
"Don't you believe him, he's pulling your legs--so don't apologise.
He's no politician, anyway."
The guest laughed. "Well, I'm not in politics now," he said. "What is
your definition of this strange animal?"