bread and bacon. His niece picked up the handkerchief and humming to
herself, walked back across the field. It was a glorious morning, and a
white sea-mist added to the promise of a hot day. He sat there munching,
thinking of nothing in particular, but gradually subsiding into a mood of
placid content. He noticed the back of Aggie disappear in the distance.
It was a mile to the cottage, and a mile and a half to Halvesham. Silly
things, girls! They were all alike. One had to make allowances. He
dismissed her from his thoughts and took a long swig of tea out of a
bottle. Insects buzzed lazily. He tapped his pocket to assure himself
that his pouch of shag was there, and then he continued munching. When
he had finished, he lighted his pipe and stretched himself comfortably.
He looked along the line of turnips he had thinned, and then across the
adjoining field of swedes. Silver streaks appeared on the sea below the
mist. In some dim way he felt happy in his solitude amidst this sweeping
immensity of earth and sea and sky.
And then something else came to irritate him. It was one of “these
dratted airyplanes.” “Airyplanes” were his pet aversion. He could find
nothing to be said in their favor. Nasty, noisy, vile-smelling things
that seared the heavens, and make the earth dangerous. And every day
there seemed to be more and more of them. Of course “this old war” was
responsible for a lot of them, he knew. The war was “a plaguey noosance.”
They were short-handed on the farm. Beer and tobacco were dear, and Mrs.
Stevens’ nephew had been and got wounded in the foot.
He turned his attention once more to the turnips. But an “airyplane” has
an annoying genius for gripping one’s attention. When it appears on the
scene, however much we dislike it, it has a way of taking stage-center;
we cannot help constantly looking at it. And so it was with old Sam
Gates. He spat on his hands, and blinked up at the sky. And suddenly the
aeroplane behaved in a very extraordinary manner. It was well over the
sea when it seemed to lurch in a drunken manner, and skimmed the water.
Then it shot up at a dangerous angle and zigzagged. It started to go
farther out, and then turned and made for the land. The engines were
making a curious grating noise. It rose once more, and then suddenly
dived downwards and came plump down right in the middle of Mr. Dodge’s
field of swedes!
Finally, as if not content with this desecration, it ran along the
ground, ripping and tearing up twenty-five yards of good swedes, and then
came to a stop. Old Sam Gates was in a terrible state. The aeroplane was
more than a hundred yards away, but he waved his arms, and called out:
“Hi! you there, you mustn’t land in they swedes! They’re Mister Dodge’s.”
The instant the aeroplane stopped a man leapt out, and gazed quickly
round. He glanced at Sam Gates, and seemed uncertain whether to address
him or whether to concentrate his attention on the flying-machine. The
latter arrangement appeared to be his ultimate decision. He dived under
the engine, and became frantically busy. Sam had never seen any one work
with such furious energy. But all the same, it was not to be tolerated.
It was disgraceful. Sam shouted out across the field, almost hurrying in
his indignation. When he approached within earshot of the aviator, he
cried out again:
“Hi! you mustn’t rest your old airyplane here. You’ve kicked up all Mr.
Dodge’s swedes. A nice thing you’ve done!”
He was within five yards when suddenly the aviator turned and covered him
with a revolver! And, speaking in a sharp, staccato voice, he said:
“Old grandfather, you must sit down. I am very occupied. If you interfere
or attempt to go away, I shoot you. So!”
Sam gazed at the horrid glittering little barrel, and gasped. Well, he
never! To be threatened with murder when you’re doing your duty in your
employer’s private property! But, still, perhaps the man was mad. A man
must be more or less mad to go up in one of those crazy things. And life
was very sweet on that summer morning, in spite of sixty-nine years. He
sat down among the swedes.
The aviator was so busy with his cranks and machinery that he hardly
deigned to pay him any attention, except to keep the revolver handy. He
worked feverishly, and Sam sat watching him. At the end of ten minutes he
seemed to have solved his troubles with the machine, but he still seemed
very scared. He kept on glancing round and out to sea. When his repairs
were completed, he straightened his back and wiped the perspiration
from his brow. He was apparently on the point of springing back into the
machine and going off, when a sudden mood of facetiousness, caused by
relief from the strain he had endured, came to him. He turned to old Sam,
and smiled; at the same time remarking:
“Well, old grandfather, and now we shall be all right, isn’t it?”
He came close up to Sam, and then suddenly started back.
“Gott!” he cried. “Paul Jouperts!”
Sam gazed at him, bewildered, and the madman started talking to him in
some foreign tongue. Sam shook his head.
“You no right,” he remarked, “to come bargin’ through they swedes of Mr.
Dodge’s.”
And then the aviator behaved in a most peculiar manner. He came up and
examined his face very closely, and gave a gentle tug at his beard and
hair, as if to see whether it were real or false.
“What is your name, old man?” he said.
“Sam Gates.”
The aviator muttered some words that sounded something like “mare
vudish!” and then turned to his machine. He appeared to be dazed and in
a great state of doubt. He fumbled with some cranks, but kept glancing
at old Sam. At last he got into the car and started the engine. Then he
stopped, and sat there deep in thought. At last he suddenly sprang out
again, and, approaching Sam, he said very deliberately:
“Old grandfather, I shall require you to accompany me.”
Sam gasped.
“Eh?” he said. “What be talkin’ about? ’company? I got these here lines
o’ tarnips—I be already behoind—”
The disgusting little revolver once more flashed before his eyes.
“There must be no discussion,” came the voice. “It is necessary that you
mount the seat of the car without delay. Otherwise I shoot you like the
dog you are. So!”
Old Sam was hale and hearty. He had no desire to die so ignominiously.
The pleasant smell of the downland was in his nostrils. His foot was on
his native heath. He mounted the seat of the car, contenting himself with
a mutter:
“Well, that be a noice thing, I must say! Flyin’ about the country with
all they tarnips on’y half thinned—”
He found himself strapped in. The aviator was in a fever of anxiety
to get away. The engines made a ghastly splutter and noise. The thing
started running along the ground. Suddenly it shot upwards, giving the
swedes a last contemptuous kick. At twenty minutes to eight that morning
old Sam found himself being borne right up above his fields and out to
sea! His breath came quickly. He was a little frightened.
“God forgive me!” he murmured.
The thing was so fantastic and sudden, his mind could not grasp it. He
only felt in some vague way that he was going to die, and he struggled to
attune his mind to the change. He offered up a mild prayer to God, Who,
he felt, must be very near, somewhere up in these clouds. Automatically
he thought of the vicar at Halvesham, and a certain sense of comfort came
to him at the reflection that on the previous day he had taken a “cooking
of runner beans” to God’s representative in that village. He felt calmer
after that, but the horrid machine seemed to go higher and higher. He
could not turn in his seat and he could see nothing but sea and sky. Of
course the man was mad, mad as a March hare. Of what earthly use could
_he_ be to any one? Besides, he had talked pure gibberish, and called him
Paul Something, when he had already told him that his name was Sam. The
thing would fall down into the sea soon, and they would both be drowned.
Well, well! He had reached the three-score years and ten.
He was protected by a screen, but it seemed very cold. What on earth
would Mr. Dodge say? There was no one left to work the land but a fool
of a boy named Billy Whitehead at Deric’s Cross. On, on, on they went
at a furious pace. His thoughts danced disconnectedly from incidents of
his youth, conversations with the vicar, hearty meals in the open, a
frock his sister wore on the day of the postman’s wedding, the drone of a
psalm, the illness of some ewes belonging to Mr. Dodge. Everything seemed
to be moving very rapidly, upsetting his sense of time. He felt outraged
and yet at moments there was something entrancing in the wild experience.
He seemed to be living at an incredible pace. Perhaps he was really dead,
and on his way to the Kingdom of God? Perhaps this was the way they took
people?
After some indefinite period he suddenly caught sight of a long strip
of land. Was this a foreign country? or were they returning? He had by
this time lost all feeling of fear. He became interested, and almost
disappointed. The “airyplane” was not such a fool as it looked. It was
very wonderful to be right up in the sky like this. His dreams were
suddenly disturbed by a fearful noise. He thought the machine was blown
to pieces. It dived and ducked through the air, and things were bursting
all round it and making an awful din; and then it went up higher and
higher. After a while these noises ceased, and he felt the machine
gliding downwards. They were really right above solid land, trees, and
fields, and streams, and white villages. Down, down, down they glided.
This was a foreign country. There were straight avenues of poplars and
canals. This was not Halvesham. He felt the thing glide gently and bump
into a field. Some men ran forward and approached them, and the mad
aviator called out to them. They were mostly fat men in gray uniforms,
and they all spoke this foreign gibberish. Some one came and unstrapped
him. He was very stiff, and could hardly move. An exceptionally
gross-looking man punched him in the ribs, and roared with laughter. They
all stood round and laughed at him, while the mad aviator talked to them
and kept pointing at him. Then he said:
“Old grandfather, you must come with me.”
He was led to a zinc-roofed building, and shut in a little room. There
were guards outside with fixed bayonets. After a while the mad aviator
appeared again, accompanied by two soldiers. He beckoned him to follow.
They marched through a quadrangle and entered another building. They went
straight into an office where a very important-looking man, covered with
medals, sat in an easy-chair. There was a lot of saluting and clicking of
heels.
The aviator pointed at Sam and said something, and the man with the
medals started at sight of him, and then came up and spoke to him in
English.
“What is your name? Where do you come from? Your age? The name and
birthplace of your parents?”
He seemed intensely interested, and also pulled his hair and beard to
see if they came off. So well and naturally did he and the aviator
speak English that after a voluble cross-examination they drew apart,
and continued the conversation in that language. And the extraordinary
conversation was of this nature:
“It is a most remarkable resemblance,” said the man with medals.
“_Unglaublich!_ But what do you want me to do with him, Hausemann?”
“The idea came to me suddenly, excellency,” replied the aviator, “and
you may consider it worthless. It is just this. The resemblance is so
amazing. Paul Jouperts has given us more valuable information than
any one at present in our service. And the English know that. There is
an award of twenty-five thousand francs on his head. Twice they have
captured him, and each time he escaped. All the company commanders and
their staff have his photograph. He is a serious thorn in their flesh.”
“Well?” replied the man with the medals.
The aviator whispered confidently:
“Suppose, your excellency, that they found the dead body of Paul
Jouperts?”
“Well?” replied the big man.
“My suggestion is this. To-morrow, as you know, the English are attacking
Hill 701, which we have for tactical reasons decided to evacuate. If
after the attack they find the dead body of Paul Jouperts in, say, the
second lines, they will take no further trouble in the matter. You
know their lack of thoroughness. Pardon me, I was two years at Oxford
University. And consequently Paul Jouperts will be able to—prosecute his
labors undisturbed.”
The man with the medals twirled his mustache and looked thoughtfully at
his colleague.
“Where is Paul at the moment?” he asked.
“He is acting as a gardener at the Convent of St. Eloise at
Mailleton-en-haut, which, as you know, is one hundred meters from the
headquarters of the British central army staff.”
The man with the medals took two or three rapid turns up and down the
room. Then he said:
“Your plan is excellent, Hausemann. The only point of difficulty is that
the attack started this morning.”
“This morning?” exclaimed the other.
“Yes. The English attacked unexpectedly at dawn. We have already
evacuated the first line. We shall evacuate the second line at
eleven-fifty. It is now ten-fifteen. There may be just time.”
He looked suddenly at old Sam in the way that a butcher might look at a
prize heifer at an agricultural show, and remarked casually:
“Yes, it is a remarkable resemblance. It seems a pity not to ... do
something with it.”
Then, speaking in German, he added:
“It is worth trying, and if it succeeds, the higher authorities shall
hear of your lucky accident and inspiration, Herr Hausemann. Instruct
Over-lieutenant Schutz to send the old fool by two orderlies to the east
extremity of trench 38. Keep him there till the order of evacuation is
given. Then shoot him, but don’t disfigure him, and lay him out face
upwards.”
The aviator saluted and withdrew, accompanied by his victim. Old Sam had
not understood the latter part of the conversation, and he did not catch
quite all that was said in English, but he felt that somehow things were
not becoming too promising, and it was time to assert himself. So he
remarked when they got outside:
“Now, look’ee here, mister, when be I goin’ back to my tarnips?”
And the aviator replied with a pleasant smile:
“Do not be disturbed, old grandfather; you shall ... get back to the soil
quite soon.”
In a few moments he found himself in a large gray car, accompanied by
four soldiers. The aviator left him. The country was barren and horrible,
full of great pits and rents, and he could hear the roar of artillery
and the shriek of shells. Overhead, aeroplanes were buzzing angrily. He
seemed to be suddenly transported from the Kingdom of God to the Pit of
Darkness. He wondered whether the vicar had enjoyed the runner-beans.
He could not imagine runner-beans growing here, runner-beans, ay! or
anything else. If this was a foreign country, give him dear old England.
Gr-r-r-r—Bang! Something exploded just at the rear of the car. The
soldiers ducked, and one of them pushed him in the stomach and swore.
“An ugly-looking lout,” he thought. “If I was twenty years younger I’d
give him a punch in the eye that ’ud make him sit up.”
The car came to a halt by a broken wall. The party hurried out and dived
behind a mound. He was pulled down a kind of shaft and found himself
in a room buried right underground, where three officers were drinking
and smoking. The soldiers saluted and handed a typewritten dispatch.
The officers looked at him drunkenly, and one came up and pulled his
beard and spat in his face, and called him “an old English swine.” He
then shouted out some instructions to the soldiers, and they led him
out into the narrow trench. One walked behind him and occasionally
prodded him with the butt-end of a gun. The trenches were half-full of
water, and reeked of gases, powder, and decaying matter. Shells were
constantly bursting overhead, and in places the trenches had crumbled and
were nearly blocked up. They stumbled on, sometimes falling, sometimes
dodging moving masses, and occasionally crawling over the dead bodies
of men. At last they reached a deserted-looking trench, and one of the
soldiers pushed him into the corner of it and growled something, and
then disappeared round the angle. Old Sam was exhausted. He lay panting
against the mud wall, expecting every minute to be blown to pieces by
one of those infernal things that seemed to be getting more and more
insistent. The din went on for nearly twenty minutes, and he was alone
in the trench. He fancied he heard a whistle amidst the din. Suddenly
one of the soldiers who had accompanied him came stealthily round the
corner. And there was a look in his eye old Sam did not like. When he
was within five yards the soldier raised his rifle and pointed it at
Sam’s body. Some instinct impelled the old man at that instant to throw
himself forward on his face. As he did so, he was conscious of a terrible
explosion, and he had just time to observe the soldier falling in a heap
near him, when he lost consciousness.
His consciousness appeared to return to him with a snap. He was lying on
a plank in a building, and he heard some one say:
“I believe the old boy’s English.”
He looked round. There were a lot of men lying there, and others in khaki
and white overalls were busy amongst them. He sat up and rubbed his
head, and said:
“Hi, mister, where be I now?”
Some one laughed, and a young man came up and said:
“Well, old thing, you were very nearly in hell. Who the devil are you?”
Some one else came up, and the two of them were discussing him. One of
them said:
“He’s quite all right. He was only knocked out. Better take him to the
colonel. He may be a spy.”
The other came up, and touched his shoulder, and remarked:
“Can you walk, uncle?”
He replied: “Ay, I can walk all right.”
“That’s an old sport!”
The young man took his arm and helped him out of the room, into a
courtyard. They entered another room, where an elderly, kind-faced
officer was seated at a desk. The officer looked up, and exclaimed:
“Good God! Bradshaw, do you know who you’ve got there?”
The younger one said, “No. Who, sir?”
“By God! It’s Paul Jouperts!” exclaimed the colonel.
“Paul Jouperts! Great Scott!”
The old officer addressed himself to Sam. He said:
“Well, we’ve got you once more, Paul. We shall have to be a little more
careful this time.”
The young officer said:
“Shall I detail a squad, sir?”
“We can’t shoot him without a court-martial,” replied the kind-faced
senior.
Then Sam interpolated:
“Look’ee here, sir. I’m fair sick of all this. My name bean’t Paul. My
name’s Sam. I was a-thinnin’ a line of tarnips—”
Both officers burst out laughing, and the younger one said:
“Good! damn good! Isn’t it amazing, sir, the way they not only learn the
language, but even take the trouble to learn a dialect?”
The older man busied himself with some papers.
“Well, Sam,” he remarked, “you shall be given a chance to prove your
identity. Our methods are less drastic than those of your Boche masters.
What part of England are you supposed to come from? Let’s see how much
you can bluff us with your topographical knowledge.”
“Oi was a-thinnin’ a loine o’ tarnips this morning at ’alf-past seven on
Mr. Dodge’s farm at Halvesham, when one o’ these ’ere airyplanes come
roight down among the swedes. I tells ’ee to get clear o’ that, when the
feller what gets owt o’ the car, ’e drahs a revowler and ’e says, ‘You
must ’company I—’”
“Yes, yes,” interrupted the senior officer; “that’s all very good. Now
tell me—Where is Halvesham? What is the name of the local vicar? I’m sure
you’d know that.”
Old Sam rubbed his chin.
“I sits under the Reverend David Pryce, mister, and a good God-fearin’
man he be. I took him a cookin’ o’ runner-beans on’y yesterday. I works
for Mr. Dodge what owns Greenway Manor and ’as a stud-farm at Newmarket
they say.”
“Charles Dodge?” asked the younger officers.
“Ay, Charlie Dodge. You write and ask ’un if he knows old Sam Gates.”
The two officers looked at each other, and the older one looked at Sam
more closely.
“It’s very extraordinary,” he remarked.
“Everybody knows Charlie Dodge,” added the younger officer.
It was at that moment that a wave of genius swept over old Sam. He put
his hand to his head, and suddenly jerked out:
“What’s more, I can tell ’ee where this yere Paul is. He’s actin’ a
gardener in a convent at—”
He puckered up his brow and fumbled with his hat, and then got out:
“Mighteno.”
The older officer gasped.
“Mailleton-en-haut! Good God! What makes you say that, old man?”
Sam tried to give an account of his experience, and the things he had
heard said by the German officers. But he was getting tired, and he broke
off in the middle to say:
“Ye haven’t a bite o’ somethin’ to eat, I suppose, mister, and a glass
o’ beer? I usually ’as my dinner at twelve o’clock.”
Both the officers laughed, and the older said:
“Get him some food, Bradshaw, and a bottle of beer from the mess. We’ll
keep this old man here. He interests me.”
While the younger man was doing this, the chief pressed a button and
summoned another junior officer.
“Gateshead,” he remarked, “ring up G. H. Q. and instruct them to arrest
the gardener in that convent at the top of the hill, and then to report.”
The officer saluted and went out, and in a few minutes a tray of hot food
and a large bottle of beer was brought to the old man, and he was left
alone in the corner of the room to negotiate this welcome compensation.
And in the execution he did himself and his country credit. In the
meanwhile the officers were very busy. People were coming and going and
examining maps and telephone-bells were ringing furiously. They did not
disturb old Sam’s gastronomic operations. He cleaned up the mess tins and
finished the last drop of beer. The senior officer found time to offer
him a cigarette, but he replied:
“Thank’ee kindly, but I’d rather smoke my pipe.”
The colonel smiled, and said:
“Oh, all right. Smoke away.”
He lighted up, and the fumes of the shag permeated the room. Some one
opened another window, and the young officer who had addressed him at
first suddenly looked at him and exclaimed:
“Innocent, by God! You couldn’t get shag like that anywhere but in
Norfolk.”
It must have been over an hour later when another officer entered, and
saluted.
“Message from G. H. Q., sir,” he said.
“Well?”
“They have arrested the gardener at the convent of St. Eloise, and they
have every reason to believe that he is the notorious Paul Jouperts.”
The colonel stood up, and his eyes beamed. He came over to old Sam and
shook his hand.
“Mr. Gates,” he said, “you are an old brick. You will probably hear more
of this. You have probably been the means of delivering something very
useful into our hands. Your own honor is vindicated. A loving government
will probably award you five shillings or a Victoria Cross, or something
of that sort. In the meantime, what can I do for you?”
Old Sam scratched his chin.
“Oi want to get back ’ome,” he said.
“Well, even that might be arranged.”
“Oi want to get back ’ome in toime for tea.”
“What time do you have tea?”
“Foive o’clock or thereabouts.”
“I see.”
A kindly smile came into the eyes of the colonel. He turned to another
officer standing by the table, and said:
“Raikes, is any one going across this afternoon with dispatches?”
“Yes, sir,” replied the young officer. “Commander Jennings is leaving at
three o’clock.”
“You might ask him to come and see me.”
Within ten minutes a young man in a flight-commander’s uniform entered.
“Ah, Jennings,” said the colonel, “here is a little affair which concerns
the honor of the British army. My friend here, Sam Gates, has come over
from Halvesham in Norfolk in order to give us valuable information. I
have promised him that he shall get home to tea at five o’clock. Can you
take a passenger?”
The young man threw back his head and laughed.
“Lord!” he exclaimed. “What an old sport! Yes, I expect I could just
manage it. Where is the Godforsaken place?”
A large ordnance-map of Norfolk (which had been captured from a German
officer) was produced, and the young man studied it closely.
At three o’clock precisely old Sam, finding himself something of a hero
and quite glad to escape from the embarrassment which this position
entailed, once more sped skywards in an “airyplane.”
At twenty minutes to five he landed once more amongst Mr. Dodge’s swedes.
The breezy young airman shook hands with him and departed inland. Old Sam
sat down and surveyed the field.
“A noice thing, I must say,” he muttered to himself, as he looked along
the lines of unthinned turnips. He still had twenty minutes, and so he
went slowly along and completed a line which he had commenced in the
morning. He then deliberately packed up his dinner-things and his tools,
and started out for home.