"Can you tell me----" I said pleasantly. He scowled and jerked his
head towards the door. I went in and tried another man. "Can you tell
me----" I began. "Enlist?" he said. "Upstairs." I went upstairs and
pushed open a door. "Can you tell me----" I said. "This is the
canteen," answered a man in an apron....
At last I found a sergeant. "Enlist?" he said briskly. "Come in." I
went in.
He leant against a table and I smiled at him pleasantly.
"I just wanted to ask," I said, "whether----"
"Quite so," he said, and gave me a long explanation of what my pay
would be now that I had decided to join the Army. He began with the
one and a penny of a private and was working up towards the stipend of
a Field Marshal when I stopped him.
"One moment----"
"Exactly," he said. "You're married."
"Y--yes," I said. "At least, no," I added, thinking of Madingley.
"Surely you know?" he asked in surprise.
I remembered suddenly the penalty for a false declaration. It would be
no good explaining afterwards that I meant Madingley.
"Yes," I said. "Married."
He told me what my separation allowance would be.... As a married
Field Marshal with three children it came to ----.