IN WHICH THE READER IS INTRODUCED TO THE PIMPLE
“‘Pimple’ wants to see you, Bones,” said Freeland, one afternoon in
April.
“What on earth does he want with me?” I asked. I had never yet had any
truck with the five-foot-nothing of impertinence that called itself the
Camp Interpreter.
“Don’t know, I’m sure. He’s waiting for you in the lane.”
I went down. Moïse, the Turkish Interpreter, was standing at our camp
notice-board, surrounded by the usual little crowd of prisoners trying
to pump him on the progress of the war. His hands were plunged deep in
the pockets of a pair of nondescript riding-breeches. At intervals he
took them out to readjust the pince-nez before his short-sighted eyes,
and then plunged them back again. His calves were encased in uncleaned,
black, leather gaiters. His sadly worn boots gave one the impression of
having previously belonged to someone else. His grey-blue uniform coat
had Austrian buttons on it, and his head-gear was a second-hand
caricature of the Enver cap. Yet he stood there with all the assurance
of a bantam cock on his own dung-heap, and crowed in the faces of his
betters. He was part of the bitterness of captivity.
“Good afternoon, Jones,” he said familiarly, as I came up. He had never
greeted me before—he kept his salutations for _very_ senior officers.
“What do you want?” I asked.
He led me a little to one side, away from the crowd.
“You are a student of spiritism?” he said, eyeing me sharply. “The
sentries have told me.”
“Well?” I ventured.
“Have you much studied the subject?”
“So-so,” said I.
“How much do you know about it? I, too, am interested.”
(I wondered what was up. Was I going to be punished?)
“The Commandant also is interested in these matters,” he went on
insinuatingly, “and many officers have written to England of what you
are doing.”
I thought I was “for it,” and fought for time. “I refer you to my
friends for what I have done,” said I. “Captain Freeland, for instance.”
“Can you read the future?” he asked. “I have some questions.”
“What?” (I breathed again.)
“I want you to answer by occultism for me some questions. You will?”
Again I needed time, but for a different reason.
“We can’t talk here,” I said confidentially; “our mess has tea in about
half an hour; come up and join us.”
“Right-o!” The familiar phrase somehow sounded obnoxious on his tongue.
I walked back, up the steep path, thinking hard. Hitherto spooking had
been merely a jest, with a psychological flavouring to lend it interest.
But now a serious element was being introduced. If I could do to the
Turks what I had succeeded in doing to my fellow-prisoners, if I could
make them believers, there was no saying what influence I might not be
able to exert over them. It might even open the door to freedom. Without
any clear vision of the future, with nothing but the vaguest hope of
ultimate success, I made up my mind to grip this man, and to wait for
time to show how I might use him.
“Freak,” said I, entering our room, “wash your face, ’cause the ‘Pimple’
is coming to tea.”
Freeland stared at me open-mouthed. Uncle Gallup protested mildly
because the announcement had caused him to blot his Great Literary Work.
The Fat Boy woke from a deep sleep, and Pa dropped his pipe.
“Well, I’m ——,” said everybody at once.
“We’ll have that cake you’re saving up for your birthday, Freak,” I
suggested.
“Hanged if we do,” said Freeland. “The little swab pinches half our
parcels—why should we feed him? If he comes to tea, I’ll go and sit on
the landing.”
“And I—and I—and I——” chorused the other three.
“No you don’t!” I said. “You’ll stay here and be good. Because of my
great modesty _I_ am the one who will be away. I can’t listen to my own
praises. You, Freak, will tell him yarns about my powers as a Spookist,
you will tell him that never before was there such a Spookist, never——”
“But I know nothing about your beastly spooking,” Freeland objected.
“Oh yes, you do! You know how I learnt the occult secrets of the
Head-hunting Waa Tribe, and——”
“The WHO?” Freeland interrupted.
“The Head-hunting Waas in Burma,” I repeated. “I got this scar on my
forehead from them, you know, when they were trying to scalp me.”
“You old liar!” said Pa. “I know how you got that scar. It was on the
Siamese side in ’09——”
“Shut up, Pa!” I said. “I’m only asking Freak to prepare the ground. I
want to make another convert, and once we’ve got the blighter on the
string I’ll make him dance all right.”
“I’m sure it’s all beyond me,” said Uncle Gallup plaintively; “I’m all
mixed up between you and the Spook, anyway.”
Freeland was looking at me strangely. “_You’ll_ make him dance, will
you?” he said.
“I mean, of course,” I corrected myself hastily, “the _Spook_ will make
him dance.”
“How d’you know what the Spook will do?” asked Freeland. There was a
confoundedly knowing twinkle in his eye.
I was cornered. “I’m only guessing,” I said lamely. “I—I——”
“Right-o!” said Freeland, laughing. “I’ll stuff him up for you. You
leave it to me.”
In that moment, I am convinced, Freeland more than suspected it was all
a fraud. Like the good sport he was, he covered my confusion from the
others, and never, either then or afterwards, pressed his advantage. We
talked hurriedly over what he was to say to the Interpreter, and I left
the room.
[Illustration: THE LANE WHERE THE PRISONERS EXERCISED]
An hour and a half later, from my hiding-place in Stace’s room, I
watched the Interpreter depart. Then I returned to our Mess. There was a
litter of tea-cups all over the place. I poured myself out a cup of cold
tea.
“Oh, you’ve had the cake,” I said, pointing to some delectable-looking
crumbs on a plate; “where’s my bit?”
“_Yok_,”[6] said Freeland, with ill-concealed glee.
“Come on, you blighters, fork it out,” I pleaded. It was a recognized
rule of the mess that all parcel dainties (Heaven knows they were few
enough!) were scrupulously shared. An absentee’s portion was always put
aside for him.
“_Yessack_,”[7] said Freeland, laughing. “We told the Interpreter you
never eat anything rich before a séance, so he took it. Besides, you
told me to stuff him up——”
When the necessary posh had subsided, Freeland let me know what yarn he
had told Moïse. It appeared that some years ago I had been taken
prisoner by the Head-hunters. They tortured me—my body bore scars in
witness of it—but I was saved from death by the Witch Doctor, who
recognized in me a brother craftsman. In exchange for my knowledge he
taught me his. Then he died, and I became Chief of the Tribe by reason
of my magic powers. In due course I left the Waas and returned to
civilization with my pockets full of Burmese rubies, and my head full of
the Magic of the East.
“You piled it on a bit thick, Freak,” said I.
“Oh, I went further than that,” he laughed. “I told him Townshend used
to employ you to read the minds of the Turkish generals, which explains
why none of the Turkish attacks on Kut came off!”
“Well, _that’s_ torn it all right!” I exclaimed.
“Not a bit of it. It all went down—same as the cake. See here——”
He handed me a sheet of paper on which Moïse had written a list of
questions.
“He wants these submitted to the Spirit at the next séance.”
I ran my eye down the page. No names were mentioned, but it was possible
to read between the lines. There were some civilian ladies interned in
another part of Yozgad.
“Why,” I said in astonishment, “the fellow’s given himself away! He is
using his official position as jailor to pay court to those unhappy
girls!”
“Yes,” said Freeland, and there was a deep anger in his voice. “Yes.
He’s got to be made to sit up. Can you manage it, Bones?”
My back was turned towards the other occupants of the room. I looked
into Freak’s eyes, and winked.
* * * * *
At the next séance I produced the Pimple’s written questions for the
inspection of Price, Matthews, and the Doc. Then I showed them answers
prepared by Freeland and myself at the expenditure of much time and
thought.
“I propose,” said I, “to send these as if they came from the Spook. It
is no good wasting the Spook’s time over the Pimple; but you fellows
will have to say, if asked, that we got this stuff at a séance.”
“The answers are pretty good,” said Alec, “and they hit him about as
hard as he deserves, but they are not exactly characteristic of the
Spook.”
“They won’t do at all, at all,” said the Doc. “He will know at once it
is your work. Anybody with half an eye could spot your style, Bones.”
“Why not try the Spook and see,” Price suggested. “If the answers we get
are not suitable, we can send this forgery.”
“But what’s the use of wasting time?” I objected; “the thing’s done
already, and——”
“Ach! Come on, Bones!” The Doc. put his fingers on the glass. “Let’s get
the genuine article. It’ll be as different as chalk from cheese.”
Freeland and I had spent a whole afternoon concocting the replies. It
was most annoying that they should thus be consigned to the scrap-heap.
I was also doubtful if I could manufacture a fresh series at such short
notice, but I put my fingers on the glass and somehow the answers came
and elicited general approval.
“There you are,” said Price at the end of the séance, putting the record
before me. “Read that, my son!”
“The Spook’s the boy,” laughed the Doc. “If the Pimple has got any
epidermis left to his feelings when he has read through those answers,
you can call me a Dago. It’ll frighten the little cad out of his seven
senses. Look at question eight, will ye! ‘What will my friends think?’
Bones gives a wishy-washy, non-committal answer, and says, ‘Your friends
won’t know.’ _Spook_ says, ‘You have NO friends.’ That’s the stuff to
keep him awake o’nights. I’m all in favour of leaving it to the Spook
every time; there’s not a man of us can come within shoutin’ distance of
him.”
“Yes, it’s a good job we left it to the Spook,” said Alec; “he gets
there every time, right on the solar plexus—a regular knock-out.”
It has always been the same. Far-away birds have fine plumage. A
prophet’s meed of honour varies directly as the square of the distance.
Still, every man wants to consider himself an exception to the rule. To
me it was at first a little disappointing to be one more example of its
application and to find the utterings of an unknown spook so much
preferable to my own.
However, the answers created a deep impression on Moïse the Interpreter,
who, at this time, was not a believer in spiritualism. He had only
reached the stage of wondering if there might not be something in it.
Moreover, he was a well-educated man (he had spent some years in the
Ecole Normale in Paris), and had all the natural intelligence and acumen
of the cosmopolitan Jew. I felt I had a difficult task in front of me
and walked warily. I pretended an absolute indifference as to whether he
believed in the Spook or not and never suggested that he should come to
séances. The result was that he consulted the Spook once, twice and
again. Every time, without knowing it, he gave something away. I
privately tabulated his questions, studied them hard, and determined
above all to hold my own counsel until the time was ripe.
On May 6th, 1917, an order was posted forbidding prisoners to
communicate in their letters to England “news obtained by officers in a
spiritistic state.” This was encouragement indeed! It showed that the
Turks were taking official notice of my humble efforts. At the same time
I could not believe that it was the Interpreter who was responsible for
this new prohibition. He was by now deeply interested if not already a
believer, and was too anxious to keep on good terms with the mediums to
risk offending them by attacking their spiritualism. It behoved me
therefore to find out who was behind it. I waited my opportunity and
waylaid Moïse in the lane.
“That’s a poor trick of yours,” said I, “stopping us writing home about
spiritualism. We only want verification of what the Spook says. The
matter is one of scientific interest. It has no military significance at
all.”
“I say so to the Commandant,” said Moïse, “but he would not agree! He
says it is dangerous.”
“Get along, Moïse! The Commandant has nothing to do with that notice.
You put it up yourself to crab our amusements.”
Moïse probed excitedly in his pockets and produced a paper in Turkish
which he flourished under my nose.
“There you are!” he said. “The seal! The signature! He wrote the order.
I merely translated. I _told_ him how great was the scientific value,
how important is the experiment. He said the Spook gives war news. It is
his fault, not mine.”
“Is the Commandant also a believer?” I asked.
“Assuredly! He has much studied the occult. He often consults on
problematic difficulties women and witches in this town, but mostly by
cards. He greatly believes in cards.”
“Yes,” I said, “there is much in cards, but it is rather an
old-fashioned and cumbersome method. Now the Ouija——”
Jimmy Dawson rushed up to find out if the Pimple had any parcels for him
in the office, and I seized the opportunity to depart. As I went I
hugged myself. The Commandant too!
Kiazim Bey, Bimbashi of Turkish Artillery and Commandant of our camp,
was the most nebulous official in Asia. He did not visit us once in
three months. He answered no letters, took not the least notice of any
complaints, refused all interviews, and pursued a policy of masterly
inactivity which was the despair of our Senior Officers. He was a sort
of Negative Kitchener—the very antithesis of organizing power—but he had
the same genius for silence. Endowed with a native dignity and coolness
which contrasted favourably with our helpless anger at his incapacity
and neglect, he was comfortable enough himself (thanks to the contents
of our food parcels) to be able to view our discomforts with a
philosophic calm. And, withal, he was more inaccessible than the Great
Moghul. Of the man himself, of his likes and dislikes, his hopes, his
fears, his ambitions, his most ordinary thoughts, we knew less than
nothing. How long, I wondered, would it be before I could get him into
the net? Would he ever consult the Ouija as he consulted the “women and
witches” of Yozgad? Would the Spook be able to play with him as it
played with Doc. and Matthews and the rest of my friends?
The whole thing looked very impossible, but in less than a twelvemonth
this “strong silent man” was to be clay in the potter’s hands, and evict
his pet witch to give houseroom to two practical jokers—Lieutenant C.W.
Hill and myself.