The idea was heavenly but it occurred to me I ought to get permission. So I went into the Orderly Room.
There were two officers and a lot of sergeants. I tiptoed up to a sergeant and explaining that a lady had come over to see me, asked if I could get out of camp for half an hour? I was very raw in those days,—half an hour!
The sergeant stared at me. Presumably ladies in motor-cars didn’t make a habit of fetching cavalry privates. It wasn’t “laid down” in the drill book. However, he went over to one of the officers,—the Adjutant, I discovered later.
The Adjutant looked me up and down as I repeated my request, asked me my name and which ride I was in and finally put it to the other officer who said “yes” without looking up. So I thanked the Adjutant, clicked to the salute and went out. As I walked round the front of the car, while the chauffeur cranked up, the door of the Orderly Room opened and the Adjutant came on to the step. He took a good look at the American girl and said, “Oh—er—Gibbs! You can make it an hour if you like.”
It may amuse him to know, if the slaughter hasn’t claimed him, that I made it exactly sixty minutes, much as I should have liked to make it several hours, and was immensely grateful to him both for the extra half hour and for the delightful touch of humour.
What a picnic it was! We motored away from that place and all its roughness and took the basket under a spinney in the afternoon sun which touched everything in a red glow.
It wasn’t only tea she gave me, but sixty precious minutes of great friendship, letting fall little remarks which helped me to go back all the more determined to stick to it. She renewed my faith in myself and gave me renewed courage,—for which I was unable to thank her. We British are so accursedly tongue-tied in these matters. I did try but of course made a botch of it.
There are some things which speech cannot deal with. Your taking me out that day, oh, American girl, and the other days later, are numbered among them.
11
The other occurrence was also brought about by a woman, the woman for whom I joined up. It was a Sunday morning on which fortunately I was not detailed for any fatigues and she came to take me out to lunch. We motored to Marlborough, lunched at the hotel and after visiting a racing stable some distance off came back to the hotel for tea, a happy day unflecked by any shadow. In the corner of the dining-room were two officers with two ladies. I, in the bandolier and spurs of a trooper, sat with my back to them and my friend told me that they seemed to be eyeing me and making remarks. It occurred to me that as I had no official permission to be away from Tidworth they might possibly be going to make trouble. How little I knew what was in their minds. When we’d finished and got up to go one of the officers came across as we were going out of the room and said, “May I speak to you a moment?”