His reply would have blistered the paint off a door. His adjectives concerning me made me want to hit him. But one cannot hit one’s superior officer in the army—more’s the pity—on occasions like that. So we had a verbal battle. I told him that if he didn’t find me everything down to lance buckets I shouldn’t appear on parade and that if he chose to put me under arrest, so much the better, as the Major would then find out how damned badly the sergeant ran his troop.
It was a good bluff. Bit by bit he hunted up a head collar, a saddle, sword, lance, etc. Needless to say they were all filthy and I wished all the bullets in Germany on the dirty dog who had pinched my clean stuff. However, I was on parade just half a minute before the Major came round to inspect us. He stopped at me, his eye taking in the rusty bit and stirrup irons, the coagulations on the bridle, the general damnableness of it all. It wasn’t nice.
“Did you come in last night?” The voice was hard.
“Yes, sir.”
“Did you come up from the base with your appointments in that state?”
“No, sir.”
“What do you mean?”
The sergeant was looking apoplectic behind him.
“These aren’t my things, sir,” said I.
“Whose are they?”