The rest of the company made it abundantly clear that Bindle had expressed its sentiments, and Ruddy Bill subsided into sotto voce blasphemies.
During these Friday nights at the Scarlet Horse, many subjects came up for discussion; marriage, politics, religion were dealt with in turn, but it was impossible to keep the talk away from the War, to which time after time it returned with the same persistency that the needle of the compass flutters back to the north.
"I'd sooner be like 'Earty than a German," Bindle once remarked with decision. "If they'd only come over 'ere I'd get a smack at 'em, spite of me various veins."
His forced inaction was to Bindle a tragedy of which he seldom spoke; but when he did it was generally to the point, and more than one man enlisted as a direct result of Bindle's views on the war.
For "the slacker" he had one question. "You got various veins?" he would enquire; and on hearing that the man had not, he would say, "Then yer got to join."
To those who suggested that he himself should enlist, he made only one reply, "You get me in the army, ole sport, an' I'll give yer anythink I got. Gawd strike me dead if I won't." And impressed by Bindle's earnestness, almost without exception, the questioner had the grace to feel ashamed of himself.
One man had cast some doubt upon the genuineness of Bindle's refusal by the authorities.
"Come along, then," yelled Bindle in a passion; "come along an' see." And seizing the astonished man by the arm he marched him round to the nearest recruiting station, followed by those who had heard the challenge. Before the sceptic had recovered his self-possession he found himself a soldier and Bindle once more convicted of "various veins."
"Well, Ginger," remarked Bindle pleasantly, after the pause that followed Ruddy Bill's discomfiture, "wot 'ave yer been doin' that yer can talk about without 'urtin' Sweet William's ears. Any noos?"
"I been an' joined," grumbled Ginger, as if he had committed one of the Seven Deadly Sins.