"Don't choke me, mates," he spluttered. "Let me finish this soup, and I'll tell you a story as beats cock-fighting."
"Tuck in. They starved you, I suppose--the brutes!" said Harry. "Let's get our coats, Ken: it's chilly. Bonnard will make up the fire."
Presently, sitting around the fire, they listened to Ginger's story.
"I was sitting on the wing of that aeroplane, thinking of the missus and kids, when all of a sudden I was knocked head over tip from behind. When I came to myself, there was I strapped in the aeroplane, going through the sky like an express train. We came down in the village over yonder, and they lugged me to a colonel, and he asked me a heap of questions, and of course I wouldn't answer, and then they hauled me to a room, took away my belt and bay'net and boots, and locked me in. Here's the end of my milingtary career, thinks I, and only a lance-corporal!
"They gave me some black bread, like gingerbread without the ginger, and some slops they called coffee; I called it dishwater. I wondered how long I'd last on fare like that. But just before morning I was woke by a touch on my face, thought it was a mouse, slapped my hand up, and heard a little voice say 'Oh!' If I could only speak French like you! It was the woman of the house. She let me out and took me down to the cellar, and said something which I took to mean she'd give me the tip when to get away, but it might have been something else for all I know. Anyway, she didn't come back."
"A very unsafe place, I should think, with Germans," said Kenneth.
"There you're wrong. For why? 'Cos there was no wine there. The cellar was empty. Hadn't been used for an age, I should think. It was almost pitch dark; just a little air through some holes at the top of the wall. Well, there I was. The woman had given me some pang and fromarge, and a so of o--rummy lingo the French, ain't it?--and for I don't know how long I waited, thinking she'd come back and tell me the coast was clear. But she didn't, and knowing the Germans were all over the village I didn't dare to stir of my own accord. Besides, when you're expecting something, you don't trouble for a time. I was so sure the woman would come when she could.
"Down there in the dark, of course, I'd no notion of how time was going. I heard guns booming every now and again, and sounds in the house above, and being pretty easy in my mind, as I say, I dropped off to sleep. When I woke I finished off my grub, waiting as patient as a monument for the word to clear. Whether it was night or day I couldn't tell: there seemed to be someone moving about the house all the time. At last I got hungry and mortal sick of being alone in the dark, and began to wonder what I'd do if she didn't come back. Thought I'd try and have a look round. I felt my way to the door, and came to the bottom of the staircase. It was light up above, and I heard the Germans talking overhead, and didn't dare go up. I decided to wait till night and try again. I went to that staircase a dozen times, I should think, before night; the day seemed extra long; and even when night came I was dished, for a lamp was burning, and there were more voices than ever, and I heard someone playing a flute. I guessed they'd sacked the woman for letting me go, and smiled to myself at their hunting like mad for me all over the place.
"But it was no smiling matter there, I can tell you. I didn't sleep a wink that night, but kept on going to the staircase on the chance they were napping above. Not they! And I was getting hungrier and hungrier, and thirsty!--I never knew before what thirst was. I felt seedy, and a banging in my head, and couldn't keep still, going round and round that cellar till I was nearly mad."
"Why didn't you break out when we stormed the village?" asked Kenneth.