Galbraith gave his enemy the butt of his rifle and laid him out. From his pockets he shook out a mixed collection of loot. He took possession of his pistol, and kicked him with some vehemence into a cupboard.
"That yin's a thief," was his spoken reflection. "There's something michty wrong wi' Wipers the day."
His head was clearing, and he was getting very wroth. His battalion had gone off and left him in a cellar, and miscreants were abroad. It was time for a respectable man to be up and doing. Besides, he wanted his breakfast. He fixed his bayonet, put the pistol in his pocket, and emerged into the November drizzle.
The streets suddenly were curiously still. The occasional shell-fire came to his ears as if through layers of cotton-wool. He put this down to dizziness from lack of food, and made his way to what looked like an estaminet. The place was full of riotous people who were helping themselves to drinks, while a distracted landlord wrung his hands. He flew to Galbraith, the tears running down his cheeks, and implored him in broken words.
"Vere ze Engleesh?" he cried. "Ze méchants rob me. Zere is une émeute. Vere ze officers?"
"That's what I'm wantin' to ken mysel'," said Galbraith.
"Zey are gone," wailed the innkeeper. "Zere is no gendarme or anyzing, and I am rob."
"Where's the polis? Get the Provost, man. D'ye tell me there's no polis left?"
"I am rob," the wail continued. "Ze méchants rob ze magasins and ve vill be assassinés."
Light was dawning upon Private Galbraith. The British troops had left Ypres for some reason which he could not fathom, and there was no law or order in the little city. At other times he had hated the law as much as any man, and his relations with the police had often been strained. Now he realised that he had done them an injustice. Disorder suddenly seemed to him the one thing intolerable. Here had he been undergoing a stiff discipline for weeks, and if that was his fate no civilian should be allowed on the loose. He was a British soldier—marooned here by no fault of his own—and it was his business to keep up the end of the British Army and impose the King's peace upon the unruly. His temper was getting hot, but he was curiously happy. He marched into the estaminet. "Oot o' here, ye scum!" he bellowed. "Sortez, ye cochons!"