“You see,” Tish said bitterly, “that is the sort of help one gets from the Army.” She drew a deep breath and looked in the general direction of the trenches. “One thing is sure and certain—I’m not going back until I’ve found out whether Charlie Sands is still in that town over there or whether he has been taken away so we’ll have to get at him from Switzerland.”
Aggie gave a low moan at this, and Tish eyed her witheringly.
“Don’t be an idiot, Aggie!” she observed. “I haven’t asked you to go—or Lizzie either. I’d be likely,” she added, “to get through our lines unseen and into the very midst of the German Army—with one of you sneezing with hay fever and the other one panting like a locomotive from too much flesh.”
“Tish——” I began firmly. But she waved her hand in silence and demanded Aggie’s flashlight. She then led the way behind the ruins of a wall and took a bundle of papers from under her jacket.
“If the Army won’t help us we have a right to help ourselves,” she observed. And I perceived with a certain trepidation that the papers were some that had been lying on the table at headquarters.
“‘Memorandum,’” Tish read the top one. “‘Write home. Order boots. Send to British Commissary for Scotch whisky. Insect powder!’ Wouldn’t you know,” she said bitterly, “that that general would have to make a memorandum about writing home?”
Underneath, however, there was an aeroplane picture of the Front and V——, and also a map. Both of these she studied carefully until several bullets found their way to our vicinity, and a sentry ran up and was very rude about the light. On receiving a box of cigarettes, however, he became quite friendly.
“Haven’t had a pill for a week,” he said. “Got to a point now where we steal the hay from the battery horses and roll it up in leaves from my Bible. But it isn’t really satisfying.”
Tish gave him a brief lecture on thus mutilating his best friend, but he said that he only used the unimportant pages. “You know,” he explained—“somebody begat somebody else, and that sort of thing. You haven’t any more fags about you, have you?” he asked wistfully. “I’ll be sandbagged and robbed if I go back without any for the other fellows.”
“We can bring some,” Tish suggested, “and you might show us to the trenches. I particularly wish to give some to the men in the most advanced positions.”