"But it's all tommy rot."
"Is it? The Germans did'nt think so when I charged plunk into the middle of 'em. Yer should 'ave been there to see it. They were all round me and two taubes over 'ead watching my movements. Swish! and my bayonet went through the man in front and stabbed the identity disc of another. When I drew the bayonet out the butt of my 'ipe[3] would 'it a man behind me in the tummy. Ugh! 'e would say and flop bringing a mate down with 'im may be. The dead was all round me and I built a parapet of their bodies, puttin' the legs criss-cross and makin' loop 'oles. Then they began to bomb me from the other side. 'Twas gettin' 'ot I tell you and I began to think of my 'ome; the dug-out in the trench. What was I to do? If I crossed the open they'd bring me down with a bullet. There was only one thing to be done. I had my boots on me for three 'ole weeks of 'ot weather, 'otter than this and beer not so near as it is now——"
"Have another drink, Bill?" I asked.
"Glad yer took the 'int," said my mate. "Story tellin's a dry fatigue. Well as I was sayin' my socks 'ad been on for a 'ole month——"
"Three weeks," I corrected.
"Three weeks," Bill repeated and continued. "I took orf my boots. 'Respirators!' the Germans yelled the minute my socks were bare, and off they went leavin' me there with my 'ome-made trench. When I came back I got a dose of C.B. as I've told you before."
We went back to our billet. In the farmyard the pigs were busy on the midden, and they looked at us with curious expressive eyes that peered roguishly out from under their heavy hanging cabbage-leaves of ears. In one corner was the field-cooker. The cooks were busy making dixies of bully beef stew. Their clothes were dirty and greasy, so were their arms, bare from the shoulders almost, and taut with muscles. Through a path that wound amongst a medley of agricultural instruments, ploughs harrows and grubbers, the farmer's daughter came striding like a ploughman, two children hanging on to her apron strings. A stretcher leant against our water-cart, and dried clots of blood were on its shafts. The farmer's dog lay panting on the midden, his red tongue hanging out and saliva dropping on the dung, overhead the swallows were swooping and flying in under the eaves where now and again they nested for a moment before getting up to resume their exhilirating flight. A dirty barefooted boy came in through the large entrance-gate leading a pair of sleepy cows with heavy udders which shook backwards and forwards as they walked. The horns of one cow were twisted, the end of one pointed up, the end of the other pointed down.
One of Section 4's boys was looking at the cow.
"The ole geeser's 'andlebars is twisted," said Bill, addressing nobody in particular and alluding to the cow.
"It's 'orns, yer fool!" said Section 4.