“We? You mean the young Tommies who lie dead the other side of the canal? We come in and get the kudos. Presently the Generals will come and say, ‘We did it. Regard our glory! Fling down your flowers! Cheer us, good people, before we go to lunch.’ They will not see behind them the legions they sent to slaughter by ghastly blunders, colossal stupidity, invincible pomposity.”
Fortune broke into song. It was an old anthem of his:
“Blear-eyed Bill, the Butcher of the Boche.”
He had composed it after a fourth whiskey on a cottage piano in his Nissen hut. In crashing chords he had revealed the soul of a General preparing a plan of battle—over the telephone. It never failed to make me laugh, except that day in Lille when it was out of tune, I thought, with the spirit about us.
“Let’s put the bitter taste out of our mouth to-day,” I said.
Fortune made his sheep-face, saluted behind his ear, and said, “Every inch a soldier—I don’t think!”
III
It was then we bumped straight into Wickham Brand, who was between a small boy and girl, holding his hands, while a tall girl of sixteen or so, with a yellow pig-tail slung over her shoulder, walked alongside, talking vivaciously of family experiences under German rule. Pierre Nesle was on the other side of her.