COWDIE, THE "SPARE PART"
"REVEILLE! Show a leg there!" shouted Corporal Yap, one morning, as he went round the tents and hangars about the aerodrome near Contalmaison.
The sleepy air-mechanics of the Royal Flying Corps in the field opened their eyes and yawned, showing no immediate disposition to rise, for the fatigue of the previous day's work had scarcely passed away.
"Did you hear me, Cowdie, you, 'spare part.' Get up there smartly. I shan't call you again. If you're not on parade in fifteen minutes you'll be for the high jump."
"'S all right, Corporal," shouted the "spare part," trying to wriggle out of his roll of blankets and commencing to sing in a doleful monotone:
"Oh, it' snice to get up in the mornin'
But it' snicer to stop in bed..."
Corporal Yap turned and went off on his errand, shaking up a few more "spare parts," and threatening everybody more or less with "the high jump"; which, of course, meant an appearance before the Commanding Officer of the Squadron.
As soon as his woolly head had disappeared behind the flap of the tent door, Cowdie rolled back into his blankets for another minute-and-a-half's nap. As he lay there he looked for all the world like an Egyptian mummy, for he had a peculiar way of rolling himself up in his blankets at night which gave him that appearance. But although his eyes were closed his ears were wide awake for the soft, stealthy tread of the orderly N.C.O., who he knew would be sure to return in about the space of ninety seconds to try to find who had left his warning unheeded.
Cowdie, though a spare part about the aerodrome, was quite a genius in his way. His senses were so acute that the others said he could hear the "footsteps" of a snake in the grass, so they dubbed him the "listening post" and made him sleep next the door of the tent, so that he could always give the alarm in case of need.