“’Ere’s Old Barbarity on the ramp again with some of ’is lady friends, ’oo don’t like concentration camps. Wish they’d visit ours. Pinewood’s a married man. He’d know how to be’ave!”
“Well, I ain’t goin’ to amuse my prisoner alone. ’E’s gettin’ ’omesick,” cried Copper. “One of you thieves read out what’s vexin’ Old Barbarity an’ ’is ’arem these days. You’d better listen, Burjer, because, afterwards, I’m goin’ to fall out an’ perpetrate those nameless barbarities all over you to keep up the reputation of the British Army.”
From that English weekly, to bar out which a large and perspiring staff of Press censors toiled seven days of the week at Cape Town, did Pinewood of the Reserve read unctuously excerpts of the speeches of the accredited leaders of His Majesty’s Opposition. The night-picket arrived in the middle of it, but stayed entranced without paying any compliments, till Pinewood had entirely finished the leading article, and several occasional notes.
“Gentlemen of the jury,” said Alf Copper, hitching up what war had left to him of trousers—“you’ve ’eard what ’e’s been fed up with. Do you blame the beggar? ’Cause I don’t! … Leave ’im alone, McBride. He’s my first and only cap-ture, an’ I’m goin’ to walk ’ome with ’im, ain’t I, Ducky? … Fall in, Burjer. It’s Bermuda, or Umballa, or Ceylon for you—and I’d give a month’s pay to be in your little shoes.”
As not infrequently happens, the actual moving off the ground broke the prisoner’s nerve. He stared at the tinted hills round him, gasped and began to struggle—kicking, swearing, weeping, and fluttering all together.
“Pore beggar—oh pore, pore beggar!” said Alf, leaning in on one side of him, while Pinewood blocked him on the other.
“Let me go! Let me go! Mann, I tell you, let me go——”
“’E screams like a woman!” said McBride. “They’ll ’ear ’im five miles off.”
“There’s one or two ought to ’ear ’im—in England,” said Copper, putting aside a wildly waving arm.
“Married, ain’t ’e?” said Pinewood. “I’ve seen ’em go like this before—just at the last. ’Old on, old man, No one’s goin’ to ’urt you.”