I sat down again on the bale. I was surprised to find how fast the time had gone, for my relief arrived a few minutes later. We talked for more than half an hour, and then I turned into bed. I rolled up in the blankets and started to read. I was directly under the light, and I had a magazine to finish. I read and read, feeling utterly unlike sleep. I read until I yawned my head off. The heavy air and monotonous noises made me drowsy, and still I could not sleep.
The picket that had relieved me was relieved in his turn. The magazine was finished. I threw it aside and lay back, yet I felt less like sleep than ever. Overhead the stars had circled half-way round the sky. They were less bright, so I knew the moon had come up. Surely it must be midnight, said I.
Just then there came much movement overhead, and a turning of winches and a roaring of cables, and I knew we weighed anchor for the last time. Up jumped the pickets crying, “We’re off, boys, we’re off”—and one ran up the ladder like a monkey and climbed on to the upper deck. Presently he poked his head down into the light. “We’re off all right: it’s dinkum this time!” The screws began to turn, and the boat began very gently to throb. The movement woke up the horses and set them shuffling in the stalls, rattling with new energy the head-chains. I lay on the broad of my back and stared straight up.
“Gunner Lake, Gunner Lake, beyond those lights Azrael arises and spreads out his wings. At dawn he flies wide for his harvest, to return at even with much booty. The merry of to-day will be with him, and the downhearted; the blasphemous and the pure will be there: here and there he will have flown, picking up without choice and design. Aye, Gunner Lake, even you may be of that silent company. Is that why you toss here to-night, and woo sleep so vainly? Go, rest—what matters it? Let the Book of Death be opened wide; and be your name writ there, add to it a bold AMEN.”
CHAPTER IX
THE LANDING IN GALLIPOLI
I ended by waking up quite late in the morning—not only ended by waking up late, in fact, but even by forgetting the undertaking ahead of us. I discovered myself on my back, looking through the open hatchway at the sky, where a pleasant breeze found a way down, and drove off the musty odours of manure and pressed lucerne. For half a minute maybe I lay thus, thinking of nothing much, and hearing in a far-off way the shuffling of the horses. Then of a sudden the business before us came into my brain like a thunderclap; and I read a fresh meaning into the scene. Daylight had crept nearly over the sky, and the deck above was full of men come up for the morning wash, with towels about their necks and soap in their hands. Instead of washing, all looked in one direction. The landing, of course.
Up went my head, and I listened hard for the guns, but not a sound I caught. I did not wait long after that. In three minutes my toilet was finished, and up the ladder two rungs at a time I went, to find myself on the hatch top and a big crowd of fellows all round me.
The first thing I noticed was the stiff breeze. The air was full of salt. I slid down from the uncertain perch into the crowd, and made a way to the rail. Considering the breeze the sea moved very little, and the weather gave promise of becoming fine and clear. However, it was not light enough to see properly the horizon, and after a long look round I had distinguished nothing. I came across Wilkinson and Lancashire.