On the right of the British line

Excerpt

"The C.O. wants to see you."

"What for?" I asked.

"I don't know, but he is in the orderly room."

It was the adjutant who was speaking, and his manner led me to think there was something in the wind which he did not like to tell me. I left the mess, and a few moments later I was standing before the C.O.

"I have just received a telegram from the War Office; you are included in the next reinforcements for France."

"I am glad, sir."

"You've only forty-eight hours' notice. You are to report at Southampton at 4. P.M. the day after to-morrow."

"Very good, sir."

"Well, as your time is so short, you had better go home and get things ready. The adjutant will have your papers ready for you within half an hour."

"Very good, sir."

The C.O. stood up, and in his cordial military manner, which seemed to take you straight from the orderly room into the mess, held out his hand to bid me good-bye.

There is quite a difference between a C.O. in the orderly room and a C.O. in the mess. I mean those C.O.'s who are made of the right stuff, and our C.O. was certainly one of them.

In the orderly room his presence keeps you at arm's length and makes you feel that you want to keep clicking your heels and coming to the salute. You are conscious of the terrible crime you would commit if you permitted your body to relax from the position of attention; your conversational powers are restricted; you fancy you have a voice at the back of your head, saying:

"Don't argue, listen; digest, and get out."

It's a feeling which does not make the orderly room a very pleasant place to go to; yet you have an instinctive feeling of confidence.

The same C.O. in the mess, however, is a different man and creates quite a different atmosphere. In the orderly room he holds you from him; in the mess he pulls you to him. You have the feeling that you can sit in an armchair, with your feet on the coal-box, and talk to him round the corner of your newspaper, like the very ordinary human being he really is.

"Well, good-bye, and good luck." We shook hands, I came to the salute, and the next moment I found myself once more outside the orderly room door.

Have you ever experienced the feeling? Yes, thousands have, for the despatch of reinforcing officers to the front in this abrupt manner was taking place daily throughout the empire. You remember the feeling quite well; amazement at its suddenness; eagerness for the adventure; the prospect of the home parting; the sudden change in the daily routine; the mystery of the future—all swirling through your brain in a jumble of thoughts.

Then the hasty despatch of telegrams, the examination of time-tables, and the feverish packing of a kit which has grown to enormous proportions and hopelessly defies the regulations for weight.

An hour later and I had made a quick sale of my bicycle, distributed odds and ends of hut furniture which I should no longer need, and was sitting in a motor-car, outside the mess, grabbing at hands which were outstretched in farewell.

Those who lived in camp at Fovant can remember what an uninteresting, dreary place it seemed at the time, and how we cursed its monotony....