Six empty barrels stood on the main dining table of the best restaurant in St. Denis. They supported two large chairs, which supported one small chair. Lambert sat in this chair and emptied his wine over Finlayson, seated far below. “That was a Low Story,” he said. “The chair find bloody old Finlayson guilty of telling a Low Story, the bastard.”
“All right,” Finlayson said easily, licking the drops off his upper lip. “Tell you another. Man walking down quiet street, gets taken short—”
“Heard it!” The other pilots sprawled, bloated with food and tipsy with drink, around the table. Some of them started throwing bread at Finlayson.
“Another story, then,” Finlayson said. “Man falls down at stag party and breaks his cock.”
“Heard it!” The squadron booed him.
“Christ, that’s old,” Kimberley said.
“My problem,” said Finlayson, drinking, “is I don’t know any new dirty jokes.”
“Your problem is you don’t know any old jokes,” Dangerfield boomed. “Your problem is you have absolutely no sense of humor.”
“I deny that!” Finlayson cried. “I categorically repudiate that!”
“There you are, that proves it,” Rogers declared. “Boring and pompous.”
“Found guilty,” Lambert ruled from on high. “Mr. Woodruffe will pass sentence.”
“Relax and enjoy your problem,” the adjutant decreed.
Lambert emptied his glass over Finlayson again. “Perhaps you’ll know better next time,” he said. “Next problem.”
“My problem is I can’t see straight,” Rogers said. “Seriously, chaps, you all look a bit drunk to me.”
“You’re boozed, Rogers,” Lambert told him.
“Who’s that?” Rogers closed one eye and peered up. “Is that God?” The bread-throwers turned their attention on Lambert. “I always knew God was on our side,” Rogers mumbled, “but I never knew He was so bloody ugly.”
Lambert stood up. “Being God,” he said, “and seeing as this is Tuesday, I shall now make water.” He began unbuttoning.
The owner of the restaurant came in. “Non, non, messieurs!” he pleaded. Lambert sat down. “Good news,” he said. “We’ve found someone who really has a problem.” They cheered, and threw bread at the haggard Frenchman. Lambert tried to douse him with wine. “In nomine Patris—” he began when the street door burst open, and Killion rushed in. “I found them!” he shouted.
“You forgot to stutter,” Rogers said. “Go out and come in again.”
Six sulky girls sidled through the door. “I f-f-f-found them,” Killion bragged, “in a b-b-b-brothel.”
The restaurant owner had turned white. “Mon dieu!” he gasped. “Ah! Ça non! Quand même!” He rushed over to Killion and shook him, spitting demands.
“I s-s-s-say,” Killion said as he rattled back and forth. “This is f-f-f-f-u-n.” The girls slouched moodily into the room and found places to sit. “We shall now sing one chorus of ‘Praise God, from Whom all Blessings Flow,’” Lambert announced. Woodruffe rose and led the singing. The girls found themselves glasses and bottles and began drinking. The Frenchman slapped Killion hard on both cheeks and ran out into the street. Dangerfield selected the thinnest girl and began dancing a waltz to the hymn-tune. Killion stood there hiccupping until Lambert threw wine over him; then he woke up and went to the doorway and started calling out.
The singing ended. Killion came back in. “I found these ch-ch-chaps in the b-b-b-brothel, too,” he said. Three elderly French accordionists eased sideways through the door, smiled nervously, and played conflicting chords. “Music!” Dangerfield shouted happily, and kissed them. “Allez, allez!” The eldest one wheezed uncertainly into a waltz. The others listened hard, launched themselves, and put on speed until they caught up with him. Soon all the girls were dancing. Lambert conducted them on high with an open bottle, sprinkling the couples as they passed beneath. The owner came in with a gendarme.
“Bonjour, gents,” Lambert called, “vous avez une réservation?”
The gendarme came over to the table and began a long address to Lambert, who listened politely commenting “Peutêtre,” from time to time. The restaurant owner went around the room, trying to separate the dancers. He grabbed Killion and shouted at him, spitting heavily. Killion put down his glass and used the Frenchman’s necktie as a towel to mop his face.
The man trembled with rage, leaning slightly forward because of the strain on his collar. Then he slapped Killion hard on the face and took a pace back and kicked him in the groin. Killion collapsed, screaming; the music faltered, stopped, and started up again in a noisy polka. Kimberley left his girl and knocked the Frenchman down. Lambert leaned over and sprinkled wine on both bodies. “Ashes to ashes,” he intoned. “A tooth for a tooth.”
The gendarme hurried around the table, drawing his truncheon as he came. Dangerfield followed and, as the gendarme raised his truncheon, reached up and tugged it away from him. The gendarme whirled around and swung a punch. Dangerfield dodged; the Frenchman stumbled over Killion and lurched into one of the girls. She kicked him on the leg and also knocked his hat off. He got away from her and looked for Dangerfield. The French girl came up behind him and kicked his backside. The gendarme saw Dangerfield and flung a chair at him.
It went through a window.
The band faltered, took a breath, and plunged into a two-step. The gendarme stood bewildered for a moment, and then ran into the street, where for some time he could be heard blowing his whistle. But he did not come back, and soon they were dancing again. Discarded clothing began to litter the floor. The band was fairly drunk, and the tunes tended to overlap now. A small crowd gathered in the street and was watching through the shattered window. Church came up from the cellar with his arms full of bottles, and handed them out to the spectators. “Plenty more downstairs,” he assured them. “They’ve been hiding it, you know. But I found it.” Killion got to his feet, kicked the groaning restaurant owner, and took a bottle from Church.
Woodruffe found Rogers, and shook his hand. “Dudders, old boy,” he said. “Don’t you think we ought to be toddling off? Otherwise the chaps might start getting into mischief.”
“Can’t go yet,” Rogers objected. “These girls still have to be stuffed. Besides, we’re not all here. Dickinson and Gabriel haven’t come back.”
“Where are they?”
“Don’t know. Went off on their own.”
“Damn nuisance.”
“Never mind, Woody. Relax and enjoy your problem.”
“I hope you’re sober enough to drive us all home, that’s all.”
Rogers studied him curiously, “Funny thing, Woody,” he said. “I can see your lips moving, but I can’t hear what you say.”
“That’s because you’re absolutely stinko, Dudley.”
“I won’t deny it, I am a bit drunk.”
Dangerfield danced past and called out: “That nasty frog is beginning to come round. He just tried to bite my ankle.”
“We ought to do something about our genial host,” the adjutant said.
“Look here, I’m coming down,” bawled Lambert. “I’ve been making several very funny speeches and no bugger has laughed, so I’m coming down.”
“We could put him up there,” Rogers suggested.
“What, the high seat? Not very safe, is it?”
“Best place for him. Better tie his hands, or he might do himself an injury.”
They bound the restaurant owner, who moaned feebly and threshed about a bit; then with Lambert’s aid they hoisted him to the high seat. They got down and looked at him. He swore so violently that he nearly fell off; then he froze. Then he was sick all down his front. “Definitely the best place,” Rogers said.
Twenty minutes later the band had been augmented by violins and drums, and several new girls had joined the party. Church was making regular trips to the cellar. The girls from the brothel had taken over a small back room. Rogers found Killion and congratulated him on his work. “Don’t get left out, old chap,” he urged. He tried to slap Killion on the shoulder and missed, and ended up on the floor. “Make sure you get your share,” he advised.
“Don’t worry, D-Dudley,” Killion said. “I h-h-h-had mine at the b-b-b-brothel. All s-s-s-six of them.”
Rogers rolled his eyes. He found himself looking up the skirts of a girl dancing by, and he rolled across the floor in an attempt to keep up with her. The dancers kicked him and trod on him until he got to his knees and crawled away.
A few minutes later the lights went out. “Boche bombers,” said Woodruffe complacently. “Hit the electricity works again. Now we can all go home.” He trod carefully, searching for pilots in the occasional glow of cigarettes. “Is that you, Kimberley? The lights have all gone out. Don’t you think we might get started?” Kimberley grunted as he took off his pants. “I am,” he said.
Woodruffe found a bottle and sat down. A couple of minutes later a soft glow appeared in the cellar doorway. Church tip-toed into the room, carrying a biscuit-tin full of candles. He tittered nervously as he tried to see through the glare of the flames. His sweaty, unshaven face gleamed like wet chalk.
“Christ, Church, you look like the Spirit of Syphilis Yet to Come,” Lambert said. Church shook with silent mirth and dropped the tin. All the candles went out. “Bloody good job,” someone said. “I don’t need any bloody beacons to guide my way.” Eventually a few candles were lit, the band started playing, the couples uncoupled and went off to the back room, and the party went on.
Woodruffe slouched around, looking for Rogers. He noticed that the floor was running with wine. Over in one corner Church was systematically emptying bottles. The dancers sent up a spray of froth and droplets. Woodruffe turned his head sideways and dimly saw Rogers sitting under the table, cross-legged, smoking.
“Come in out of the rain,” Rogers said. “Bags of room in here.” Woodruffe crawled in.
“Far be it from me to play the killjoy, Dudders,” he said. “Is that a bottle you have there? Thanks.”
“Good party, eh?”
Woodruffe drank thoughtfully. “Church is behind all this,” he said, pointing at the floor. “Church is raining booze.”
“Trouble with this lot,” Rogers said, “don’t know when to stop.”
“I always said, right from the start—and you’ll bear me out, Dudley—I always said it would end in tears.”
“Right.”
At that moment the police smashed down the door.
The struggle was messy. A dozen policemen rushed into the room and tried to herd everyone into the corners. One of them slipped on the sopping floor, cannoned into the table, and brought down the pyramid of barrels and chairs which still supported the restaurant owner. He fell badly, unable to use his arms to protect himself. In the excitement Church hit a policeman with a bottle. Abruptly the atmosphere changed, and the police began knocking people about.
The pilots were drunk and half-naked; they got no help from the French girls, who simply screamed and tried to get out of the window. The band, too drunk to understand, began to play the Marseillaise. More pilots ran out of the back room, aroused by the uproar, and joined in the fistfight.
Only Woodruffe kept his head.
“Candles, Dudley,” he shouted in his ear. “Put out the candles.”
They crawled from under the table and knocked over every candle they could see. Soon the room was no longer dim but gloomy. The fighting became wilder and more confused. One policeman accidentally hit another, who fell to his knees, cursing. He was evidently their leader, for most of them stopped. Woodruffe scrambled toward the splintered door and croaked: “Everybody get out!” Nobody heard him. Rogers bellowed: “Get out, get out, get out!”
This started a scrambling rush to the door. Woodruffe was vaguely puzzled by the passivity of the police. One or two lashed out, but most did nothing. He held the broken door and shoved people into the street. Still nobody tried to stop them, or come after them. It was too good to be true. Perhaps the leader was too badly hurt to give orders …
He joined the tail-end of the rush and slammed the door behind him. The night was ten times blacker than he expected. He heard a confusion of puzzled shouts ahead and stumbled over something. His wet feet slithered on a wooden ramp which sounded hollowly underneath. Woodruffe paused, suspicious, yet too muzzy to decide.
“Get on!” rasped someone. He scrambled up the ramp and fell over a body. Behind him the tailgate went up with a bang, and through his face he felt the vibrations of an engine. Then the truck accelerated over the cobbles into a violent right-hand turn, and the squadron found itself thrown hard against the side of the police patrol-wagon.
The truck raced along bad roads for about five miles, crashing over potholes and making heavy weather of the gear changes. The pilots sorted themselves out, and tried to find something to hang on to. The inside was black, dirty and deafening. Woodruffe shouted a question which even he could not hear. After that he concentrated on saving his battered skin.
The truck finally swerved off the road and jounced across pine roots before it stalled with a jerk in the middle of a little grove. The pilots cautiously relaxed their grip and let their muscles slacken. Nobody spoke. Chains rattled and pins grated. The tailgate fell with a bang. A dark figure took off a police helmet and wiped his brow. “I think we’ve shaken them off,” he said. It was Dickinson.
“Can we get out, Dicky?” Woodruffe asked.
“By all means. Stretch your legs, have a smoke. I’m out of cigarettes myself. Got some snuff, though.”
Groaning and wincing, Goshawk Squadron fell clumsily on to the springy turf.
“I’ll take a pinch, if I may,” Dangerfield said. “Head seems a spot thick.”
Dickinson offered his snuff. “You didn’t get beaten up by those savage cops, I hope,” he said.
“To tell the truth, I’m not one hundred percent sure whether I did or not,” Dangerfield said. “I wasn’t paying much attention.” He sniffed vigorously.
“Look here, Dicky,” Rogers said, “what on earth are you doing wearing that ridiculous hat? And driving this filthy truck? I take it you were driving.”
“None other. I got her up to seventy-five, too. Not bad, considering I had the handbrake on all the way.”
“So that’s what that funny smell is,” Lambert said. “I thought it was Church.”
“I keep seeing great big purple Catherine Wheels,” Dangerfield said. “Purple with orange spots.” He sneezed hard. “Ah, that’s better,” he said damply.
“I thought we were done for,” Kimberley said. “I thought we were all going to end up in some manky frog clink.”
“Dicky rescued us from the jaws of the Bastille,” Richards said. “How did you do it? Damned lucky you came along when you did.”
“Actually, I’d been hanging around the street for quite some time. Those coppers had been assembling, you see, so I lurked in the shadows and watched, and when the Top Cop turned up he told them all to get in the Black Maria, then they backed it up to the front door and they all charged inside.”
“I remember that now,” Lambert said. “They didn’t even knock. I mean, we could have been doing anything in there.”
“I thought I ought to do something,” Dickinson said, “but I couldn’t think what. The driver was still in the cab, you see, so I couldn’t let the tires down.”
“What?” Woodruffe interrupted. “You were going to let the tires down?”
“That was my first idea.”
“Ah.” The adjutant opened his mouth, then closed it. “Never mind,” he said.
“So what I did was, I got some stones and threw them at the driver.”
“Quite right,” Lambert said. “When in doubt, always stone the police.”
“Well, it worked,” Dickinson said defensively. “He jumped out and came galloping down the street, waving a sort of club. I remember he was an awfully big chap. Big, but not fast.”
“Like an elephant,” Kimberley suggested.
“Elephants are bloody swift,” Finlayson declared. “I’d like to see you outrun an elephant.”
“Shut up,” Woodruffe said.
“Well, I nipped down a little alley. There was a doorway on one side, so I got in there. I still had a stone in my hand, and the moment the bobby turned into the alley I threw this stone up the other end. He thought it was me, and he put on a bit of a spurt, and as he went by I tripped him up.”
“With your foot?” Rogers asked.
“Well, yes. I mean, it was all I had.”
“Just trying to get the picture, old boy.”
“Walking sticks are best,” Kimberley said. “Walking sticks are bloody lethal.”
“Shut up,” Woodruffe said. “So down he went.”
“Oh, rather. He came the most appalling cropper. I think he knocked himself out, or something. Anyway, I removed his belt and pulled his pants down and tied the legs in a knot, just to make sure. Then I came back, just as you chaps were pouring out. Fortunately the engine was still running.”
“Remarkable, Dicky,” the adjutant said. “I honestly never thought you had it in you. First-class performance.”
“It did come off rather well, didn’t it? That bit about throwing the stone up the alley to make him rush off after it, I got that from a detective story. The business with the pants was my idea. I must admit—Good God, what’s that dreadful noise?”
They turned toward a choking, bubbling death-rattle. “It’s only Church being sick,” Finlayson said. “D’you think you could drive a little slower for the rest of the way, Dicky? My ass is raw.”
“Now that I have the handbrake off,” Dickinson said, “I think it’ll be less of a struggle. I suppose we can go back now?”
“Why ever not?” Dangerfield asked in surprise.
“Well, everybody did get out? You are all here?”
A simple count answered that question. Killion was missing.
A minority was in favor of abandoning Killion and going home, but the others were persuaded by Rogers. “Killion got hold of the whores and the band,” he pointed out. “Whatever you think about Killion, you must admit that it was a damn good band.”
They got into the truck and Dickinson drove cautiously back toward St. Denis. When they were still two miles away his headlights caught a half-naked figure trying to scramble through a hedge. He pulled up alongside. “B-b-b-b-bugger off, you w-w-w-w-wogs,” Killion called. “Ooooh!” he added with feeling as a bramble raked his shoulder.
“Killion, it’s us.” Dickinson got down and held back the prickly branches while Killion blundered out, his lips trip-hammering away at the opening consonants of all the swear words he knew. It turned out that Killion had been in the cellar when the police came, and he escaped through a trapdoor into the street. As he was wearing only pants and shoes he knew that he would soon be picked up in the town, so he got away through alleys and into the country. It was sheer luck that he had chosen the same road as the truck.
“Now, perhaps, we can all go home,” said Finlayson.
“N-n-n-n-no, not y-y-y-y-yet.” Killion shook his head emphatically.
“Who the hell else?”
“G-g-g-g-”
“Gabriel,” said Rogers disgustedly. “I’d completely forgotten about Gabriel. Where the devil is he?”
“I know,” said Killion.
Dickinson stopped outside a Catholic church on the outskirts of St. Denis. Killion and Woodruffe were in the cab with him. “Are you sure?” he asked. Killion nodded. “He s-s-said he’d b-b-b-be here.”
Woodruffe said: “I can see a little light. See? In the corner of that high window.”
They walked through the churchyard. It was bitterly cold, and Killion wore Dickinson’s tunic. Dickinson, in shirt sleeves, shuddered. Faintly they heard music.
The church door was not locked. Woodruffe pushed it open, and the organized moan of pleading chords reached out to them with a smell of cold masonry and dusty matting and faintly clinging incense. They walked in, feeling their way along the matting: the church was even darker than the night. From the middle they could see, by the limited and spherical aura of two candles, Gabriel’s large and lumpy head, up on high beyond the choir-stalls, outlined against the soaring stalagmites of organ pipes. He leaned slightly to the right, and a high trickle of icy notes began to feel its way toward them.
“Has he been up to this all night?” Dickinson whispered. Again Killion nodded.
Woodruffe took a deep breath. “He really does have a problem,” he said; but he too spoke softly. “All the same, we can’t stay here.”
They stood, feeling the groan of Gabriel’s chords vibrate through their teeth, and tasting the pure crystal of his wandering notes. At last, when there was a brief pause, Woodruffe cleared his throat.
Gabriel turned his head and stared. He was utterly calm, waiting for the interrupter to explain himself.
“We’re going back now,” Woodruffe called. “If you want to come with us.” His voice resounded and redounded, searching into every cold corner.
Gabriel looked sharply in their direction. Then he took his hands from the organ and looked all over the keyboards as if to make quite sure that all the keys and stops were there. He snorted quietly: an unemotional noise; a punctuation mark. He pinched out one candle and took the other to light his way down.
Nobody spoke on the way back to the truck.
“Now can we please go bloody home?” Finlayson said.
“I think we might,” Dickinson said, yawning.
“You do know, of course, that you’re pointing in the wrong direction,” Gabriel stated.
Woodruffe stared. “You mean that’s the way back to camp? Back through the town?”
“Unless you want to make a fifty-mile detour.”
“We can’t just drive back through the middle of St. Denis,” Rogers said. “They’ll lynch us.”
“I’m not so sure,” Richards said. “It’s the last thing they’d expect, you know. Besides, I don’t fancy going fifty miles the wrong way at this time of night.”
“Church has just been sick again,” Finlayson said, “partly over me.”
“You’re absolutely sure, Gabriel?” Dickinson asked.
Gabriel gave him a short, flat look. “Yes,” he said.
“All right,” Dickinson said. “Only you don’t know what’s been going on.”
“Let’s get started, for God’s sake,” Kimberley growled. “I don’t care if I sleep in camp or the Bastille. There’s damn-all to choose between them, anyway.”
They got into the truck and drove gingerly through the town. They had to pass the restaurant in order to reach the right road; but as it happened nobody even looked at them. The restaurant was on fire.
“Not a happy day for our genial host,” Lambert said. They scrambled to the back to see the fire brigade squirting water on the flames. “He must be feeling pretty discouraged.”
“I expect he did it for the insurance,” Dangerfield said. “Some chaps are like that, you know. Completely irresponsible.” They turned a corner, and the scene vanished. Almost immediately the truck came to a stop. “Police,” guessed Finlayson. “Now we’re for it.” But it was Woodruffe who came around from the cab.
“You can drive me home, Dudley,” he said. “We’ve found your car.”
“Don’t have a car,” Rogers said. “Do I?”
“Well, you drove it here. You might as well drive it back.”
“I can’t,” said Rogers. “I’m too drunk.”
“But you must. It has your checkbook in it, and we still haven’t paid for tonight’s meal.”
“All right.” Rogers got down. The truck rumbled away. With some difficulty he got the car to start and drove slowly along the middle of the road. He gripped the wheel tightly and held his face quite close to the windscreen. They were in top gear, but still moving slowly.
“We’ll never get home at this rate, Dudley,” Woodruffe said.
“These hills are a lot steeper than they look,” Rogers said. “It’ll be all right when we go down the other side.”
After a few minutes Woodruffe said: “You have your foot on the brake, Dudley.” Rogers released it, and the limousine bounded forward. He relaxed and sat back. “Dickinson has the same trouble, sometimes,” he said.
A few miles later, Rogers asked what Gabriel had been doing in the church.
“Playing the organ. Rather well, too.”
“You mean he played the bloody organ all night?”
“Yes.”
Rogers frowned. “Odd thing to do.”
“Yes.”
“Sounds as if friend Gabriel has a bit of a problem.”
“Perhaps. On the other hand, he seems to be able to relax and enjoy it.”
They caught up with the truck and followed it back to camp. It was four in the morning when they arrived, and the place was alive with men taking down tents and loading stores and checking supplies. Woodruffe jumped out of the car in a panic and looked for Woolley.
He found him sitting in his canvas chair beside a brazier, drinking Guinness with the chief armorer. Woolley gave the adjutant a single glance and then looked away. “Get dressed,” he ordered. “We’re moving back to the Front. Fricourt. Takeoff at dawn.”
“But they can’t,” Woodruffe said automatically. “They’re—” He turned and looked behind him. Killion and Richards, half-undressed and filthy, were carrying Church; his feet dragging in the mud. Behind came Kimberley, holding his head, and Finlayson, barefoot and wrapped in a blanket. Lambert, limping badly, wore a French police helmet, and Dangerfield was wiping mud from his eyes: he had just fallen down. Only Gabriel and Dickinson were fully dressed and erect. As he watched, Lambert tripped over his own stumbling feet.
The adjutant turned away in shame and disgust. But Woolley was no longer there. His chair was there, and beside it his empty bottle, but Woolley had gone. The pilots dragged themselves over and blinked painfully at the tableau, harshly delineated by the pressure lamps. They shuffled into a semicircle and squinted at Woodruffe.
“We’re off to Fricourt,” he said miserably. “Takeoff at dawn.”
Out of the darkness came a squat metal canister. It bounced and rolled between them and lay in the shadow of the chair. Some of them leaned forward and tried to see what it was. The thunderflash exploded with a stunning ferocity that shattered their jagged nerves and twisted their sagging faces with terror. They were home again.