WAS HE DOING HIS BIT?

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 6, Issue 288, 29 June 1917, Page 2 (Supplement)

WAS HE DOING HIS BIT?

By \.\ OFFICER OX LEAVE. The captain sat in his office and wrote a letter. It was a ni-e office, witn piles cf Army books and files of forms neatly arranged on the table covered with clean brown paper, and a fine arrav of pens and pencils, and the blacii and the red ink as carefully set out as a battalion on parade. Outside, the windows rattled the traffic of the base, but it disturbed the captain not at all, for ever since he had joined up a twelve-month ago he had been emploved in that Pleasant office in that peaceful French town.

The captain was writing to a girl friend of his. "Of course it is a great satisfaction to feel that one is out here doing one's bit " he had written, when he heard a ribald laugh at his elbow. He turned quickly. Thece was old Dickie, whom he had not seen for eighteen months, standing ai his side, but such a disreputable looking object that for a moment he did not recognise him. He was unshaven and so besmeared with mud that littte pellets were even clinging to the bristles of his chin. The skirts of his tunic were torn, there was a jagged gash in the knee of his breeches, and his puttees, heavily caked with mud, were badly rent and all sagging. He looked so grotesquely inappropriate in that nattv office that the captain could not forbear tc cast a self-satisfied i-lanc* over his own Immaculate uniform and glossy brown field boots

Old Dickie was laughing with a glint of his white teeth. He nut one muddy finger on the letter spread out on the table hit "In t k l now ;,J' ou ' re not doing your bit. old thing!" he said genially M „;; hat d 0 - vou mean?" replied the '-You're doin* a bit, but not vour hit. was the answer. about said the captain rather ruffled. Ive heen out here for a vear ve only been home on leave three times; I work on an average ten day, Sundays included; "How old are you?" said Dickie "Same age as yourself—26. " But "Fit." "You know I'm perfectly fit. As i was raying " ''Ever done any drill?'' "No. You see the Armv was plad to avail itself of my business abilitv The experience I gained at the bank has been simply invaluable. I always thought you were ill-advised to go into the Blankshires. Fine regiment and very gallant of vou and all that, but your business talents were simply lost old man as a toot-slogging infantry subaltern •Now—|—"

Jhen you don't know what it is like getting rap on a cold winter's morning, shaving by candle-light and drilling dull recruits in the unwind? You don't know the discomfort of dirty billets, of long route marches of endless hours of boredom en the rifle range? You don't know the impossibilities of living on an infantry subaltern's pav?" "Well I suppose I don ; t. But I don t mind telling you " "Ever been in the trenches'" "Xo, but "

Then you don't know what it is to live like a beast in a hole in the ground? You have never experienced what utter weariness of mind and body that comes io a man at stand-to in the early hours of the morning? You have never been sickened by the foul odours that dawn brings out of the ground' ion have never gone out into Xo Mans land on patrol, with vour heart in your boots, terrified * no* of death, but of the unknown that peoples every shadow cast l>v the Verey lights? You have never takon a fatigue parly out at night over roads swept by machine-guns, across broken country under shrapnel? But perhaps you have never been under fire?

"Well, there was an .air raid at the station here, but, as a matter of fact, I was on leave at the time "

"And of course you've never been over the top, never felt your heart thrill at the roar of the intensive bombardment, and warm to the splendid bravery of the men yooi lead? You have never seen the blood and the mud and the horror of a show like the Somme. or got that lump in your throat when you looked on your men. what was left of them, worn out and dirty like me? You've been out of the way of death, so you can hardly be expected to know how glorious life is!"

The captain lifted his head and looked at his friend, and noticed how pale and tired he seemed. "It strikes me you think I am a funk, Dickie,'" he said. "Oh. no." answered the other. "only thoughtless and rather blind.' "But," the captain went on ignoring the interruption. "I am at the orders of the Army, and if tliev want me for the firing line they will send for me—l am quite ready to go." "Bid you read the story of the death of Lofttis Jones. V.C.?'' asked the other. "He might have pleaded many things so as not to risk his life: ho might have accepted the cccr of the other destroyers to help him; wounded as he was. there was no pjFsible obligation for him t? g to the bridge of the Shark and fight the Inst pin, But ho didn't "ait lor orders: he derided for himself."

-Yes, but " "Are yon indispensable in this job of yours?"

"I think my chief is pleased with 1!,, ' : I ioinod ns a lieutenant and I fc'ot my third star three months nso. And I tell von again that if thewant me for the firing line the-. will take me."

"1 am told." his friend replied, "that yon do your work extremely well: but you haven't answered mv nuestion. Are von indisnensable? Do you honcrtlv think that an ridman. a disabled officer, could nol lake >•(•>, ir plpen?" "I tell you once more that if flmv believe th.it to he the ease it j s un to the auihoritics to replace me'" ".\'o. it isn't old pmn." answerel Dickie, "and I'll tell von whv. No man wants his organisation dirtm'>-

ed. 'arid 'I hm. riorfo.rtly sire thai your chier mlsvhi be considerably I annovod to lose (t-p services of nirh ! an able and hard-working fellow a-1 yourself. lint IMs is a question in (he first instance r.el between yoi: and your chief. hit between y< and your con. s ! ior"v». Tlavo von r\ asked to he releised?"' "I can'' ?av 1 have!" he replied with bowed head. "Then you I.no<" what to dr>. Ai :

r-wember my words— when you ara up against it, it's riot hard to die!'' N hen the captain looked up the ">ee was empty, and he found had fallen asleep over his unfinished !e't n r. And then he remembered that Dickie had been killed at Sen-* :n July.