Chapter 3 STONEWAY ENLISTS

Mr. Randall pulled a wry face when he heard of Kenneth's impulsive action. At the dinner-table he spoke his mind.

"This won't do, you know. You are both certain to obtain commissions. I don't object to your serving as Tommies for a week or two, for the sake of example, you know; but I'm not going to allow you to let yourself down permanently, Harry. Your friend, of course, can do as he pleases."

"I've promised, Father," said Harry.

"Promised what, may I ask?"

"To share and share alike with the men."

"Fiddlesticks! It won't do. Good gracious, what are we coming to? The whole social order will be destroyed. You'll succeed me at the head of this business, when you've settled down and are a trifle less scatter-brained than you are now. How in the world do you expect to maintain the proper relation between employer and employed if you put yourself on a level with the hands? Look at it logically. Take it that I myself had been idiot enough to do as you've done, and put myself in the position to be ordered about by some factory hand who happened to be a sergeant, or some young whipper-snapper fresh from school who happened to have got a commission: what would become of my authority, I should like to know? How could I maintain control over my workmen? Do look at it reasonably. It's preposterous."

The idea of portly Mr. Randall as a Tommy was almost too much for the boys' gravity. But Harry answered meekly:

"Well, we've enlisted over a hundred men, and there'll be more to-morrow. That's what you wanted, Dad, isn't it? You won't have to close down now."

"But I didn't want my son to consort with a lot of roughs--socialists, too, to a man, by gad! You can't associate with such fellows without getting coarsened, and besides, as I said before, it's the principle of the thing--the principle of social order, caste, call it what you like. Destroy caste, and you ruin old England. Come now, I'll see the colonel, and he'll arrange to get you gazetted to the regiment. You'll then be in a natural position of authority over my men, and I'll be proud to think that my works has furnished a contingent to the New Army, with my own son as one of the officers."

"You ought to have lived in the middle ages, Dad," said Harry, admiringly. "What a jolly old feudal chief you'd have been! But it can't be done. Amory and I have thrown in our lot with the men, and we'll stick it: we can't go back on our word."

"I'll see that you have proper under-clothing, my dear," said Mrs. Randall. "I'm told that some of the poor men have only one shirt."

"Shirts!" cried Mr. Randall. "Oh, I'm out of all patience with you. Do as you please, do as you please. I wash my hands of it. Don't expect any sympathy from me if you are disgusted, horrified, in a week."

As Harry had said, more than a hundred of the men had already given in their names. Next day a still larger number volunteered, and when the medical tests had been applied, it was found that the recruits from the Randall works were enough to form a company. This accordingly was scheduled as No. 3 Company in the 17th Service Battalion of a regiment which, for reasons which will appear in the course of this narrative, we shall know as the Rutland Light Infantry.

Colonel Appleton, the officer commanding, sent for Harry and Kenneth in the course of the day.

"Look here, young fellows," he said, "you're both O.T.C. men, aren't you?"

They confessed that they were.

"Well, I'm short of officers. They've sent me several boys without any experience at all, who'll want a thundering lot of licking into shape. I'll put you both down, glad to have somebody who knows something about company drill."

"Thank you, sir," said Harry, "but we only got the men to enlist by promising to go in with them."

"That's all very well, but nobody can object to promotion. The men will think it the most natural thing in the world for you to officer them."

The boys, however, persisted in their refusal.

"Nonsense," said the colonel. "I'll give you twenty-four hours' leave to think it over. There'll be nothing doing for a day or two. It's chaos at present: no uniforms, no boots, no earthly thing. Come and see me this time to-morrow, and tell me you've changed your mind."

As they left, they saw Ginger and two or three other men on the opposite side of the street, evidently on the watch for them. Ginger took his hands out of his pockets, wiped his mouth, and came across the road.

"Beg pardon, sir," he said to Harry, "but we only want to know where we are. The question is, have we got to salute you, or ain't we?"

"Of course not. That's a silly question. We're all Tommies together."

"There you are, now, what did I say?" Ginger called to his mates. "Unbelieving Jews they are," he added, addressing Harry. "Said it was all kid, and you'd come out majors or lootenants or something. I knowed better."

"Make your minds easy on that score, Ginger. We've given our word."

"That's a bob lost to Stoneway."

"By the way, Stoneway hasn't enlisted, of course."

"Not him! He bet you'd get yourselves turned into officers as soon as you'd raked us in. That's a day's pay extra for me."

"That fellow Stoneway is a bit of a riddle," said Kenneth as they passed on. "Judging by his speech the other day, he's better educated than most--a Scot perhaps; there's a sort of burr in his accent."

"I daresay," replied his friend. "A fellow who likes the sound of his own voice, I fancy. Cantankerous: always agin the Government; you know the sort."

"Well, old chap, as we've got twenty-four hours' leave I'll run up to town and explain things to the mater, make a few business arrangements and so on. I'll be back to lunch to-morrow."

"All right. I suppose they'll put us in billets for the present, so I'll arrange to have you billeted on the governor. He'll get seven bob a day for the two of us; rather a rag, eh?"

Kenneth was early at the station on his return journey next morning. The platform was crowded, a good sprinkling of men in khaki mingling with the civilian passengers always to be seen before the departure of a north-going express.

Standing at the bookstall, deliberating on a choice of something to read, Kenneth heard behind him the accents of a voice which he had heard so recently as to recognise it at once, though the few words he caught were French. He glanced over his shoulder and was not surprised to see Stoneway, the orator of Mr. Randall's yard. The man was walking up the platform beside a companion somewhat older than himself, upon whose arm he rested his hand as he spoke earnestly to him.

"A French Socialist, I suppose," thought Kenneth. "One of the anti-war people. Well, war is horrible, and I don't know I wouldn't agree with them if they had the power to put a stop to it altogether. But they haven't, and that French fellow had better realise that we've got to lick the Germans first. I was evidently right about Stoneway: he's better educated than most working men."

He bought a magazine, and thought no more of the matter, seeing nothing further of the two men. As he stepped into a first-class compartment he smiled at the thought that it was probably the last time for many a long day. Henceforth he was to be a "Tommy."

Harry met him at the station.

"Billets no go, old chap," was his greeting. "We're quartered in an old factory--beastly hole. But I've told the colonel we're going to stick it. Come along. They're going to serve out uniforms this afternoon; no fitting required! You'll be rather difficult: average chest but extra long arms. I suppose we might buy our own, but we'd better make shift with the rest. And I say, who do you think we've got for one of our officers?"

"Who?"

"You remember that squirt, Dick Kennedy?"

"You don't say so!"

"That's just what I do say. I was loafing about the barracks when he came up to me, fresh as paint in his new uniform. 'What O, Randall!' says he. 'You here, too? Ordered your kit, I suppose?' 'I believe it's on order,' said I, and I saluted, just for the fun of the thing. 'Oh, I say, we don't do that to each other,' says he; 'we don't salute anyone under a major, do we?' 'I don't want a dose of clink--already,' said I. 'What on earth do you mean?' says he. Then I told him, and you should have seen his face! He wouldn't believe me at first, and went as red as a turkey-cock when I said I wouldn't mind earning half-a-crown extra a week as his servant."

"I always thought him a bit of an ass at school," said Kenneth, "but a genial ass, you know. He wasn't in the O.T.C., and I expect we shall have some sport with him."

They went on to the large disused factory which had been turned into barracks for the occasion. The quartermaster was superintending the allocation of uniforms, and they were in due course fitted more or less with khaki and boots. As yet there were no belts, bandoliers or rifles.

The basement of the factory consisted of two large halls with bare brick walls and concrete floors. One of them, to be used as a drill hall, was empty. The other was fitted up with wooden frames to serve as sleeping bunks. At one end was a platform on which stood a piano, and one of the recruits was laboriously thumping out a rag-time. Another was playing a different tune on a penny whistle. At one corner four men were absorbed in halfpenny nap; elsewhere groups were amusing themselves in various ways.

Kenneth and his friend joined one of these. There was a little stiffness at first. The workmen, ranging in years from nineteen to thirty-five or so, were a little shy and subdued in the company of the "young governor." But the ice was broken when Ginger came up, his square mouth broadened in a grin. He was about to touch his cap to Harry, but altered his mind when he remembered the situation, and wiped his lips instead.

"Bet you don't never guess," he said.

"What's up, Ginger?" asked his mates in chorus.

"Why, Stoneway--he's been and gone and done it."

"What's he been and gone and done? Not done himself in?"

"Course not! Think he's broke his heart 'cause of losing us, then? No fear! He's 'listed, that's what he's done."

"Garn!"

"True as I'm standing here. He's 'listed right enough. He's got a chest on him too; forty inches, doctor said. He's been and got shaved; he'll be along here presently. His beard, that is. We can let our moustaches grow now, if we like." He rubbed his upper lip. "Hair-brush, that's what it is. Bet a penny it's as good as Stoneway's under six weeks."

"But what's he 'listed for, after all his jaw?" asked one of the men.

"Converted, that's what he is," Ginger replied. "Seen the error of his ways, or else he's so sweet on me he couldn't bear the parting. 'You made me love you, I didn't want to do it,'" he hummed. "This here khaki looks all right, mates, don't it? Matches my hair. Here, old cockalorum," he shouted to the man at the piano, "we've had enough of that there funeral march. Play more cheerful, or we'll all be swimming in our tears."

Ginger's high spirits were infectious, and the group of which Kenneth and Harry formed a part chatted and laughed away the afternoon.

Just before ten o'clock they were arranging their simple beds on the frames when a chorus of yells, cat-calls, whistles, and other discordant noises caused them to look around the hall. Stoneway had just made his appearance. It was a different Stoneway. The brown beard was gone, the long and flourishing moustache had been clipped to bristly stiffness, revealing heavy lips and a full round chin. The man bore his uproarious greeting with a defiant glare, and only looked annoyed when Ginger shouted:

"Smart, ain't he? Doesn't look so much like a blinky German, does he?"

The bugle sounded the Last Post, the electric light was switched off, and the five hundred men of the 17th Rutland Light Infantry clambered into their bunks and sought repose.