‘It’s a long time since I ’ad any decent toffee,’ he said, with a curious hunger in his black eyes.

‘I believe ’e’d sell ’imself for a tin o’ toffee,’ said Abbot with a grin.

‘Here you are, then; take the lot,’ said Bourne. ‘I have some more inside, and I don’t care about them, but some friends of mine are always sending out a tin. I shall bring you out some.’

‘I’d be glad of them,’ said Williams simply; he was a man of few words, a rare quality in a Welshman.

‘How did the carrying-party get on last night?’ Bourne inquired. ‘You know, as each party get back the officer in charge comes into the orderly-room, with a slip of paper, I think. I was half-asleep and didn’t pay much attention. And sometimes a runner comes in, too, and leaves a paper on the table; and the old colour-sergeant is cribbing like hell this morning about it. They disturb the sleep of a hard-working man.’

‘’e were a colour-sergeant when ’e went on reserve,’ said Abbot. ‘You knew ’im, didn’t you, Williams? The men were pretty tired when they got back at about two this morning, after the move, an’ parades an’ one thing an’ another, an’ wearin’ them bloody gas-’elmets the ’ole time. Parade again at ten today, an’ another big carryin’-party tonight. No sense workin’ men day an’ night.’

‘Well, they’ll have to send us back into trenches for a rest soon, I suppose,’ said Bourne, and asked Abbot for some hot water to rinse out his mess-tin, polished his knife and fork by rubbing them in the earth, and went back to the orderly-room. He arrived at the crisis of a scene; the adjutant, Captain Havelock, was at his table, looking irritable and rather nervous; at one side was the colour-sergeant, shaking with fury as he spoke, and opposite the adjutant was the regimental, perfectly cool and with a slightly supercilious smile on his face. Corporal Reynolds impatiently waved Bourne out of the room again. He didn’t hear what the adjutant said, but he heard the regimental’s voice, rather cool, almost insolent, in reply:

‘Of course, sir, if you will not support your regimental sergeant-major there is nothing more to be said.’

Bourne went right down the steps into the road, so as to be out of earshot; and he remembered Tozer’s words about the regimental and the colour-sergeant scrapping in the orderly-room. The regimental came out almost immediately after him, smiling superciliously and carrying his head high as he walked away. He didn’t see Bourne, who decided to wait a few minutes, and give things time to settle down again, before going back to his work.

The row seemed to have been quite unpremeditated, and anyway Captain Malet was out of it. He was due back today, but he was going to carry on as company-commander. Major Blessington seemed to like Captain Havelock; it was true he treated him in rather a casual way, but it was all to the good that he should like him. It was a pity Major Shadwell and Captain Malet could not run the battalion between them. Bourne had never seen much of Major Shadwell, but he was the same type as Captain Malet, only older, quieter, with more of iron and less of fire in his nature. Men said that he had changed a lot since coming out to France: he had been lively and full of humour, now he was rather taciturn, with a severe and inflexible expression. The men liked him: Captain Malet appealed more to their imagination, but they had more trust in Major Shadwell. He knew it too, apparently, because Bourne remembered talking to the Padre, who told him how the Major had said to him immediately after a show on the Somme, with a great effort to restrain himself: ‘It’s bloody murder, Padre, but by God there’s nothing like commanding men.’