‘You could ’ave worked it so that they’d ’ave let you stay in the orderly-room, if you ’ad wanted to stay there,’ said the sergeant.

‘I didn’t want to stay there,’ answered Bourne impatiently. ‘It bored me stiff, and I would rather be dog-tired than bored. I like being with the company. I like the swank of it, even if it’s as empty as a drum. I like the swank of a drum. But if I had stayed in the orderly-room much longer, I should have become a lead-swinger too. I might have asked the colour-sergeant or the adjutant to send me back; but I didn’t, because I wanted to dodge carrying gas-cylinders. I was swinging the lead as it was. Of course, I don’t mind swinging the lead a bit in the company, especially when I think I have earned a bit of a rest. It’s a game, as they say.’

‘Well, don’t you come any o’ those games on me,’ said the sergeant with a note of warning in his voice. ‘That young Shem is the most artful bugger I know. ’e got off a workin’-party ’ere, when we wanted every man we could get. ’e got off with ’is boots, I think. They was worn-out, an’ we didn’t ’ave another pair to fit the bugger, ’e ’as got such short broad feet.’

‘He got off with his eyes,’ said Bourne laughing. ‘When an officer looks up and meets Shem’s eyes, he always thinks he may conceivably be telling the truth. I can’t work it like Shem. Anyway that is all in the game, so long as you don’t overdo it. Do you think I’m windy?’

‘You’re not any more windy than the next man,’ said the sergeant with a judicial air in answer to the abrupt question. ‘Sergeant-Major Glasspool said you were all right, an’ you’ve always been all right with me. Besides, if ’e thought you was shirkin’ it, the Cap’n would be down on you. What do you want to ask me for; don’t you know yourself?’

‘I wanted another opinion,’ said Bourne. ‘I don’t think I’m windy. I am in the hell of a bloody funk, sometimes, but then everybody is. At first it seems to push me right over. I get a bit dazed; but when that has passed, funk only makes me think a damned sight quicker than usual. When I went to see the Padre tonight, he asked me why I wanted to stay with the company, and I said I liked the men. Well, you and I know that there are all sorts among the men. You know more than I do, because you have got to keep them together, and push them into it sometimes. What I said to him sounded rather silly after I had said it, but I suppose it was true all the same. I like the life better when I’m with the men. When I was in the orderly-room, and saw the men fall in on the road to go up the line, I felt out of it. Now that I’m back again I feel better.’