It was obviously the intention of authority that the men should be given an opportunity to have a bon time. They were to be paid at two o’clock, and then were free to amuse themselves.

‘You’re comin’ out with me tonight,’ said Martlow to Bourne decisively.

‘Very well,’ said Bourne, dumping his pack on the floor of the room they occupied, and opening the window. They were upstairs; and he looked out and down, into the street. There were five or six corporals, and lance-corporals, standing just outside; and both Corporal Greenstreet and Lance-Corporal Jakes spotted him immediately, and shouted for him to come. He went, a little reluctantly, wondering what they wanted.

‘You’re the man we was lookin’ for,’ said Corporal Green-street. ‘The sergeants are runnin’ a sergeants’ mess for the couple of days we’ll be ’ere; an’ we don’t see why we can’t run a corporals’ mess.’

‘Well, run one, Corporal,’ said Bourne distinterestedly. ‘There’s nothing in King’s Regs. against it, so far as I know.’

‘Well, we can’t run it ourselves. That’s where you come in, you know the lingo a bit, an’ you always seem able to get round the old women. A corporal don’t get a sergeant’s pay, you know, but we want to do it as well as we can. There’ll be eight of us; Jakes, Evans, an’ Marshall are in billets ’ere, an’ we could ’ave the mess ’ere, if she’d do the cookin’. You ’ave a talk to ’er.’

‘This is all very well,’ said Bourne reasonably; ‘but now we’re in a decent town I want to have a good time myself. I’ve just told Martlow I should go out with him tonight.’

‘Well, I’ve got ’im down for company guard tonight.’

‘Have you, Corporal? Well, you just take him off company guard, or there’s absolutely nothing doing. Every time we arrange to go out on a bit of a spree together, he, or Shem, or myself are put on company guard. I was on last night.’

‘Well, Sergeant-Major Robinson told me to put you on guard last night. ’e said it would do you good, you were gettin’ a bit fresh.’

‘I guessed that,’ said Bourne. ‘He didn’t want to be nasty, of course, but he thought he would give me a reminder. I don’t mind taking my share of guards. But, if you put one of us on, you might just as well put us all on together, and make a family party of it. I don’t mind helping you to run a mess, but I want to have a good time, too.’

‘Well, you muck in with us,’ said Corporal Greenstreet.

‘An’ you needn’t put anythin’ in the kitty,’ added Lance-Corporal Jakes.

‘Oh, thanks all the same, but I like to pay my own way,’ said Bourne coolly. ‘I don’t mind going in and asking madame what can be done in the matter; and then, if we can come to some arrangement, I shall see about buying the grub; but before things go any further, it has got to be clearly understood that neither Shem, nor Martlow, is on any guard tonight. We three are going out on a spree together. I shall muck in with you tomorrow night.’