Then afternoon, and nothing either. He still sat in the mess where Bridesman could see or find him if he liked, not waiting now any less than he had been waiting during the forenoon, because he knew now that he had not been waiting then, had not believed it then, not to mention that Bridesman had had to look at him at lunch because he had sat right across the table from him.
The whole squadron did in fact: sat or idled about the mess — that is, the new ones, the tyros, the huns like himself — Villeneuve Blanche, even Villeneuve which Collyer called that sink, still out of bounds (which fact — the out of bounds — was probably the first time in all its history that anyone not born there had specifically wanted to go there).
He could have gone to his hut too; there was a letter to his mother in it that he had not finished yet, except that now he could not finish it because the cessation of the guns yesterday had not only deleted all meaning from the words but effaced the very foundation of their purpose and aim.
But he went to the hut and got a book out and lay down on his cot with it. Perhaps it was simply to show, prove to, the old flesh, the bones and the meat, that he was not waiting for anything.
Or perhaps to teach them to relinquish, abnegate. Or perhaps it was not the bones and meat so much as the nerves, muscles, which had been trained by a government in a serious even though temporary crisis to follow one highly specialised trade, then the government passed the crisis, solved the dilemma needing it, before he had had the chance to repay the cost of the training.
Not glory: just to repay the cost. The laurel of glory, provided it was even moderately leafed, had human blood on; that was permissible only when motherland itself was at stake. Peace abolished it, and that man who would choose between glory and peace had best let his voice be small indeed ——
But this was not reading; Gaston de la Tour at least deserved to be read by whoever held it open looking at it, even lying down. So he read, peaceful, resigned, no longer thirsting now. Now he even had a future, it would last forever now; all he needed was to find something to do with it, now that the only trade he had been taught — flying armed aircraft in order to shoot down (or try to) other armed aircraft — was now obsolete.
It would be dinner time soon, and eating would exhaust, get rid of, a little of it, four, perhaps, counting tea, even five hours out of each twenty-four, if one only remembered to eat slowly enough, then eight off for sleeping or even nine if you remembered to go slowly enough about that too, would leave less than half to have to cope with.
Except that he would not go to tea or dinner either today; he had yet almost a quarter-pound of the chocolate his mother had sent last week and whether he preferred chocolate to tea and dinner would not matter. Because they — the new ones, the tyros, the huns — would probably be sent back home tomorrow, and he would return to London if he must without ribbons on his coat, but at least he would not go back with a quarter-pound of chocolate melting in his hand like a boy returning half asleep from a market fair.
And anyone capable of spreading eating and sleeping over fourteen hours out of twenty-four, should be able to stretch Gaston de la Tour over what remained of this coma-ed and widowed day, until it met the night: the dark: and the sleep.
Then tomorrow, it had just gone three Pip Emma, he was not only not waiting for anything, it had been twenty-four hours now since he had had to remind himself that he was not waiting for anything, when the orderly room corporal stood suddenly in the door of the hut.
‘What?’ he said. ‘What?’
‘Yes sir,’ the corporal said. ‘A patrol sir. Going up in thirty minutes.’
‘The whole squadron?’
‘Captain Bridesman just said you, sir.’
‘In only thirty minutes?’ he said. ‘Damn it, why couldn’t —— Right,’ he said. ‘Thirty minutes. Thanks.’ Because he would have to finish the letter now, and it was not that thirty minutes was not long enough to finish it in, but that they were not long enough to get back into the mood, belief in which the letter had been necessary. Except for signing it and folding it into the envelope, he would not even have needed to get the letter out. Because he remembered it:
… not dangerous at all, really.
I knew I could fly before I came out, and I have got to be pretty good on the range and even Captain Bridesman admits now that I’m not a complete menace to life in formation, so maybe when I settle down I might be of some value in the squadron after all
and what else could one add? what else say to a woman who was not only a mother, but an only and half-orphan mother too? which was backward, of course, but anybody would know what he meant; who knew? perhaps one of the anybody could even suggest a postscript: like this say:
P.S. A delightful joke on you: they declared a recess at noon two days ago and if you had only known it, you would not have needed to worry at all from then until three oclock this afternoon; you could have gone out to tea two afternoons with a clear conscience, which I hope you did, and even stayed for dinner too though I do hope you remembered what sherry always does to your complexion
Except that there was not even time for that. He heard engines; looking out, he saw three busses outside now in front of the hangar, the engines running and mechanics about them and the sentry standing again in front of the closed hangar doors. Then he saw a strange staff-car on the grass plot beside the office and he wrote ‘love, David’ at the foot of the letter and folded and licked it into the envelope and in the mess again now he saw the major’s batman cross toward the office carrying an armful of flying kit; apparently Bridesman hadn’t left the office at all, except that a moment later he saw Bridesman coming up from the hangars already dressed for the patrol, so the gear was not his.
Then the office door opened and Bridesman came out, saying, ‘All right, get your — —’ and stopped, because he already had it: maps, gloves, helmet, scarf, his pistol inside the knee pocket of the sidcott. Then they were outside, walking toward the three aeroplanes in front of B hangar.
‘Just three,’ he said. ‘Who else is going?’
‘The major,’ Bridesman said.
‘Oh,’ he said. ‘Why did he pick me?’
‘I dont know. Out of a hat, I think. I can wash you out if you dont like it. It wont matter. I think he really picked you out of a hat.’
‘Why should I not like it?’ he said. Then he said, ‘I just thought — —’ and then stopped.
‘Thought what?’ Bridesman said.
‘Nothing,’ he said. Then he was telling it, he didn’t know why: ‘I thought that maybe the major found out about it somehow, and when he wanted one of the new blokes on this job, he remembered about me—’ telling it: that morning when he had been supposed simply to be out practicing, contour chasing probably, and instead had spent that forty or fifty seconds right down on the carpet with the unarmed aeroplane over the hun trenches or at least what he thought was the hun front line: ‘You dont get frightened then; it’s not until later, afterward.
And then —— It’s like the dentist’s drill, already buzzing before you have even opened your mouth. You’ve got to open your mouth and you know you’re going to all right, only you know at the same time that neither knowing you are going to nor opening it either, is going to help because even after you have closed it again, the thing will buzz at you again and you’ll have to open it again the next moment or tomorrow or maybe it wont be until six months from now, but it will buzz again and you will have to open again because there’s nowhere else you can go …’ He said: ‘Maybe that’s all of it. Maybe when it’s too late and you cant help yourself anymore, you dont really mind getting killed — —’
‘I dont know,’ Bridesman said. ‘You didn’t get even one bullet hole?’
‘No,’ he said. ‘Maybe I shall this time.’ And this time Bridesman did stop.
‘Listen,’ Bridesman said. ‘This is a job. You know what jobs in this squadron are for.’
‘Yes. To find huns.’
‘And then bust them.’
‘You sound like Monaghan: “Oh, I just ran up behind and busted the ass off the son of a bitch.”‘
‘You do that too,’ Bridesman said. ‘Come on.’ They went
