No More Parades - Ford Madox Ford (the gingerbread man read aloud .TXT) 📗

Tietjens said to himself:

“The old fellow feels it!⁠ ⁠… But he can hardly expect me to tell him that Sylvia thinks Drake was the father of my own son, and desires my ruin!” But of course the old man would feel it. He, Tietjens, and his wife, Sylvia, were as near a son and daughter as the old man had. The obvious answer to make to the old man’s query as to where he, Tietjens, ought to be sent was to remind him that his brother Mark had had an order put through to the effect that Tietjens was to be put in command of divisional transport⁠ ⁠… Could he remind the old man of that? Was it a thing one could do?

Yet the idea of commanding divisional transport was like a vision of Paradise to Tietjens. For two reasons: it was relatively safe, being concerned with a lot of horses⁠ ⁠… and the knowledge that he had that employment would put Valentine Wannop’s mind at rest.

Paradise!⁠ ⁠… But could one wangle out of a hard into a soft job? Some other poor devil very likely wanted it. On the other hand⁠—think of Valentine Wannop! He imagined her torture of mind, wandering about London, thinking of him in the very worst spot of a doomed army. She would get to hear of that. Sylvia would tell her! He would bet Sylvia would ring her up and tell her. Imagine, then, writing to Mark to say that he was with the transport! Mark would pass it on to the girl within half a minute. Why⁠ ⁠… he, Tietjens, would wire. He imagined himself scribbling the wire while the general talked and giving it to an orderly the moment the talk was over⁠ ⁠… But could he put the idea into the old man’s head! Is it done?⁠ ⁠… Would, say⁠ ⁠… say, an Anglican saint do it?

And then⁠ ⁠… Was he up to the job? What about the accursed obsession of O Nine Morgan that intermittently jumped on him? All the while he had been riding Schomburg the day before, O Nine Morgan had seemed to be just before the coffin-headed brute’s off-shoulder. The animal must fall!⁠ ⁠… He had had the passionate impulse to pull up the horse. And all the time a dreadful depression! A weight! In the hotel last night he had nearly fainted over the thought that Morgan might have been the man whose life he had spared at Noircourt⁠ ⁠… It was getting to be a serious matter! It might mean that there was a crack in his, Tietjens’, brain. A lesion! If that was to go on⁠ ⁠… O Nine Morgan, dirty as he always was, and with the mystified eyes of the subject races on his face, rising up before his horse’s off-shoulder! But alive, not with half his head cut away⁠ ⁠… If that was to go on he would not be fit to deal with transport, which meant a great deal of riding.

But he would chance that⁠ ⁠… Besides, some damn fool of a literary civilian had been writing passionate letters to the papers insisting that all horses and mules must be abolished in the army⁠ ⁠… Because of their pestilence-spreading dung!⁠ ⁠… It might be decreed by A.C.I. that no more horses were to be used!⁠ ⁠… Imagine taking battalion supplies down by night with motor lorries, which was what that genius desired to see done!⁠ ⁠…

He remembered once or twice⁠—it must have been in September, ’16⁠—having had the job of taking battalion transport down from Locre to B.H.Q., which were in the château of Kemmell village⁠ ⁠… You muffled every bit of metal you could think of: bits, trace-chains, axles⁠ ⁠… and yet, whilst you hardly breathed, in the thick darkness some damn thing would always chink and jolt; beef tins made a noise of old iron⁠ ⁠… And bang, after a long whine, would come the German shell, registered exactly on to the corner of the road where it went down by the shoulder of the hill: where the placards were ordering you not to go more than two men together⁠ ⁠… Imagine doing it with lorries, that could be heard five miles away!⁠ ⁠… The battalion would go pretty short of rations!⁠ ⁠… The same antichevaline genius had emitted the sentiment that he had rather the Allies lost the war than that cavalry should distinguish themselves in any engagement!⁠ ⁠… A wonderful passion for the extermination of dung⁠ ⁠… ! Or perhaps this hatred of the horse was social⁠ ⁠… Because the cavalry wear long moustaches dripping with Macassar oil and breakfast off caviar, chocolate and Pommery Greno they must be abolished!⁠ ⁠… Something like that⁠ ⁠… He exclaimed: “By God! How my mind wanders! How long will it go on?” He said: “I am at the end of my tether.” He had missed what the general had said for some time.

The general said:

“Well. Has he?”

Tietjens said:

“I didn’t catch, sir!”

“Are you deaf?” the general asked. “I’m sure I speak plain enough. You’ve just said there are no horses attached to this camp. I asked you if there is not a horse for the colonel commanding the depot⁠ ⁠… A German horse, I understand!”

Tietjens said to himself:

“Great heavens! I’ve been talking to him. What in the world about?” It was as if his mind were falling off a hillside. He said:

“Yes, sir⁠ ⁠… Schomburg. But as that’s a German prisoner, captured on the Marne, it is not on our strength. It is the private property of the colonel. I ride it myself⁠ ⁠…”

The general exclaimed dryly:

“You would⁠ ⁠…” He added more dryly still: “Are you aware that there is a hell of a strafe put in against you by a R.A.S.C. second-lieutenant called Hotchkiss?⁠ ⁠…”

Tietjens said quickly:

“If it’s over Schomburg, sir⁠ ⁠… it’s a washout. Lieutenant Hotchkiss has no more right to give orders about him than as to where I shall sleep⁠ ⁠… And I would rather die than subject any horse for which I am responsible to the damnable torture Hotchkiss and that swine Lord Beichan want to inflict on service horses⁠ ⁠…”

The general