Argosy All-Story Weekly, Vol. 189, No. 4 — page 65: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

KING’S cal officer look you over. Report at sick parade.” He started to turn away, looked at Har- mon and stopped. ‘ Shave this morning?” “Ves, sir,’ Recruit Harmon answered promptly. ‘Stand to attention. That’s better. Al- ways remember that when you speak to a warrant officer. Your trained soldier should have warned you not to shave your upper lip. It’s against the king’s regulations. Remember that, too.” He strode away. Harmon felt his bare upper lip. He wondered how much of a mustache was demanded by the regulations —obviously, one could not grow a luxuri- ant plant like the brigade sergeant-major’s in less than ten years. “ Go sick,” scoffed Ruffit. ‘ Not likely an’ have the medical orficer lookin’ up my age. Turn me out, like as not, in a flash.” “Why, how old are you?” asked Har- mon. “T’m down at forty-eight, but I don’t mind tellin’ you I seen fifty-four last week. But I can fight for blurry old England as good as the next.” Harmon nodded silently and helped him to his feet. To the American the whole thing was an adventure—the maddest kind of a lark—but he sensed that it was sober earnest for old Ruffit. Harmon began to appreciate the caliber of the men of Kitch- ener’s army—the quality-of the raw mate- rial that was being welded in the furnace of Camberham barracks. He hurried to rejoin the squad. A drum- mer—a_ sixteen-year-old youngster not much bigger than the-emblazoned snare drum he carried—rolled his sticks vigorous- ly near by and the squads were marshaled by the corporals and the ubiquitous ser- geants into solid ranks opposite the tall flagpole. An officer, smart and shining in boots and spurs, strode to the center of the square, facing the men. Behind him marched two soldiers with fixed bayonets, a third man, who was unarmed, walking between. “Now, you chaps, pay attention,” coun- seled Corporal Robinson, sotto-voce, “ so it won’t ’appen to you. That’s the adjutant, an’ he’s goin’ to read a bloke’s court-martial sentence.” ‘‘ A-ten-shun!” the voice of the brigade sergeant-major echoed. The ranks became rigid. The adjutant read from a blue paper in a hurried mono- tone, while a corporal standing behind the prisoner stepped up and snatched off the prisoner’s cap. It was a long-winded document, unin- telligible to Harmon at that distance. Fin- ished reading, the adjutant folded the paper, the prisoner was marched away and the parade dismissed. ‘ Desertion,” Corporal Robinson in- formed Harmon on the way off the square. “Three years’ penal servitude for six months’ absence an’ a dishonorable dis- charge. But the bloke will be out before we are at that.” ‘ Kind of strict,” Tuesday suggested. ‘It was ’is own fault,” the corporal spat disgustedly. ‘ They don’t bother you none if you enlist again in some other mob. Why, I’ve seen chaps come in ’ere with ‘arf a uniform on from some other regi- ment where they went over the ‘ill count of some bad feelings with the sergeants. So long as you join up with something they don’t bother you. But if you wander about spare they'll pick you up. They can’t wink their bloomin’ eyes at everything a deserter does.” In the afternoon there was another drill, but, fortunately for number nine squad, without Narley. After that came a lecture on the history of the regiment, given by a second lieutenant, who appeared from no- where and disappeared immediately after- ward, and a talk on personal hygiene by a bored medical officer. ‘“ Swabs outside! Tea is up!” The tea-carrying details from the differ- ent squads raced to be first to the cook house door and came back heavily laden. After tea there was another spell of clean- ing up, scrubbing equipment and fatigue duty outside the huts. On the drill square forty or fifty men, carrying heavy packs and full marching equipment, tramped round and round in a haze of dust of their own raising, without AMIE Eomicbooks