The First of July(50)

He bought the compass anyway.

Then, when I was wrapping up his packages, I caught him looking at me, as if he too thought we’d met before. He frowned slightly and then looked embarrassed.

“Before. You were at Debenhams?” he said.

And then I was awkward on account of my reasons for leaving being not entirely creditable.

“I’m sorry,” he said and I could see he was feeling awkward too. “You were once very kind to my friend,” he said.

He waited to see if I was making a link.

“It was over a pair of gloves for his fiancée.”

I always knew it was his friend who had stolen the gloves, and always knew that the man now in front of me had been quite unaware of it until I accosted them in the street. But he was in uniform, and an officer, so the less said, the better.

“I think I remember, sir,” I said; “what a coincidence.” Folding the paper neatly, as I’d been taught. Then, to change the subject, I said, “Are you on leave for long, sir?”

He shook his head. “Back to my regiment tomorrow. We’ve taken a great many losses,” and he looked toward the window as if ghostly gunners might be trundling by.

“If there’s anything—” he said.

An uneasy silence fell—the sort of silence that is full of sounds: rain on the windowpanes, faded discussions in the back room, a motorcar idling outside the shop, even, I fancied, Jakob’s sewing machine, though I had never heard it before from out front.

Perhaps it was the silence or because we’d met before, in a manner of speaking, that I blurted out: “Well, excuse me for asking, but do soldiers make wills in case they might die?”

I looked behind me for Mr. Nugent, who had strong views on talking out of turn to customers and had even drawn up a list of approved subjects on which we might engage them. It was short.

“It’s just that my friend left his Hercules in my care and now he’s been killed and I don’t know what to do.”

He thought for a minute. “And Hercules is … a dog?”

“No, sir. It’s a bicycle.”

“A bicycle.” He looked puzzled. “Is it hard for you to store it?”

“No. No. It’s a fine bicycle, compares with the Raleigh Superbe, the Resilient Royal Centaur, or even the French machines, though it’s more for straight roads than agility, but that’s the point. It’s very fine and it’s not mine.”

It all came tumbling out. Mr. Nugent would have had a fit.

“But my friend had no family, you see.” And then, to my surprise, I heard myself saying, “I’ll probably be joining up soon. I want to have things straight.”

He smiled a little. “Well, that’s splendid,” he said, though he said it without the conviction of Mr. Richmond. He looked at me again as if assessing what kind of soldier I’d be.

“Are you a West Country man?” he said.

It was a small blow—I had hoped I sounded like a Londoner now.

“My own father is a clergyman in Devon,” he went on, though I noticed he had no kind of West Country tone to his voice, but then it aways seemed to me that all officers spoke the same.

“Yes, sir. My father has a business near Totnes.” That was overstating it a bit, but I hoped he wouldn’t ask.

“Splendid,” says he. “The Devons. Fine old regiment. You want to join the infantry?”

I shrugged politely.

“You obviously like bicycles, so I suppose you might consider joining a cyclist’s battalion?”

You could have knocked me down with a feather. A cyclist’s battalion. I must have looked surprised, because he said “I’ll tell you what: there’s a good unit I know of, and the adjutant’s an old school friend. If you report with a bicycle in good working order, then I think you get an allowance. I’d say that would be quite a good use of your deceased friend’s machine, wouldn’t you? If you aren’t set on the Devons, that is.”

I was hardly able to reply. If I had to go to war, to take Hercules would be like taking a friend. “Is that an infantry unit?” I asked.

“More like cavalry, I suppose,” he said. “Mounted troops, you see.” And then he really did smile.

“Do you know where Huntingdon is?” he said. “They were a territorial outfit before the war… .” He hesitated and looked less confident. “Anyway, if you would care for an introduction, I could give you details.”

I hardly knew what to say. In the end, I just said yes. “Yes, please. Thank you. Thank you very much, sir.”

He wrote down a name. “Go to this recruiting office in Huntingdon, or write direct perhaps to see if it’s worth the journey. And what’s your name?”