H.M.S. ----. John Bowers QC
along the sinking boat.
"You did not join me in the prayer, Dunn," he said. "Was it not within the scheme of your religion?"
Dunn put his pipe carefully back in his jumper and took a firmer grip of the keel. "Yes, sir," he said, "it was – but I don't whine when I'm down."
"Do you mean I was whining, Dunn?"
"No, sir, I don't. You've always prayed and you're not going back on anything. I don't go much on Church, and God wouldn't think nothing of me if I piped down now."
The padre was, as has been said, a young man, and being young he did the right thing and waited for more. It came with a rush.
"You see, sir, it's God this, and God that, and no one knows what God is like, but I'm a Navy man and I think of Him my way. If I'm not afraid to die I'm all right, I think, sir. It wasn't my fault the ship sank, sir. I've always kept my job done, and I've got 'Exceptional' on my parchment. When I joined up I took the chance of this, and I ain't kicking now it's come. I reckon if a man plays the game by his messmates, and fights clean in the ring, and takes a pride, like, in his job – well, it ain't for me to say, but I don't think God'll do much to me. He'll say, 'Jack,' He'll say, 'you've got a lot of things against you here, but you ain't shirked your work and you aren't afraid of Me – so pass in with a caution,' He'll say. You're all right, sir, and it may be because you're a good Christian; but I reckon, sir, it's because you know you've done your job and not skrimshanked it that you ain't afraid, just the same as me… Hold tight, sir, – she'll not be long now."
The padre ducked his head as a swell passed, but the sea had no crest now, the weather was certainly improving. "I don't say you're right," he said, "but I haven't time to bring you to my way of thinking now."
The pinnace began to stand on end with a gurgling and bubbling of air from her bow. The two men slipped off on opposite sides, still holding the rough splintery keel between them.
"Listen, Dunn – repeat this after me: 'Please God, I have done my best, and I'm not afraid to come to You.'"
"'Please God, I've done my best, and I'm not afraid to come to You,' sir. Good-bye, sir."
"Thank you, Dunn – good-bye."
The sunset lit up the slope of a sea that looked majestically down on them, and flashed on something behind it. As they looked the wet grey conning-tower of a submarine showed barely fifty yards away. The startled sea pounded at her hull as she rose and grew, and a rush of spray shook out the folds of a limp and draggled White Ensign that hung from the after-stanchion of her bridge.
A NAVAL DISCUSSION
The air was thick with smoke, and a half-circle of officers sat clustered round the stove in the smoking-room. True – there was no fire in the stove, but that did not count. A stove was a place you sat around and jerked cigarette ash at, or, if you were long enough, rested your heels on. The party consisted of six ship's officers and a guest. A few feet away a Bridge-party was in progress. It was the usual Naval party, and was composed of one man who could play, two who thought they could, and one who had come in in response to urgent demands to "make up a four," and who held no illusions about his own play or his partner's. However, he argued well, which was a help. The game appeared to go in spasms – a few minutes' peace punctuated only by subdued oaths, and then a cross-fire of abuse and recriminations – usually opened by the fourth player, who had somewhere learnt the wonderful feminine art of getting in first accusation, and then dodging his opponents' salvoes behind a smoke-screen of side-issues.
The group by the stove were not in the least disturbed by the game behind them. They had heard Naval Bridge played before, and knew that it was only when the players became polite that trouble was in the offing. The talk, as always, was of the War, and swung with startling suddenness from one queer aspect to another. The Senior Engineer was leaning back in his chair, his pipe between his teeth, listening to the mixture of views and voices from either side of him.
"What do they want this saluting order at all for? They're making everybody salute everybody in London now, and they say it isn't safe to walk down the Haymarket to the Admiralty, because the traffic stands to attention for you."
"All damn nonsense. There's too much saluting – that sort, I mean – and there's too little of the other sort. Let's have an order that every civilian must salute a wounded man, or a man with a wound stripe, and then I'll take Provost-Marshal and see it done."
"They'd chuck their hands in. They're all talking of Democracy now, and a wounded man would count as a gilded autocrat."
"Democracy, my foot! I know their sort of Democracy. It's like Russia's special brand – do as you please, and make all you can for yourself. A civilian's no good till he's a conscript or done his time in the Territorials. If they want democracy they can come here. This is the most democratic Service in the world."
"But you can't run down civilians over this war; why – the whole Army's civilian now. They haven't done so badly, though they had to wait for war before they moved."
"Whose fault was it they didn't help before? It wasn't ours. But that's just what I'm saying. They're all right once they've been drilled, but no damn good till they have been. We ought to put the whole lot through a short course of drill and a week of trench work, and let them go again."
The guest's voice broke in – "You mean, I take it, that the people who are going to make the peace are the people who have not yet learnt discipline?"
"Yes, sir – that's about it. They haven't learnt to think for their side instead of their own private ends."
"Call 'em politicians and have done with it, Pongo!"
"Well, they are – aren't they? They get the politicians they like, and they appoint men of their own sort, so they are all politicians really."
"Well, I think that's being rather hard on them. They have to take the men the party whips gave them. I think they're a poor lot, but I wouldn't call them politicians."
The guest moved uneasily. "I don't quite see your point," he said. "Is the term 'politician' one of reproach or praise? I once stood for my local constituency and – "
The young officer with his heels on the stove gave a sudden snort. "Don't you believe him, he's pulling your legs – so don't apologise. He's no politician, anyway."
The guest laughed. "Well, I'm not in politics now," he said. "What is your definition of this strange animal?"
There was a pause, and then a cautious reply, "Well, he's an M.P."
"But I know some very charming M.P.'s – are they all politicians?"
"Oh no, sir. They're different. It's a question of standards, really."
"Ah, but what are the standards?"
"Well, you see – we have one – and civilians have another, business people and so on, and then there's the politicians."
"You ought to write a dictionary, Pongo – you snub-nosed old shell-back. No, I ain't scrapping, and if you get up I'll take your chair."
"Whose got a cigarette? No, not one of your stinkers – gimme one of yours, Guns."
The officer addressed politely passed a cigarette across in his fingers, and turning in his chair beckoned to a marine servant who was just returning with an empty tray from the Bridge table.
"A cigarette, please, waiter – and debit it to the account of my honourable friend Mr Maugham, here. I'll stop your cadging, Pongo – if I have to take on the tobacco accounts to do it."
"Lucky there's no shortage of 'baccy, or all the armies would strike."
"Well, that'd be one way to stop the war. You can't fight without it. Wish we had some tobacco shares. Some people must be making a lot."
"Not so much as the food people."
"I don't believe the food people do make so much. It's the world shortage that causes the trouble, not the prices – or rather one involves the other."
"It isn't so much that. It's a rise of prices all round. Things get expensive, so the country strikes for