Part 7 (2/2)
”The Tebourba Tigers.”
The latter refers to the name they conferred on themselves after a savage action at Tebourba in Tunisia. Where are those tigers now? Watching telly? Was.h.i.+ng up?...We make a fire of broken furniture, and put on the brew can. We add our graffiti to the walls. ”Gunner Milligan was here, and will make sure he never returns.” Someone wrote 'Chelsea FC for ever'. Such patriotism.
Jock Webster, our myopic driver, is i/c tea; he had a remarkable forehead, bulging like a balloon. Gunner Birch explained: ”Before his bones 'ad 'ardened, someone put a pump up his a.r.s.e and blew him up.”
Why wasn't this man writing in The Lancet? The Lancet? 'Myopic' Webster is now putting spoonfuls of compo mixture into the boiling water, well, not exactly 'Myopic' Webster is now putting spoonfuls of compo mixture into the boiling water, well, not exactly in in, just missing the tin. We reorient him with ”Left hand down a bit, bit more...right.” How he became a driver is beyond logic. To keep him on the road his pa.s.sengers had to shout endless instructions. ”Look out, STOP,” etc. However, he was such a nice bloke we hated to give him the push, but he broke down so often, we had to.
”Oo fort of 'ow ter make compo?” Tume asks.
”I fink,” pontificated Fuller, ”I fink they sweeps the floors of the tea factories, put it into tins and send it to us.”
We are all squatting around the fire, some of us sit on broken furniture, Harry is balancing on a huge recoco three-legged chair, which gives him the appearance of a five-legged dwarf. We are all short of f.a.gs, but careful Milligan has a whole packet. I am persuaded to part with some: the method? manual strangulation.
With the sun setting we reel the last of the line in and set off for the Battery.
Bdr. Fuller, Tume and Edgington sit silently in the back of the Monkey truck.
”Monkey truck, that's just the b.l.o.o.d.y right name for this vehicle,” says Gunner Tume, who is now desperately crouching forward trying, through the shaking, to light a dog-end that appears to have three shreds of tobacco in it. He goes on moaning.
”Monkeys, that's what we are,” he said. ”Trained khaki monkeys, and this is just one big b.l.o.o.d.y circus.”
”If only we had an audience,” I said. ”We could go round with the hat.”
No one was amused. No, we were all p.i.s.sed off and b.l.o.o.d.y cold. We shout through the canvas of the driver's seat. ”How much bleedin' further, Jock?”
”I've nae idea,” came the Scot's burr. ”I ha tae kip askin' the wee.”
And true to his prophecy he kept stopping to 'ask the wee'. It was an experience to hear him asking 'the wee' from a puzzled Moroccan Goumier.
”Hurry up for Christ's sake!” says Gunner Edgington. ”The cook'ouse will be closed.”
”Wonder what gaff this is?” Fuller says peering out of the back.
We are pa.s.sing through stone-paved streets, with silent, locked buildings each side. I guess it must be Capua.
”Hannibal had got this far south with his Carthaginians.”
”Very good, Milligan,” says Edgington. ”Go to the top of the cla.s.s and jump off.”
”Who were the Carthaginians?” said Bombardier Fuller.
”A Third Division team from Watford.” Edgington is speaking heatedly, it's the only way to keep warm. ”How do they expect ordinary London 'erberts like us to find our way around b.l.o.o.d.y Italy with a half-blind Scots driver askin' the way from A-rabs.”
We are in a queue behind a column of Sherman tanks.
”'Ere-I remember this lot-they're the 7 Armoured,” says Edgington.
”Tanks fer the memory,” I said.
We are about to cross the Volturno, a slow process.
”Fancy having to queue for the war.”
[image]
The Bailey Bridge over the Volturno Infantry are marching silently past.
”They never speak,” said Harry, ”don't they ever chat to each other?”
”Oh yes,” I said.
”What do they say?”
”'Attention-Slope Arms-Chargeee'.”
We start to move. ”I'm getting b.l.o.o.d.y hungry,” was a frequent statement, and it came most frequently from Edgington. He was a known hungry guts. Only one man outdid him, Driver Kidgell. Kidgell it was said, could smell a sausage at 300 yards-and hear a tin of duff being opened a mile away. What's this? The rattle, rattle, of boards???
”'Ere, we're on a Bailey bridge,” says Trew, ”We must be crossin' the Volturno.”
”Ah! Guns! I hear guns,” said Edgington. ”We're getting near civilisation.”
”Move over,” an American voice is shouting. ”The trucks have to get on the verge to let pa.s.s a dozen more Sherman tanks.”
Our legs are starting to get cold, our bottoms numb, our stomachs empty, our tempers short. There is a gloomy silence. Milligan to the rescue!
”My favourite sauce is Worcester,” I said.
”Worcester?” says Edgington.
”Yes.”
”My favourite is HP.” says Tume.
”I like OK sauce with bread and cheese,” says Fuller.
The truck stops on a side road, we are lost. With our very battered map and a hand-covered match we finally get on the right road. We are looking for Map Square 132832; this was a tree-lined country road just south-west of Sparanise. The Battery are 'housed' in a long irrigation ditch by the side of the road. s.p.a.ced about are a few derelict farm buildings. From that dark ditch come the sounds of wallops, groans and furious scratching, the place is alive with mosquitoes. Beating off the beasts we familiarise ourselves with our surroundings. The guns are adjacent and are already roaring out into the night. A red glow is seen. That is what we want: the cookhouse! Soon we are grovelling to the cooks.
”Where you b.l.o.o.d.y well bin then?” says Ronnie May, who had been laying in a bivvy dreaming of some grotty bird in Houndsditch. I had seen her photograph, and the best place to think of her was in a muddy field in Italy.
”We bin reeling in a line,” said Bombardier Fuller.
”No one told us to keep any late dinners,” said May, starting to wipe a diseased tin-opener across his ap.r.o.n. ”Good job I kept the oven in,” he said.
”You should always keep a few late dinners, Ronnie,” says Edgington. ”Theatregoers, you know.”
We are all swiping left, right and centre to throw off the mozzies, ”Let's all put on a f.a.g and smoke 'em out.”
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