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invariably sitting in the centre. The pictures were all framed and glassed and captioned, with everyone’s name there. Taken together, they were in their own way a priceless record of twentieth-century naval history.
    The Bodger knew his own term of old and stopped in front of their photograph. He picked himself out at once, grinning, towards the right-hand end of the third row. There was old Corky, their term officer. Oddly enough, he had never risen above the rank of lieutenant commander he had had in the picture. Something must have gone badly wrong, for The Bodger remembered Corky with respect and affection and gratitude for all the advice he had given and the trouble he had taken with his cadets. Beside The Bodger was Dickie Vanbrugh, killed in a Liberator crash at Tripoli in 1943. On the other side was a boy called Fenton. The Bodger could remember no more about him than that he had killed himself in a motor cycle accident while they were doing their sub-lieutenant’s course at Greenwich. Further along was Eric. The Bodger could not for the moment recall his surname and looked at the tally below. Eric Glossop. He had been invalided from the Service after crushing his hand in a fall-block whilst hoisting a sea-boat.
    The Bodger looked over the faces, pleased and gratified to see how many he could still put a name to. It was sometimes fashionable to claim that one could see in these young faces a reflection of their hopes and determination for the future. Not so, in The Bodger’s opinion; as he remembered it, they had all been waiting to go for lunch. Although, there were now no survivors from those of his term who had joined the Fleet Air Arm, he was still mildly surprised to see how few had otherwise come to a premature death, and how few had ever achieved any startling destiny. Those still serving were, of course, now very much in the minority. The rest had just served, and then gone. It was not the brightest, or the most memorable, or the gayest, or the wittiest, or even the most professionally competent, who had risen in the Service. The best of all in their term, in The Bodger’s opinion, had retired early to become a probation officer. Those who were still there were those, like The Bodger himself, with a talent for survival and perhaps, he thought, they were the best for the Navy in the end. The Navy did not really want clever, or witty, or talented, or even competent men. In the last resort, the Navy just wanted those who were willing to go on with it, come what may.
    There were voices raised from the junior officers’ wardroom, which was up a short flight of steps at the end of the corridor.
    ‘We’ll go and have a look at this,’ said Jimmy.
    At the table nearest the door, a place had been laid, complete with cutlery for a six course meal, wine glasses, napkin, finger bowl, and table mat. Round the end of the table were gathered about a dozen Gromboolians, their dark faces wondering at the significances of this latest manifestation of the white sahib’s taboo ground.
    Jimmy introduced the officer in charge of the class. ‘Mr Spicer, Bodger, the Cadet Gunner and Parade Ground Officer.’
    The Bodger shook hands. ‘Have we met before, Mr Spicer?’
    ‘No, sir. But I know of you by repute, sir.’
    That, The Bodger reflected, could be a somewhat left-handed compliment.
    ‘What’s happening here?’
    ‘Knife and fork drill, sir. Lecture on correct mess procedure, sir, correct use of mess utensils, and general mess etiquette, sir.’
    ‘Ah. Carry on, please.’
    Spicer was a large man, with the right amount of hair in his nostrils and sprouting out of his ears to be a gunnery officer. But there was something about his manner which The Bodger found vaguely disappointing. The man was too innocuous. A Cadet Gunner and Parade Ground Officer was a personage of awe and majesty, pavilioned in splendour and girded with gaiters, who made his habitation at the far end of the parade ground, in that place of