Private's Progress Read Online Free PDF Page A

Stanley.
    “Up to you, Jack,” said the little man, pointing a wavering finger at the right place.
    Stanley confected an address and handed it back.
    “I don’t quite understand——”
    “Not a word, my old mate,” said the little man, laying a hand on his shoulder. “Careless talk.”
    He thrust the pen and a slip at Egan.
    “Good lads,” he cried warmly. “Sid, Sid. Coupla bitters ’ere for the lads of my old regiment. It was bitters you was ’avin’, wasn’t it? Yer, bitters, Sid, ta.”
    He stood genially over them while they drank his health.
    “Let’s go on to this Congo,” said Stanley.
    “Leaving?” asked the little man brightly. “’Ere, I got a sideline, no coupons. If you or your mate ’ere …”
    *
    When they arrived at the Congo there were egg- and-bean suppers being served to a blast from a radio loudspeaker .
    “It looks quite wholesome,” said Stanley.
    “And yours was?” asked the girl.
    “I think we’ll have two, please,” said Stanley.
    “ Y ours till the end of life’s storee,
    Yours till the birds fail to sing.”
    moaned the radio.
    *
    “The Y.M. has concerts sometimes,” said Egan. “Let’s pop in and see.”
    There was no concert, but there was a queue for a sudden arrival of off-ration chocolate. They joined it, shouting to each other above the loudspeaker.
    “Doesn’t this training make you terribly hungry?” shouted Stanley.
    “Johnny’s got a zero,
    Johnny’s got a zero,
    Johnny got a zero today ”
    howled the loudspeaker.
    *
    “Rise and shine,” roared the orderly corporal. “Out of it! What a lot of lazy people. Gitoutofit!”
    “Corporal,” asked Stanley, “how do you go and get some medicine?”
    “Going Tom and Dick?” asked the corporal, whipping out a form. “Name’n nummer?”
    “Can’t one just go and get something?”
    “Eh? Eh? Now, son, son . I ask you. Is this the bleeding Ritz? Tell me that. Ooze goin’ to run after you?”
    “Well,” said Stanley, “I thought if I did the running , up to the what d’you call it—M.I. Room—and asked. Would that be all right?”
    “Hoo,” said the orderly corporal mincingly. “Ho, Reallah? Name? What -rush? Windrush? Right. Go sick. Report Comp’ny Office 0700 hours sharp. See the ord’ly sarnt. Right? Right.”
    He rushed immediately out of the door to the hut Arras, adjoining, with cries of “Wakey-wakey! Out-abed !”
    With some difficulty Stanley got up to the CompanyOffice by seven. The orderly sergeant, early-pale and impatient, smoked within.
    “You Windrush? O.K. Going sick. Well. Report here 0800 hours with your small kit in kitbag, overcoat worn, put your kit in Comp’ny Stores, come straight the way back here, see me. Clear?”
    He rattled it off in a wearied monotone.
    “But I only wanted some Alka-Seltzer,” protested Stanley. “I was just feeling a little fragile and——”
    “You what?” said the orderly sergeant. “Double away, lad, smart. You’re on sick report now, and no change can be made. Stone the crows. Get out of it! And ’ave them overcoat buttons clean.”
    Stanley left.
    The orderly sergeant took up the absentee report and signed it palely.
    “Excuse me.”
    Stanley had returned.
    “Well, what now?”
    “What does small kit consist of?”
    The orderly sergeant exhaled at length.
    “Knife-fork-spoon-razor-shaving-brush-toothbrush-spare-shirts-spare-socks-drawers-cellular,” he said tonelessly. “In addition, P.T. vests and shorts, gym shoes, housewife and contents thereof. Right?”
    “Thank you,” said Stanley.
    “Stanley went sick,” announced Catherine. “And he got M. and D. This jargon is appalling.”
    “ Never go sick,” said Stanley to Egan.

CHAPTER FOUR
    “S ARMAJOR ,” SAID Major Harkness.
    “Sir?”
    “Do I gather from this A.C.I. that now all candidates for commissions must go to a War Office Selection Board before being admitted to an OCTU?”
    “Yessir.”
    “And Area Orders say these potential-officer people