“I met Farebrother years ago.”
“So you keep on telling me. You mentioned the fact at least once last night. Twice, I think.”
“Sorry.”
“I hope previous acquaintance will prevent you being taken in by his so-called charm, should you have dealings with him as my representative.”
Widmerpool’s feud with Sunny Farebrother, so I found, was of old standing, dating back to long before this, though, militarily speaking, in especial to the period when Farebrother had been brigade-major to Widmerpool’s Territorials soon after the outbreak of war. The work of the “A” staff, which Widmerpool (under “A. & Q.”, Colonel Pedlar) represented at Division, comprised administration of “personnel” and “interior enonomy,” spheres in which, so it appeared, Farebrother had more than once thwarted Widmerpool, especially in such matters as transfers from one unit to another, candidates for courses and the routine of disciplinary cases. Farebrother was, for example, creating difficulties about Widmerpool’s correspondence with the Judge Advocate’s Department. There were all kinds of ways in which an “opposite number” at Corps or Command could make things awkward for a staff officer at Division. As Command Headquarters were established in one of the blocks of regular army barracks on the other side of the town, I had no contact with Farebrother in the flesh, only an occasional word on the telephone when the D.A.A.G. was not available; so the matter of our having met before had never arisen. It was hard to estimate how justly, or otherwise, Widmerpool regarded this mutual relationship. Farebrother’s voice on the line never showed the least trace of irritation, even when in warm conflict as to how some order should be interpreted. That quiet demeanour was an outstanding feature of Sunny Farebrother’s tactic. On the whole, honours appeared fairly evenly divided between the two of them where practical results were concerned.
“Right, Sunny, right,” Widmerpool would mutter, gritting his teeth when he had sustained a defeat.
“It’s gone the way Kenneth wants,” was Farebrother’s formula for accepting the reverse situation.
Then there were my own hopes and fears. Though by now reduced to the simplest terms, these were not without complication. In the first place, I desired to separate myself from Widmerpool; at the same time, if possible, achieve material improvement in my own military condition. However, as the months went by, no prospect appeared of liberation from Widmerpool’s bottle-washing, still less of promotion. After all, I used to reflect, the army was what you wanted, the army is what you’ve got – in terms of Molière, le sous-lieutenant Georges Dandin. No use to grumble, not to mention the fact that a great many people, far worse off, would have been glad of the job. This was a change, of course, from taking pride in the thought that only luck and good management had brought a commission at all at a moment when so many of my contemporaries were still failing to achieve that. However, to think one thing at one moment, another at the next, is the prescriptive right of every human being. Besides, I recognised the fact that those who desire to share the faint but perceptible inner satisfaction of being included, however obscurely, within the armed forces in time of war, must, if in their middle thirties and without any particular qualifications for practising its arts, pay for that luxury, so far as employment is concerned, by taking what comes. Consolation was to be found, if at all, in Vigny’s views (quoted that time in the train by David Pennistone) on the theme of the soldier’s “abnegation of thought and action.”
All the same, although the soldier might abnegate thought and action, it has never been suggested that he should abnegate grumbling. There seemed no reason why I alone, throughout the armies of the world, should not be allowed to feel that military life owed me more stimulating duties, higher rank, increased pay, simply because the path to such ends was by no means clear. Even if Widmerpool left Divisional Headquarters for what he himself used to call “better things,” my own state, so far from improving, would almost certainly be worsened. The Battalion, made up to strength with a flow of young officers increasingly available, would no longer require my services as platoon commander, still less be likely to offer a company. Indeed, those services, taking them all in all, were not to be exaggerated in value to a unit set on streamlining its efficiency. I was prepared to admit that myself. On the other hand, without ordination by way of the War Intelligence Course, or some similar apostleship, there was little or no likelihood of capturing an appointment here or on any other staff. For a course of that sort I should decidedly not be recommended so long as Widmerpool found me useful When, for one reason or another, that subjective qualification ceased to be valid – when, for example, Widmerpool went to “better things” – it looked like pretty certain relegation to the Regiment’s Infantry Training Centre, a fate little to be desired, and one unlikely to lead to name and fame. Widmerpool himself was naturally aware of these facts. Once, in an expansive mood, he had promised to arrange a future preferable to assignment – as an object to be won, rather than as a competitor – to the lucky-dip provided by an I.T.C.
“I look after people who’ve been under me,” Widmerpool said, in the course of cataloguing some of his own good qualities. “I’ll see you get fixed up in a suitable job when I move up the ladder myself. That shouldn’t be long now, I opine. At very least I’ll get you sent on a course that will make you eligible for the right sort of employment. Don’t worry, my boy, I’ll keep you in the picture.”
That was a reasonable assurance in the circumstances, and, I felt, not undeserved. “Putting you in the picture,” that relentlessly iterated army phrase, was a special favourite of Widmerpool’s. He had used it when, on my first arrival at Headquarters, he had sketched in for me the characteristics of the rest of the Divisional staff. Widmerpool had begun with General Liddament himself.
“Those dogs on a lead and that hunting horn stuck in the blouse of his battle-dress are pure affectation,” he said. “Come near to being positively undignified in my opinion. Still, of the fifteen thousand men in the Division, I can think of only one other fit to command it “
“Who is?”
“Modesty forbids my naming him.”
Widmerpool allowed some measure of jocularity to invest his tone when he said that, which increased, rather than diminished, the impression that he spoke with complete conviction. The fact was he rather feared the General. That was partly on account of General Liddament’s drolleries, some of which were indeed hard to defend; partly because, when in the mood, the Divisional Commander liked to tease his officers. Widmerpool did not like being teased. The General was not, I think, unaware of Widmerpool’s qualities as an efficient, infinitely industrious D.A.A.G., while at the same time laughing at him as a man. In this Widmerpool was by no means his only victim. Generals are traditionally represented as stupid men, sometimes with good reason; though Pennistone, when he talked of such things later, used to argue that the pragmatic approach of the soldier in authority – the basis of much of this imputation – is required by the nature of military duties. It is an approach which inevitably accentuates any individual lack of mental flexibility, an ability, in itself, to be found scarcely more among those who have risen to eminence in other vocations; anyway when operating outside their own terms of reference. In General Liddament, so I was to discover, this pragmatic approach, even if paramount, was at the same time modified by notable powers of observation. A bachelor, devoted to his profession, he was thought to have a promising future ahead of him. Earlier in the war he had been wounded in action with a battalion, a temporary disability that probably accounted for his not already holding a command in the field.
When the General himself was present, Widmerpool was prepared to dissemble his feelings about the two attendant dogs (he disliked all animals), which could certainly become a nuisance when their double-leashed lead became entangled between the legs of staff officers and their clerks in the passages of Headquarters. All the same, Widmerpool was not above saying “wuff-wuff” to the pair of them, if their owner was in earshot
, which he would follow up by giving individual, though unconvincing, pats of encouragement.
“Thank God, the brutes aren’t allowed out on exercise,” he said. “At least the General draws the line there. I think Hogbourne-Johnson hates them as much as I do. Now Hogbourne-Johnson is a man you must take care about. He is bad-tempered, unreliable, not more than averagely efficient and disliked by all ranks, including the General. However, I can handle him.”
Hogbourne-Johnson, a full colonel with red tabs, was in charge of operational duties, the staff officer who represented the General in all routine affairs. A Regular, decorated with an M.C. from the previous war, he was tall, getting decidedly fat, with a small beaky nose set above a pouting mouth turning down at the corners. He somewhat resembled an owl, an angry, ageing bird, recently baulked of a field-mouse and looking about for another small animal to devour. The M.C. suggested that he was presumably a brave man, or, at very least, one who had experienced enough active service to make that term almost beside the point. Widmerpool acknowledged these earlier qualities.
“Hogbourne-Johnson’s had a disappointing career up to date,” he said. “Unrealised early hopes. At least that’s his own opinion. Sword of Honour at Sandhurst, all that sort of thing. Then he made a balls-up somewhere – in Palestine, I think – just before the war. However, he hasn’t by any means given up. Still thinks he’ll get a Division. If he asked me, I could tell him he’s bound for some administrative backwater, and lucky if he isn’t bowler-hatted before the cessation of hostilities. The General’s going to get rid of him as soon as he can lay hands on the particular man he wants.”
“But the General could sack him to-morrow.”
“For some reason it doesn’t suit him to do that. Hogbourne-Johnson is also given to putting on a lot of swank about being a Light Infantryman. To tell the truth, I’m surprised any decent Line regiment could put up with him. They might at least have taught him not to announce himself to another officer on the telephone as ‘Colonel Hogbourne-Johnson.’ I know Cocksidge says, ‘This is Captain Cocksidge speaking,’ if he’s talking to a subaltern. You expect that from Cocksidge. Hogbourne-Johnson is supposed to know better. The C.R.A. doesn’t say, ‘This is Brigadier Hawkins,’ he says ‘Hawkins here.’ However, I suppose I shouldn’t grumble. I can manage the man. That’s the chief thing. If he hasn’t learnt how to behave by now, he never will.”
All this turned out to be a pretty just description of Colonel Hogbourne-Johnson and his demeanour, from which in due course I saw no reason to dissent. The army is a place where simple characterisation flourishes. An officer or man is able, keen, well turned out; or awkward, idle, dirty. He is popular or detested. In principle, at any rate, few intermediate shades of colour are allowed to the military spectrum. To some extent individuals, by the very force of such traditional methods of classification, fall into these hard and fast categories. Colonel Hogbourne-Johnson was one of the accepted army types, disappointed, sour, on the look-out for trouble; except by his chief clerk, Diplock, not much loved. On the other hand, although he may have had his foolish moments as well as his disagreeable ones, Hogbourne-Johnson was not a fool. Where Widmerpool, as it turned out, made a mistake, was in supposing he had Colonel Hogbourne-Johnson eating out of his hand. The Colonel’s failings, such as they were, did not include total lack of grasp of what Widmerpool himself was like in his dealings. Indeed, Hogbourne-Johnson showed comparatively deep understanding of Widmerpool eventually, when the titanic row took place about Diplock, merging – so far as Widmerpool and Hogbourne-Johnson were concerned – into the question of who was to command the Divisional Reconnaissance Regiment.
The Reconnaissance Unit, then in process of generation, was one in which Colonel Hogbourne-Johnson took a special interest from the start, though not an entirely friendly interest.
“These Recce fellows are doing no more than we Light Bobs used to bring off on our flat feet,” he would remark. “Nowadays they want a fleet of armoured vehicles for their blasted operations and no expense spared. There’s a lot of damned nonsense talked about this so-called Recce Battalion.”
The Reconnaissance Corps – as in due course it emerged – was indeed, on first coming into being, a bone of considerable contention among the higher authorities. Some pundits thought like Colonel Hogbourne-Johnson; others, just the opposite. One aspect of the question turned on whether the Recce Corps – to some extent deriving in origin from the Anti-tank Companies of an earlier phase of the war – should be used as a convenient limbo for officers, competent, but judged, for one reason or another, less than acceptable in their parent unit; or, on the other hand, whether the Corps should be moulded into one of the Elites of the army, having its pick of the best officers and men available. Yanto Breeze, for example, of my former Battalion, had transferred to an Anti-tank Company after the never-explained death – suicide or murder – of Sergeant Pendry. Breeze had been implicated only to the extent of being Orderly Officer that night, sufficient contact – bringing the unpleasantness of a Court of Inquiry – to make him want to leave the Battalion. A good, though not particularly ornamental officer, he was felt to be entirely suitable for the Anti-tank Company. Adherents of a more stylish Recce Corps might, rightly or wrongly, have required rather more outward distinction from their officer in-take than Breeze could show. That was much how things stood. The whole question also appealed greatly to Widmerpool, both as an amateur soldier in relation to tactical possibilities, and, as a professional trafficker in intrigue, a vehicle offering all sorts of opportunity for personal interference.
“Hogbourne-Johnson is playing a double game about the Recce Corps,” he said. “I happen to know that. The Divisional Commander is very keen on this new unit. The Generals at Corps and Command, on the other hand, are neither of them enthusiastic on the subject, not helpful about speeding things up. Hogbourne-Johnson thinks – in my opinion rightly – that General Liddament plans to get rid of him. Accordingly, he is doing his best to suck up to the other two Generals by backing their policy. He’ll then expect help if relieved of his appointment”
“Like the Unjust Steward.”
“Who was he?”
“In the Bible.”
“I thought you meant an officer of that name.”
“The one who said write ten, when it ought to have been fifty.”
“There’s nothing unjust about it,” said Widmerpool, always literal-minded. “Naturally Hogbourne-Johnson has to obey his own Divisional Commander’s orders. I do not for a moment suggest he is overstepping the bounds of discipline. After all, Recce developments are a matter of opinion. A regular officer of his standing has a perfect right to hold views. However, what our General would not be specially pleased to hear is that Hogbourne-Johnson is also moving heaven and earth to get a friend from his own regiment appointed to this new unit’s command.”
“How do you know?”
“Because I too have my candidate.”
“To command the Recce Corps?”
“Going into the matter, I discovered Hogbourne-Johnson’s tracks. However, I can circumvent him.”
Widmerpool smiled and nodded in a manner to indicate extreme slyness.
“Who?”
“No one you would have met. An excellent officer of my acquaintance called Victor Upjohn. Knew him as a Territorial. First-rate man.”
“Won’t they appoint a cavalryman, in spite of Hogbourne-Johnson and yourself?”
“They’ll appoint my infantryman – and be glad of him.”
“If the General is likely to be annoyed about Hogbourne-Johnson messing about behind his back as to appointments to command in his Division, he’ll be even less pleased to find you at the same game.”
“He won’t find out. Neither will Hogbourne-Johnson. Upjohn will simply be gazetted. In the meantime, so far as it goes, I am prepared to play ball with Hogbourne-Johnson up to a point. After all, if I know the right man to command the Recce Corps, it’s surely my duty to get him there.”
br /> There was something to be said for this view. If you want your own way in the army, or elsewhere, it is no good following the rules too meticulously, a canon all great military careers – and most civil ones – abundantly illustrate. What Widmerpool had not allowed for, as things turned out, was a sudden deterioration of his own relations with Colonel Hogbourne-Johnson. No doubt one reason for his assurance about that, in spite of the Colonel’s uncertain temper, was that most of Widmerpool’s dealings were with his own immediate superior, Colonel Pedlar, so less likelihood of friction existed in the other more explosive quarter. Naturally he was in touch with Colonel Hogbourne-Johnson from time to time, but there was no day-to-day routine, during which Hogbourne-Johnson was likely, sooner or later, to make himself disagreeable as a matter of principle.
Colonel Pedlar, as “A. & Q.”, set no problem at all. Also a regular full colonel with an M.C., he had little desire to be unaccommodating for its own sake. A certain stiffness of manner in official transactions was possibly due to apprehension that more might be required of him than he had to offer, rather than an innate instinct, like Hogbourne-Johnson’s, to be unreasonable in all his dealings. Colonel Pedlar seemed almost surprised to have reached the rank he had attained; appeared to possess little or no ambition to rise above it, or at least small hope that he would in due course be promoted to a brigade. The slowness of his processes of thought sometimes irked his subordinate, Widmerpool, even though these processes were on the whole reliable. If Colonel Hogbourne-Johnson looked like an owl, Colonel Pedlar resembled a retriever, a faithful hound, sound in wind and limb, prepared to tackle a dog twice his size, or swim through a river in spate to collect his master’s game, but at the same time not in the top class for picking up a difficult scent.