It says, "Ref. your S.C. 1985 please
ask PIG if they have salvaged any German socks. A.A.A. urgent."
I stand up, and the orderly, completely unnerved by the sight of a
Staff Captain in undress uniform, releases the button of his torch and
retires under cover of darkness.
I twirl the handle of the telephone and listen. There is silence.
I turn it again with vigour. For twenty minutes I behave like an
organ-grinder. Towards dawn the bell rings and I receive an electric
shock.
"Hullo!" says the operator.
I tell him what I think of him. When I have finished the sun is up
and the first aeroplane is dropping its glad bombs on the dewy earth
below.
I demand PIG. PIG is a Machine Gun Company. By breakfast-time I have
discovered that PIG has salvaged socks, German, one.
I ring up Division ...
It is a splendid force, as they used to say in _The Message from
Mars_--it is a splendid force, the Signal Service.
And men sleeping among the rats in the front line wake for their
coffee and hot water and envy me my undisturbed nights.
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