George Fraser - The Complete McAuslan

About two days later, which was shortly before Christmas, I fell from grace in the mess. There was a mess meeting called, and I forgot about it, and went into town to play snooker at the officers’ club. As a result I got a nasty dig next day from the Adjutant, and was told that I was orderly officer for the whole of next week; normally you do orderly officer only a day at a time.

This was a nuisance, since the orderly officer has to stay in barracks, but the worst of it was that I would miss the great Hogmanay party on New Year’s Eve. To Highlanders, of course, Christmas is a pagan festival which they are perfectly prepared to enjoy as long as no one sees them doing it, but Hogmanay is the night of the year. Then they sing and drink and eat and drink and reminisce and drink, and the New Year comes in in a tartan, whisky-flavoured haze. The regimental police shut up shop, haggis is prepared in quantity, black bun is baked, the padre preaches a sermon reminding everyone that New Year is a time for rededication (“ye can say that again, meenister”, murmurs a voice at the back), and the sergeants extend their annual invitation to the officers.

This is the great event. The Colonel forms the officers up as a platoon, and marches them to the sergeants’ mess, where they are greeted with the singing of “We are Fred Karno’s Army”, or some other appropriate air, and the festivities go on until well into the next morning. The point was that the sergeants’ mess was outside barracks, so as orderly officer I would be unable to attend.

Not that I minded, particularly, but it would be a very silent, sober night in barracks all by myself, and even if you are not a convivial type, when you are in a Scottish regiment you feel very much out of it if you are on your own on Hogmanay. Anyway, there it was; I mounted my guards and inspected my cookhouses during that week, and on December 31 I had had about enough of it. The battalion was on holiday; the Jocks were preparing to invade the town en masse (“there’ll be a rerr terr in the toon the night”, I heard McClusky remarking to one of the other batmen), and promptly at seven o’clock the Colonel marched off the officers, every one dressed in his best, for the sergeants’ mess.

After they had gone, I strolled across the empty parade ground in the dusk, and mooched around the deserted company offices. I decided that the worst bit of it was that every Jock in the battalion knew that the new subaltern was on defaulters, and therefore an object of pity and derision. Having thought this, I promptly rebuked myself for self-pity, and whistled all the way back to my quarters.

I heard Last Post at ten o’clock, watched the first casualty of the night being helped into the cells, saw that the guard were reasonably sober, and returned to my room. There was nothing to do now until about 4 a.m., when I would inspect the picquets, so I climbed into my pyjamas and into bed, setting my alarm clock on the side table. I smoked a little, and read a little, and dozed a little, and from time to time very distant sounds of revelry drifted through the African night. The town would be swinging on its hinges, no doubt.

It must have been about midnight that I heard feet on the gravel outside, and a muttering of voices in the dark. There was a clinking noise which indicated merry-makers, but they were surprisingly quiet considering the occasion. The footsteps came into the building, and up the corridor, and there was a knock on my door.

I switched on the light and opened up. There were five of them, dressed in the best tartans they had put on for Hogmanay. There was McClusky, my batman, Daft Bob Brown, Fletcher of the wooden countenance, Forbes, and Leishman. Brown carried a paper bag which obviously contained bottles, and Forbes had a carton of beer under his arm. For a moment we looked at each other.

“Well,” I said at last. “Hullo.”

Then we looked at each other some more, in silence, while I wondered what this was in aid of, and then I searched for something further to say—the situation was fairly unusual. Finally I said,

“Won’t you come in?”

They filed in, Daft Bob almost dropping the bottles and being rebuked in hideous terms by Fletcher. I closed the door, and said wouldn’t they sit down, and Leishman and Daft Bob sat on my room-mate’s empty bed, Fletcher placed himself on the only chair, and Forbes and McClusky sat on the floor. They looked sidelong at each other.

“Well,” I said. “This is nice.”

There was a pause, and then Fletcher said,

“Uh-huh”.

I thought furiously for something to say. “Er, I thought you were going into the town, McClusky?”

He looked sheepish. “Ach, the toon. Naethin’ doin’. Deid quiet.”

“Wisnae bad, though, at the Blue Heaven,” said Daft Bob. “Some no’ bad jiggin’.” (Dancing, that is.)

“Ach, jiggin’,” said Fletcher contemptuously. “Nae talent in this toon.”

“I’m sorry,” I said, conscious that in these unusual circumstances I was nevertheless the host. “I don’t have anything …”

“… in the hoose,” said Leishman unexpectedly, and we laughed.

“No’ tae worry,” said Fletcher. He slapped Daft Bob sharply on the knee. “C’mon, you. Gie the man a drink.”

“Comin’ up,” said Daft Bob, and produced a bottle of beer from his bag. He held it out to me.

“In the name o’ the wee man,” said Fletcher. “Where the hell were you brought up? Gie ’im a glass, ya mug.”

Daft Bob said, “Ach!” and rummaged for tumblers, McClusky came to his assistance, and Fletcher abused them both, striking them sharply about the knees and wrists. Finally we were all provided for, and Fletcher said,

“Aye, weel, here’s tae us.”

“Wha’s like us?” said McClusky.

“Dam’ few,” said Forbes.

“And they’re a’ deid,” I said, completing the ritual.

“Aw-haw-hey,” said Daft Bob and we drank.

Conversationally, I asked: “What brought you over this way?”

They grinned at each other, and Forbes whistled the bugle call “You can be a defaulter as long as you like as long as you answer your na-a-a-me”. They all chuckled and shook their heads.

I understood. In my own way, I was on defaulters.

“Fill them up, ye creature ye,” said Fletcher to Daft Bob, and this time Daft Bob, producing more glasses from his bag, gave us whisky as well. It occurred to me that the penalty for an officer drinking in his own billet with enlisted men was probably death, or the equivalent, but frankly, if Montgomery himself had appeared in the doorway I couldn’t have cared less.

“They’re fair gaun it up at the sergeants’ mess,” said Forbes. “Ah heard the Adjutant singing ‘Roll me over’.”

“Sair heids the morn,” said McClusky primly.

“The Jeep’ll be away for ile again,” said Leishman.

“The Jeep?” I said.

“Captain Bennet-Bruce,” said Fletcher. “Your mate.”

“Oh,” I said.

“Stoap cuddlin’ that bottle tae yerself as if it wis Wee Willie, the collier’s dyin’ child,” said Fletcher to Daft Bob.

“Ye’d think you’d paid for it,” said Daft Bob, indignantly. “Honest, sir, d’ye hear him? Ah hate him. I do.”

They snarled at each other, happily, and the quiet Forbes shook his head at me as over wayward children. We refilled the glasses, and I handed round cigarettes, and a few minutes later we were refilling them again, and Leishman, tapping his foot on the floor, was starting to hum gently. McClusky, after an anxious glance at me, took it up, and they sang “The Muckin’ o’ Geordie’s Byre”—for Leishman was an Aberdonian, and skilled in that strange tongue.

“That’s a right teuchter song,” said Fletcher, and gave tongue: