Kipling's Choice (4 page)

The chalky field by the Bois Hugo is covered with dark spots from shell explosions, the rims colored red from bleeding bodies. John lies powerless on his side and focuses on that one foot, the tip of his low black army shoe. He is covered in white dust.

 

"They will shine like a mirror!"

It is so quiet at Warley Barracks that you can hear the wind blowing through the rose beds. The drill sergeant steps past the row of officer candidates and peers at them, boys still, standing stiffly at attention. Only the creak of leather from his coal-black shoes on the concrete pierces through the menacing silence now and then. He turns on his heel and stops by John Kipling. Since John is the smallest, he is standing at the front of the line.

"Isn't that so,
Mister
Kipling?"

"Yes,
sir!
"John says, and swallows.

"Like a mirror!"

John is familiar with military drills from his days at Wellington School. Still, this sergeant-major isn't easy. He has at most a few weeks to take these budding officers, these schoolboys, and mold them into obedient lieutenants who will soon be commanding their own men.

The modern khaki uniforms are inspected: green puttees wound tightly around the calves from the knee to the ankle; the pistol belt at the middle of the coat, with two leather bands rising straight over the shoulders. The sergeant-major inspects each detail. John feels the sweat streaming down his face and neck. The officer lets his eye fall on the flat knapsack. Is the thick winter coat securely tucked away? And who lashed his woolen blanket over his pack like a crushed sausage? He zigzags among the recruits and here and there taps his stick on a hip bag or a bayonet in its sheath. John puffs under his thirty kilos of equipment. Even the ten cartridge holders are full of ammunition; they are contained in five leather pouches mounted on the left and right straps, under the breast pocket. Slung over his shoulder is a rifle, heavy as lead and as tall as John himself.

Just give me a revolver,
John thinks. If he could get his gold star, he would gladly exchange this long Enfield for an officer's pistol.

And that gold star comes very quickly. The war won't wait and it is consuming many officers. On the very day John receives his star, he is standing in front of a platoon of new boys and shouting himself hoarse. John is being drilled on how to drill under the watchful eye of an aging sergeant.

"I'm losing my voice," John writes home, "and my feet are swollen and pinched in those new shoes, but otherwise a soldier's life is wonderful! Sorry, an
officer's
life! For today we've gotten our gold stars."

"That star will be celebrated appropriately," Daddo writes back on the day he receives John's letter. He promises to buy his son a car.

"A Singer?" John's roommates ask in surprise.

"Not a sewing machine, an automobile," John explains. He nods and passes the letter from one bed to the other.

"I honestly don't think that there is a better car to buy," writes his father, the car fanatic. "She is unbelievably strong and fast, and handles so well. And she's terribly attractive."

John's friends are amused as he reads Daddo's letter aloud while stretched out on his bed.

"Of course that little car must have a name," the old Kipling goes on.

John continues: "It must be a famous singer, Patti or Caruso or perhaps Depeche Melba!"

"Car-Uso? Yes, that's a singer. A
real
Singer!" Everyone laughs.

The letter is passed from hand to hand.

"Next week we're scooting over to the city to the theater or the Music Hall!" John croaks in his worn-out voice. "Three candidates are sought!" He jumps on top of his iron bed. "Who's going to London with me?"

Chaos breaks out and a list is quickly drawn up.

A few days later the Kiplings pull up in front of the barracks gate. John's sister, Elsie, is at the wheel of John's gleaming Singer, with Daddo seated beside her. Mummy and the chauffeur follow in the
Green Goblin.
It is a happy reunion, with Colonel Bobs, too. John has a pass for that evening. After the mandatory tour of Warley Barracks, during which Mummy continually asks how her poor boy can stand living without any comforts in such a decrepit shack, the flashy party departs in two cars for Brown's Hotel in London. Shortly before midnight, just before his pass runs out, John tears into Brentwood in his Singer.

***

A howling shell skims over the bushes and explodes, carving the sky into a thousand gray, smoking pieces. For one second all is still; then the battlefield is again full of the rattling of machine guns and the cracking of rifle shots.

"We can't leave him here, just look at him."

"He'll never make it, man. He took a direct hit," calls a voice without emotion.

"If this fellow survives, he'll get a one-way ticket home."

A penetrating hiss that drowns out the rifle salvos turns into a raucous whistling sound; it is difficult to determine where it is coming from.

"Look out!" calls a third voice somewhat farther away. "That's for us!"

John can only shut his eyes. A rumbling shakes the earth up under his back. Three seconds later a rolling wave of warm dirt mixed with stinking gunpowder smoke rains down on him.

Home, yes, home!
John prays. He no longer tries to talk. A burning pain creeps into his face, mouth, and neck. He clenches his fists and stamps his good leg in utter despair.

Home, Mummy!

Everything is spinning before his eyes.

I'm ... I'm falling ... I'm falling ... No, don't die! Not now, not yet, no! Hold me back!

 

"Finally, young man. Welcome home!" Carrie Kipling says as she falls into her son's arms. He pulls off his leather racing helmet and goggles and throws them into the open Singer.

"Hi, sis," John says and gives Elsie a quick kiss. "Could you put this machine in the garage?"

Elsie jumps over the car door and drives away in a graceful curve. She takes a short spin through the winding streets, between the tall hedges, and uphill to the center of Burwash. She chugs past the back of the garden ten minutes later. John and Mummy are chatting by the hearth.

"You've changed, my boy. You seem much older." Mummy pulls John out of the easy chair and inspects him. "You're a real officer and gentleman in that uniform."

John beams. He shakes the dust from his coat and examines himself in the mirror. Noticing his mother's worried look in the reflection, he turns around.

"Alas, still no news of George Cecil," Mummy says, reading John's thoughts. She sighs. "Rudyard is doing what he can. He even visited the area near the battlefield at Mons."

"I know," says John. He adjusts his green tie. "Information is scanty for us, too."

"Poor Lady Cecil." She sighs again. "And surely there are many other families that receive no news. Everyone must sacrifice."

John is startled by the number of names she can list. Names with question marks beside them; names of acquaintances, often friends of his and friends of his sister's, too, sons from high society who in these first weeks of war are already missing, badly wounded, or dead.

"Soon I'll have no one to go out with," Elsie cries all of a sudden.

John hadn't noticed that his sister was in the room. She runs up the stairs before he can react.

Mother and son stand by helplessly. Mummy looks outside. John sets his pince-nez firmly on his nose and shrugs his narrow shoulders. Then he breaks the awkward silence. "So Daddo is reporting for the newspaper?"

"Unfortunately. He would have wanted to see you very much. But who knows? He is not far away this time. He's visiting training camps in Larkhill, Bournemouth, and Salisbury Plain."

"You mean our overseas troops who have just arrived." John knows about it from Daddo's letters.

Mummy nods. "You know him," she says, laughing. "Chatting with Canadians, South Africans, and especially Indians. He'll feel right at home. A big child, that's your Daddo."

"Was he terribly shocked by Belgium?" John asks, remembering what his father wrote him about those wounded at Mons. He visited them in the English field hospitals.

"More than he cares to admit." She sighs.

"With a bit of luck I'll be heading into it by the end of the year, Mummy," he says. He blinks. "France!"

But John remains in England. He celebrates Christmas of 1914 with his family at the Aitkens' home in Leatherhead, not far from his barracks. Despite his enthusiasm, his military training has been more difficult than he thought it would be. The harsh outdoor life during the raw winter months undermines his health. And the spartan regime inside the barracks puts too great a strain on his frail constitution. He works himself to the bone, and though his superiors are full of praise, he won't be sent to the front for the time being. "Patience, Lieutenant," he hears constantly. "You're still so young." But John is afraid that everything will be over before he gets a chance to fight. In mid-January 1915, he is overcome by fatigue and stress. He is so exhausted that he has to go home for a little while. His mother spoils him like a baby. She doesn't mention another word about the growing list of acquaintances who are missing in action. Friends and sons of friends who seemed to be adolescents just a year ago are now at their final resting places somewhere in Flanders or France.

 

John enjoys the rest and the luxury of home. He doesn't even object to Mummy's reading to him when he lies in bed or on the sofa, just as she used to do. Fashion magazines such as
Tatler,
the satirical
Punch,
sometimes a book.
Sherlock Holmes
is nice.
Strange,
John thinks,
that my father's stories also give me a good feeling again. All those years when
everyone jeered at me, gave me names from animal stories, grilled me about Daddo—they were either jealous or nosy. Oh, those books! And yet, now that I'm home, all washed out, that one little piece from Father's
Jungle Book
constantly comes to mind:

 

Mowgli laid his head down on Bagheera's back and slept so deeply that he never waked when he was put down in the home-cave.

***

"Officers aren't exactly poor sods, I tell you."

"Certainly not this one. Just look, what a fine chain."

"Let me see. Hmmm. It's silver, don't you think?"

Why are they fumbling with my coat?
John wonders, dazed.
Is the attack over? It's so quiet. There are a couple of shots in the distance. Pain, terrible pain. Who are those men there? Help me. Don't leave me behind!

John can't turn his blood-soaked head. Black shadows pass through his narrow field of vision in front of the low-lying sun. The silhouettes talk in subdued voices and act as though he isn't there. A quick hand unbuttons his breast pocket.

"Bingo! What a splendid pocket watch!"

"A Hunter. That's worth a fortune. With that chain—" "'J.K.' is on the back. And it's still ticking. Exactly six o'clock."

From far away a church clock chimes imperturbably through the short, deafening silence.

Six o'clock ...
The words reverberate through John's empty head and carry him four months back in time, from northern France to the south of England, from the front to the army barracks.

 

"Six o'clock. Dismissed!"

The recruits scatter about the courtyard. Five minutes later John and his friends from the Irish Guards are driving to London in the open Singer. They tear through the street and disappear in a cloud of blue smoke and dust. It is the end of May 1915 and John is on standby for the front. The time has finally come; it's just a matter of days. That's what he hopes, at least. But since he regularly gets a night pass, he and his mates take the car to the city and stay out until the wee hours of the morning.

"Easy does it, young man," his mother admonished him in April, when once again he was sent home for two weeks, completely exhausted.

"That's my boy!" Daddo writes to his son after John describes his nightly escapades at the trendy Savoy Hotel and other pricey nightclubs. When he and Ma think about their frail boy, they are reminded that "in the army you become a man." Daddo believes that no diversion is too expensive for his only son. And perhaps later on he won't be able to indulge him at all, although the elder Kipling doesn't talk about that. Every risk at the front has been thoroughly banished from his thoughts. He laughs heartily at the nightly hell-raising in Car-Uso, which John and his friends bring back to the dreary army barracks by dawn. "That's my boy!" the great writer thinks, delighted. His little boy is becoming a man. And a man must do what is expected of him, certainly in wartime.
Pro patria, pro rege,
for king and country.

***

Damn, those cowards are going to undress me completely. God! Help me! All I can do is move my one leg and my hand a little. Come here, you pathetic grave robbers, you filthy swine, I'll kick you anywhere I can!

"This lieutenant's an angry little bugger, eh, Matt?"

"Surely he's having convulsions?"

I haven't given up, just wait, you idiots. Get your hands out of my pockets! Owww! Don't move me, you bastards, the pain is killing me! If I could just get my revolver. Oh Mummy, help me!

"That wallet isn't up to much, Dick."

Crap! I'll put a bullet through your heads, you scum! And then I'll shoot myself. Mummy! Let me go. I'm going to throw up, I can feel it, no...

"Hey Matt, you've got to see this!"

"Give it here. Ah, a photo taken in the snow. This little chap must be rolling in money. Expensive ski holidays with friends, well, well—"

"While we were slaving away in that stinking factory."

Holiday? Snow? Oh yes, Engelberg. Daddo, my dear Daddo! And look, Oscar, good old Oscar Hornung.

 

Second Lieutenant J. Kipling
Mr. and Mrs. R. Kipling, Bateman's
Burwash (Sussex)

5 August 1915
Warley Barracks, Brentwood (Essex)