James.  “BUT I HAVE.  I’VE DRAWN THE RED CORPUSCLES IN THE BLOOD OF A FROG.”]

* * * * *

A FLEETING DETACHMENT.

Private Albert Snape, A.S.C. (M.T.), stepped off the footboard of X.33, a mediaeval Vanguard, and splashed his way round to the driver.  “I’m fair sick o’ this ’ere Flanders, I am,” he complained, expectorating dolorously into the sea of mud; “’spose it ‘ull be up to the blinkin’ axles before February?” He stirred the mixture with a cautious foot.

“Not ’arf, ole sport,” replied the driver, carefully unsticking a cigarette from his underlip.  “But yer ought to ’ave bin out larst winter, then yer did ’ave to sit above yerself to keep yer tootsies dry.”

“Wot—­wuss than this?” exclaimed the disconsolate one.

“Wuss!” was the withering retort.  “Wy, when I tells yer that some o’ them Naval ‘Umming-birds, t’other side o’ Popinjay, fitted out an ole Blue ‘Ammersmith with a pair o’ propellers ...  Wuss!” He exhaled scornfully and gave a turn to the lubricator.

“Any chance o’ getting down Vermelly way?  They say it ain’t ’arf bad there.”  Albert brightened up at the thought.

“’Tain’t likely,” was the sharp and unsympathetic reply. “’Oo do yer think’s goin’ ter do this little job if they takes our lot away?  Wy, this ’ere road is just like ’Igh ’Olborn to me; I knows all the ’umps and ’ollows blindfold.”

Albert returned to the stern sheets and considered the most feasible method of desertion.

Half-an-hour later, when the daylight had gone, X.33, generously over-flowing with a detachment of the 20th Mudlarkers, was, in company with many other vehicles, making her inharmonious way along the “Wipers” road.  Judging from the plunginess of her progress and the fluent language of the man of oil, it was evident that some of the “’umps and ’ollows” had passed from the driver’s memory.  Not that such a slight matter could damp the spirits of the passengers.  Rather it served to entertain them.

“We ‘ave gone an’ fallen out of the dress-circle this time,” a voice exclaimed after an extra steep dive into a badly-filled shell crater.

Albert, wet and unsociable, hung gloomily on to the back rail.

“Carn’t see wot they got to be so blinkin’ ’appy abart,” he muttered savagely; “I don’t believe it’s ’arf bad in them trenches.”  He ruminated bitterly on the thought that his job was probably the worst one on the whole front, and made a resolve to put the matter right.

When the final stopping-place had been reached and the 20th Mudlarkers, after the usual indescribable melee, had been put upon the path that would ultimately lead them (if they were fortunate enough to avoid all guides, philosophers and friends) to their trench, the man of oil was profanely grieved to discover that Albert Snape had abandoned X33 for the unknown.

As a matter of fact Albert had slipped away and followed the Mudlarkers, with a hazy idea that a rifle would fortuitously present itself.  That an extra unit could possibly be noticed never occurred to him.  He had a vague intention of joining a cavalry regiment.  Very soon he lost the Mudlarkers, and then, by an easy sequence of events, himself.