Adrian took a deep breath. ‘Come on, boy, left, right, left.’
As we went in, the sergeant major stood up, leant across his desk and stuck out a hand to introduce himself in a thick Scottish accent. Hurrying across the narrow shop, I was first to it. It was warm and soft. He was a bear of a man, with thick glasses on a large ruddy face guarded by a sergeant major’s curly moustache. He wore tight green trousers and polished brown brogues. Over his barrel chest was stretched a thick woollen jumper, and a wide red belt encircled his large girth, a brass buckle shining resplendent at the centre. Sewn onto the left breast of the jumper was a balloon-like para motif, and on the sleeve were three inverted V-shapes with a crown in the indent. On his right breast was a small, discreet enamelled badge bearing the word FALKLANDS.
‘H-he’s come to join,’ I stammered, looking between Adrian and the sergeant major.
Surreptitiously Adrian squeezed my wrist. ‘We’ve both come to join,’ he dug a nail into my skin. It hurt and I felt a trickle of something warm, but I decided I’d take it: no pain.
The sergeant major ironed a corner of his moustache between two stubby fingers and stared at us. ‘What’s it gonna be, who’s joining?’
‘We both are,’ said Adrian quickly.
‘Comedians, hey? Take a wee look around ye, see if anything catches yer eye.’ The sergeant major shook his head and sank back into his chair.
The army recruitment office had once been a video arcade with slot machines lined up against each wall; the owner was a thin fella we called Uncle Stan. I can still picture Stan, counting tall stacks of coins behind a counter where the sergeant major’s desk now sat. I peered closely at the pictures that had replaced the slot machines: a green helicopter firing a missile at a Russian tank; the view through a submarine periscope with hairlines dead centre over a ship on the horizon; a troop of soldiers kitted out like green monsters in nuclear-biological-chemical-protective suits, their rifles held before them with fixed bayonets and behind them a lunar landscape.
Adrian and I bent over a leaflet rack next to the door, thumbing through brochures. I picked up one with a picture of a dagger on the front. ‘What’s happening?’ I whispered. ‘I thought you were enlisting?’
‘I dare you,’ he said.
‘What would my dad say?’
‘Thought you had left him.’ For a brief moment his jaw slackened as though he himself was unsure, and then he continued, ‘You owe me!’
The sergeant major wrote very slowly as he took down our particulars — names, age and addresses — and afterwards he tapped the nib of his pen on the paper as though he had to think about the details it listed. He squeezed his chin, looked at me, back at the paper and again at me. Adrian and I sat in chairs facing him across the desk.
‘What are ye, son? Are ye a Hindoo?’
‘He’s a Muslim,’ said Adrian, his eyes flicking to the name badge on the desk, ‘Recruiting Sergeant Major Mackay, a Muslim, no law against that.’
The sergeant major peered over his glasses. ‘Are ye sure about this?’
I nodded.
‘Have ye talked it over with yer family?’ He clicked the pen against his teeth.
‘He’s old enough, isn’t he?’ Adrian said.
The sergeant major stared again at the paperwork as though perplexed, then back at us through narrowed eyes. ‘Ye’re both seventeen, so ye dinnae need parental consent.’
Adrian settled back in his chair and grinned. ‘That’s what I thought!’
‘In the army ye lads could learn a trade. We have cooks, drivers, engineers and medics, even bricklayers. Almost everything ye have on Civvy Street, we have an equivalent in the army.’
I shrugged my shoulders.
‘Ah myself first enlisted in the Army Intelligence Corps,’ the sergeant major said proudly. ‘Ye’ll need a trade when ye’re back. ’
‘Sir, Sergeant Major Mackay, with respect, we want to be soldiers,’ said Adrian.
‘Rough and tumble, hey? Ah got caught by that wee bug too.’ He pointed to the para badge sewn onto his breast. ‘Well, let’s have a wee look. ’ He thumbed through a Rolodex next to a large green telephone on his desk. I looked at Adrian excitedly, wondering if he was thinking what I was thinking — that the sergeant major was about to call someone up and send us over there and then.
‘So a Muslim, hey?’ He seemed defeated by the idea and continued to flick through the cards on his Rolodex, his brow visibly reddening. A solitary bead of sweat trickled down it.
I spoke up. ‘Sergeant Major Mackay, my grandfather fought in the Second World War, in the Indian army, but he was fighting for the British.’
‘Muslims, Pakis, they’re everywhere, and they’re as English as we are,’ Adrian added.
‘Ah, of course.’ The sergeant major relaxed back into his chair. ‘Fine fighting men. Yer grandfather, was he on the Asian Front or in Europe?’
‘He was taken prisoner by the Japanese, sir.’
‘Terrible, wicked. ’ He stared at the paperwork on his desk and shook his head. He looked at me again, but now he seemed to inspect me in a kinder manner, as though he was no longer afraid. ‘Strong family history. Very good, lad.’ He turned to Adrian. ‘And ye, chap?’
‘BEF, sir. After that POW in France. Escaped, shot and captured, escaped again, then Home Guard on account of shrapnel in one eye.’
I looked at Adrian. There was no sign of pride on his face; it was as though what he was relating was expected, normal. I was struck suddenly by the thought that it was normal and expected: during the war, fighting had been the duty of all Englishmen. This was the first time I had ever articulated my grandfather’s achievements and suddenly I felt proud that we, the Khans, had been part of the gora war.
‘We’ll let him off for that,’ said the sergeant major. Forming a fist with both hands, he put it to his chin and leant forward, speaking slowly. ‘War is the terrible reality of killing another man, and the world we live in calls upon men like us to do that job.’ We leant forward too, our faces inches from his. This was something serious and we were almost part of it.
The sergeant major took down some further information: the names of our parents, our school, and that of our old headmaster, whom he said he knew and would call for a reference.
Adrian handed him the leaflets we had picked up. The sergeant major shuffled cursorily through them, then placed the pile neatly on his desk and slid it back towards us. ‘Army Air Corps?’ He shook his head. ‘Ya gonna need qualifications for that, and the Paras.’ In homage he put his right hand to his left breast. ‘They’re always recruiting, always looking for the right stuff.’ Although he did it very discreetly, I saw him look us up and down. ‘And the guards’ regiments — well, there’s policy and there’s policy, if ye know what ah mean.’ He put a conspiratorial finger to his nose. ‘Not that ah agree with it, a man’s a man and that, so the bard said, ach but there’s no use sending ye along only to be turned down at the outset now, is there, lads?’
We shook our heads in agreement like small children. Outside there was a sudden downpour.
‘Now. ’ he paused for effect, ‘the Yeomanry are a fine local regiment. They begin their next round of basic training in a fortnight’s time. Ah suppose. ’ He stopped again.
I looked over at Adrian.
Sergeant Major Mackay thought for a moment longer, squeezing his chin. ‘The HQ’s not far from here and they like to recruit locally. Light infantry and reconnaissance.’ He looked us up and down again, more obviously this time. ‘Strong lads like ye, suit ye both to a tee.’
Yeomanry. It was a fine word. A word that was as old as England. Reconnaissance — I pictured Adrian and me in nuclear uniforms hiding behind a bush then leaping out, guns blazing, the enemy caught entirely by surprise.