It took them fifteen boneshaking minutes to get to a small town called Montvilliers. Milne let the tender trundle around the main square, its headlights washing over a drifting population of troops – a few French, some Australians, but mostly British. Only the occasional French soldier wore red and blue; otherwise khaki was everywhere. Khaki puttees, khaki breeches, khaki tunic, khaki cap. The world was brown. A French civilian, all white moustaches and rusty black clothes, looked wrong, looked foreign. “That’s for us,” Milne said, and parked outside a bar-café called Le Trictrac.”Are we late for something?” Appleyard asked; but Milne was already out of the cab and heading for the bar.
“What’s the panic?” Tim Piggott said, rubbing his backside. “He nearly got us up to flying speed, for God’s sake.”
“Beats me, old boy,” the adjutant said. “I’ve never seen him like this before.”
The airmen trailed into the bar. The atmosphere was a warm stew of tobacco smoke, wine fumes and noise. Milne had found an empty table, and a waitress who looked about twelve years old was bringing him bottles and glasses.
“You are a sweet little thing,” he said, kissing her hand,”and later on I shall devour you in one bite with an apple in your mouth. Sit down, you sluggards. Have a drink. You’re just in time for the cabaret.”
“The way you drove, we were nearly in time for eternity,” Goss said.
“If it’s built to do sixty miles an hour,” said Milne,”it’s obviously meant to do sixty miles an hour.”
Jimmy Duncan was gazing about the room. “I don’t see any cabaret,” he said.
“Who speaks Russian?” Milne was pouring wine by running the bottle up and down a row of glasses. Nobody answered. “All right, who speaks anything? Cheers.”
They all drank. “I’ve got a bit of Spanish,” said an observer called Mayo.
“That’ll do. Remember to wave your arms.” Milne climbed onto the table and shouted for silence. Eventually the gentle roar of talk faded to nothing. “Gentlemen, tonight we are privileged,” he announced. Derision came back like an echo. “We are indeed privileged,” he cried, “because here tonight is a member of the Russian royal family, none other than His Highness Prince Boris Romanoff!” Milne led the applause. Mayo reluctantly stood, waved once, and would have sat down if Milne had not seized his shoulder. “Prince Boris would like to say a few words in his native tongue,” he said. “I shall translate.”
Mayo clambered onto the table. He didn’t look like a Russian prince. He was short and stocky, slightly bow-legged, with very wide shoulders and a heavy black moustache. He looked more like a gamekeeper or a ghillie.
“Buenas noches”, he mumbled. “El menu, por favor”.
“His highness says you are the bravest of the brave!” Milne cried. “Everyone in Russia is thrilled by your deeds of tremendous courage. People stop each other in the street to exchange tales of the glorious Gloucesters, the wonderful Warwicks, the invincible Irish Rifles, the incomparable Cameron Highlanders…” Men from each regiment cheered at the sound of its name until the combined din made Milne pause. “Together we shall squeeze the Huns from east and west until their eyeballs pop out,” Milne told the troops. Huge cheer.
“Guadalahara”, Mayo announced.
“Prince Boris recommends to you a traditional Russian drinking game known as the Boat Race,” Milne said. “Each team has eight drinkers. Kindly pick your team! Prince Boris has generously agreed to buy the drink for everyone.”
“Caramba!” Mayo said; but in the storm of applause his voice was lost.
The waiters had retired. The King’s health had been drunk. The smoke from three hundred cigars rose and mingled and mellowed the light from the chandeliers. Decanters of port slid softly from hand to hand. A great, cathedral hush possessed the room, with only a rare and well-cushioned belch to point up the silence. Lord Trafford, swaying slightly, making an occasional irrelevant gesture but without a note to assist him, was delivering his presidential speech, as tradition required, in Latin. He was reaching the end of his second joke.
“Omne ignotum pro magnifico,” he said, “et certe errare est humanum”. He paused to let that sink in, but only briefly; his main thrust was yet to come. ” Et fortasse virtus incendit vires, sed non licet in bello bis peccare.”
Everyone saw the point. It was a show-stopper, and Trafford knew he had ample time to sip his wine, while their laughter surged and sank and surged again, until it was crowned with warm applause. Trafford smiled at the friendly blur which, without his glasses and with a mixed litre of wine inside him, was all that he could see. He knew there were three jokes still to come, each one a sure-fire crackerjack.
“Prince Boris will start the Boat Race by dropping his handkerchief,” Milne announced. “Are you ready?”
“Enchilada”, Mayo told him.
“Not you, fathead,” Milne muttered. “Them.”
Eight teams were lined up: four from infantry regiments, two lots of sappers, one set of gunners, and an entry from Hornet Squadron. Each team had eight men standing on a bench, and each man held a tumbler brimful of red wine. As Mayo raised his handkerchief there came a shout and a crash from the back of the team of the Warwickshire Regiment. “Sorry, sir,” their leader said. “We just lost a bloke. No head for heights, see.”
“Let me take this opportunity of reminding you all of the rules,” Milne said. “No man starts to drink until the man in front has emptied his glass, turned it upside down and put it on his head. Anyone who cheats begins again with a full glass. Puking, or falling off the boat, disqualifies the whole team. Good, I see the Warwicks are at full strength again…”
Mayo dropped his handkerchief.
The leaders of each team began drinking, gulping, gasping, sometimes choking and spluttering. The tumblers were deep and the wine was raw. All around, troops roared encouragement, stamping and whistling.
“I say, old boy,” the adjutant said. “D’you think this is such a good idea?”
“Piss off, Uncle.”
“Half of them are fairly bottled already, you know.”
“Yes, I do know. And the other half are going to be completely bottled soon, you watch.”
The Warwicks lost to the Gloucesters by a couple of moüthfuls. The Irish Rifles romped home after a young sapper tried too hard and poured a flood of wine up his nose. Two Cameron Highlanders got into a fight while their team was leading the other sappers, fell off the bench and were disqualified. Hornet Squadron came from behind to beat the artillerymen.
“The draw for the semi-finals,” Milne declared,”is the Gloucesters against the Irish Rifles and the sappers against the airmen.”
“Look here, Rufus,” Piggott said, hiccuping painfully,”why don’t we call a halt now?”
“What? And let the others down?”
“Thing is, if we win again we’ll have to drink again.”
“Twice, at least. The finals are best of three. That’s how they do it in Russia. Don’t they, Boris?”
“You feeling quite all right, Rufus?” Piggott asked.
“Fine. You look bloody awful, but I feel fine.”
“I don’t care how many nuns got raped in Belgium,” James Yeo said. “That speech was the biggest atrocity of this or any war.”
“Bags me those chandeliers,” Essex said.
“Better hurry,” Foster advised. He was lobbing coffee-cups over the next table. Nearby, there was a violent splitting and rending as a group of staff officers began ripping a door from its hinges. A brigadier wandered by and punched Ogilvy in the head. “That’s for hitting me with a bread roll,” he said amiably, and punched him again. “And that’s for missing. Bloody awful marksmanship.” He wandered off, dodging a crossfire of crockery and crystal. “Told you he wasn’t Bunny Bradley,” Foster said. “Not a hint of a stutter.” Ogilvy picked himself up. The first chandelier came down like a bomb.