A Man Could Stand Up - Ford Madox Ford [58]
'I shall apply to have you transferred to the Jewish regiment. In the meantime you can go back to the First Line Transport. You shouldn't have been a Left journalist and have a name like Eisenstein. One or the other. Not both.' The man said the name had been inflicted on his ancestry in the Middle Ages. He would prefer to be called Esau, as a son of that tribe. He pleaded not to be sent to the Jewish regiment, which was believed to be in Mesopotamia, just when the fighting there was at its most interesting.
'You're probably thinking of writing a book,' Tietjens said. 'Well, there are all Abana and Pharpar to write about. I'm sorry. But you're intelligent enough to see that I can't take...' He stopped, fearing that if the Sergeant heard any more the men might make it hot for the fellow as a suspect.. He was annoyed at having asked his name before the Sergeant. He appeared to be a good man. Jews could fight...And hunt!...But he wasn't going to take any risks. The man, dark-eyed and erect, flinched a little, gazing into Tietjens' eyes.
'I suppose you can't, sir,' he said. 'It's a disappointment. I'm not writing anything. I want to go on in the Army. I like the life.'
Tietjens said:
'I'm sorry, Smith. I can't help it. Fall out!' He was sorry. He believed the fellow. But responsibility hardens the heart. It must. A very short time ago he would have taken trouble over that fellow. A great deal of trouble, very likely. Now he wasn't going to...
A large capital 'A' in whitewash decorated the piece of corrugated iron that was derelictly propped against a channel at right angles to the trench. To Tietjens' astonishment a strong impulse like a wave of passion influenced his being towards the left--up that channel. It wasn't funk: it wasn't any sort of funk. He had been rather irritatedly wrapped up in the case of Private Smith-Eisenstein. It had undeniably irritated him to have to break the chances of a Jew and Red Socialist. It was the sort of thing one did not do if one were omnipotent--as he was. Then...this strong impulse?...It was a passionate desire to go where you could find exact intellect: rest.
He thought he suddenly understood. For the Lincolnshire Sergeant-Major the word Peace meant that a man could stand up on a hill. For him it meant someone to talk to.
V
The Colonel said:
'Look here, Tietjens, lend me two hundred and fifty quid. They say you're a damn beastly rich fellow. My accounts are all out. I've got a loathsome complaint. My friends have all gone back on me. I shall have to face a Court of Enquiry if I go home. But my nerve's gone. I've got to go home.'
He added:
'I daresay you knew all that.'
From the sudden fierce hatred that he felt at the thought of giving money to this man, Tietjens knew that his inner mind based all his calculations on the idea of living with Valentine Wannop...when men could stand up on hills.
He had found the Colonel in his cellar--it really, actually was a cellar, the remains of a farm--sitting on the edge of his camp-bed, in his shorts, his khaki shirt very open at the neck. His eyes were a little bloodshot, but his cropped, silver-grey hair was accurately waved, his grey moustache beautifully pointed. His silver-backed hair-brushes and a small mirror were indeed on the table in front of him. By the rays of the lamp that, hung overhead, rendered that damp stone place faintly nauseating, he looked keen, clean and resolute. Tietjens wondered how he would look by daylight. He had remarkably seldom seen the fellow by daylight. Beside the mirror and the brushes lay, limply, an unfilled pipe, a red pencil and the white buff papers from Whitehall that Tietjens had already read.
He had begun by looking at Tietjens with a keen, hard, bloodshot glance. He had said:
'You think you can command this battalion? Have you any experience? It appears you suggest that I take