Mussolini_ His Part in My Downfall - Spike Milligan [57]
Mind you, one doesn’t get crabs every day, not even at the fishmongers.
The terrible crab-ridden M.2 team
NOVEMBER 23, 1943
“Milligan? Fildes?” a voice of authority calls. It tells us we are to take twenty-four hours’ rations, drive to the top of Monte Croce and set up the wireless relay station.
“They say the reason for the bad reception is adverse metals,” said Fildes.
Adverse metals? I thought. “What are adverse metals?”
“Fuck knows,” he said.
“Do you think it’s the metal rings on the laceholes in our boots?” Fildes shrugged.
“Adverse Metals,” I intoned repeatedly. It was a lovely phrase. I buzzed up the now crab-free Edgington.
“Hello,” replied an angry voice, obviously suffering from burning balls.
“Is Edgington there?”
“Yes, I’m here, what you want?”
“How is the old Scorched Scrotum?”
“Ohhh Christ,” he groaned, “you should see ‘em, they’re goin’ up and down like yoyos’!”
“Have you any Adverse Metals?”
There is a small pause. “What?”
I repeat the query.
“Adverse Metals?” he chuckles, “I cannot tell a lie, I have no adverse metals but I have a pair of bright red cobblers.”
“Do you have any effect on wireless communications?”
“No,” he chuckled, “they aren’t picking up any signals.”
“Then you can’t have any adverse metal inside them.”
“That’s very comforting, it’s bad enough having them skinned raw without lumps of metal inside.”
Fildes has put chains on the wheels of the truck. Does he think they’re going to escape? We wave goodbye, and take the road that travels round the rear of our position skirting the foot of Monte Croce, we get on to a rough mountain road slippery as grease. The road finally disappears. “It’s come to something when the road can’t get up the hill,” I said. By steady driving Fildes gradually makes it to the top; we pull up just below the crest. The slopes are slightly wooded, with a scrubby grass floor. We look down into the valley at our gun positions; so skilful is the camouflage that we can see everything as though under a magnifying glass. Cautiously we peer over the crest into enemy territory. The view is obscured by drizzle and mist. Comfort! that’s the thing. Brew up! Hot water boiled for dinner. Make up beds in the back of truck. We stow our spare gear in the driving cab. Attempts are made to contact the OP, no luck, we report this to the Command Post, they say stay up there on listening watch, we put the set to ‘receive’ and put the earphones in a mess-tin, to amplify the sound.
“What was that place with the church?” said Fildes. He’s writing an airmail home.
“Terra Corpo,” I tell him, “freely translated it means Land Body.”
“Land Body?” he echoed.
“Yes, we’re somewhere round about the legs, the foothills you might say, ha, ha, ha.”
It’s night, we have our dinner, in beds. The back flap is buttoned down, a light run from the battery. I am smoking and listening to AFN Naples. “French Moroccan Troop reinforcements have arrived in Italy.” Japs resisting like fury on Bourganville. Tito’s Yugoslav Partisans are holding down over twenty German and Bulgarian divisions.
“It’s starting to go our way,” I remember saying to Fildes. Laconically he sang, “It doesn’t seem to matter which way it’s going, we’re still all in the shit out here.”
It’s remarkably peaceful on our mountain, the night has no sounds save the gunfire from the valleys below, the rushing sound of twenty-five pounder and five-five shells can be heard travelling overhead. We can hear mules and men.
They are bringing up