Mussolini_ His Part in My Downfall - Spike Milligan [89]
“Amalfi?” says Edgington, rearranging his cigarettes for the night. “What is an Amalfi?” says White.
“It sounds like a high-powered Iti motor car,” says Edgington.
But I, I, know-all/well-educated-Milligan tell them, “It’s an Italian village that lies along the Divine Coast, south of Naples and south-east of Catford, 6,000 miles south-east of Catford I’m glad to say.”
Amalfi? There must be some mistake!!! Gunners don’t go to the Divine Coast, they only go to the karzi; but folks, it was all true!
9.30, MONDAY, DECEMBER 27, 1943
We were loaded on to our three-tonner, like merry cattle. We were all in cracking spirits; it was December 27, a crisp sunny morning, though Edgington is overcast, cloudy with rain on high ground.
“I had a drop too much last night,” he said. “It was a mere thousand feet,” he said, imitating W. C. Fields.
I continued in the same voice, “That’s perfectly true, my dear, he was making love to Grace on a clifftop when suddenly he went over the side, that’s how he fell from Grace.” Groans!
From the back we were watching the column of military traffic going up the line, and in between the pitiful civilian transport. There were loads of pretty girls who came under fire from the tailboard. The cries ranged from “I can do you a power of good, me dear,” to the less poetic “Me give you ten inches of pork sword, darlin’.” It’s strange none of the soldiers in Shakespeare talked like this. If Shakespeare had been in the army he would have sounded more like ‘Once more into the breach, dear friends, once more—cor, look at those knockers—or fill this wall up with our English dead—grab “old of this, darlin’.” We’re travelling south down route six, along the line of a Roman Road.
“It’s not the Via Appia,” said Edgington, “but I have—ha, ha—never been ‘appier.” Groans. He pretends to hurl himself out of the lorry.
The roads were really a series of holes joined together; we spent the time yoyoing between the floor and the roof of the lorry. Sometimes to ease the jolting we hung on to the roof supports with feet off the floor, making monkey faces and scratching under the arms, all clever stuff. Edgington is demonstrating how he can hang by his insteps. We hit a bump, he goes straight down on his nut.
A few songs to alleviate the boredom.
I’ll never forget the day I joined the Army on the spree,
To be a greasy gunner in the Royal Artillery.
For my heart is aching and a-breaking,
To be in Civvy Street once more.
Oh you ought to see the drivers on a Friday night
A-polishing up their harness in the pale moonlight,
For there’s going to be inspection in the morning
And the Battery Sergeant Major will be there,
He’ll be there—he’ll be there, In the little harness room across the square.
And when they’re filing out for water I’ll be shagging the Colonel’s daughter
In the little harness room across the square!
I’d come a long way since I was Altar Boy at St Saviour’s Church, Brockley Rise. We are going through Capua at a speed that would have left Hannibal and his lads a long way behind. Driver Wilson has put a spurt on and we are being shook to buggery. I clasp my legs.
“Ohhhhh.”
“What’s up?” says Edgington.
“Nothing—just practising.”
On, on through Santa Maria, Afrigola, the outskirts of Naples. At the Piazza Dante we get out to stretch our legs and have a slash; we are besieged by Neapolitan Street-Urchins, ‘Scunazziti’, who sell everything from cigarettes to sisters. How could they ever lead normal lives after this? The square is a mass of lorries, jeeps and trucks, large numbers of soldiers drunk and otherwise are either arriving or leaving. The Americans are bumptious. They have a great sense of humour, if you’re about five.
“Come on, you lot, we’re leavin’,” Driver Wilson is yelling above the noise.
On to Amalfi! It’s still a nice clear day but cold, the sun shines and bounces off the Gulf of Napoli.