I think you ought to have
a retiring headquarters in readiness." So I put in two days
superintending the erection of a little colony of houses, built of
ammunition boxes and corrugated iron, half a mile from the main road. I
camouflaged the sloping roofs with loose hay, and, at a distance, our
"Garden City" looked like a bunch of small hay-stacks. We got quite
proud of our handiwork; and there was a strained moment one midday when
the regimental sergeant-major rode hurriedly to the cafe with a most
disturbing report. Riding along the main road he had observed a party
of men pulling down our huts, and piling the sheets of corrugated iron
into a G.S. waggon. When he cantered across, the driver whipped up his
horses, and the G.S. waggon bounded over the open fields for half a
mile before the sergeant-major got sufficiently near to order it to
halt. "They belong to the --st Brigade, sir," the sergeant-major
informed the adjutant, "and I've told the sergeant in charge of the
party to consider himself under arrest until you have seen him."

The adjutant, eye flashing, nostrils dilated, was already out of the
cafe walking hard, and breathing dire threats against the servant who
had been posted to guard our new home. Apparently he had gone away to
complain that the cook was late in sending his dinner.

The sergeant and his assistant "pirates" were restoring the dismantled
huts by the time the adjutant and myself drew near. The sergeant was
plainly a disciple of the "It's all in the same firm" school. He
submitted, with great respect, that he was innocent of criminal intent.
There was nothing to show that the huts were in use ... and his battery
wanted iron for their gun-pits.

"None of your old soldier talk with me," blustered the adjutant,
shaking a ponderous forefinger. "You knew you were doing wrong.... Why
did you send the waggon off when you saw the sergeant-major?"

"I went after it and stopped it when he told me to, sir," returned the
sergeant.

The sergeant-major admitted that, strictly speaking, this was a correct
statement. There was a ten seconds' pause, and I wondered what the
adjutant's next thrust would be.

"The waggon was trotting away, was it?" he demanded slowly.

"Yes, sir," replied the sergeant.

"And you made no attempt to prevent it trotting until the
sergeant-major told you to stop it?"

"No, sir."

"And you know it's forbidden for waggons to be trotted except in very
exceptional circumstance