been for her!

Madame came into existence about this time. She was a poor Frenchwoman
whom we hired to come and wash the dishes for us. She had no teeth,
wispy hair, and looked very underfed and starved. Her "man" had been
killed in the early days of the war. Though she looked hardly strong
enough to do anything, Bridget and I, who interviewed her jointly, had
not the heart to turn her away, and she remained with us ever after and
became so strong and well in time she looked a different woman.

The Mess tent was at last moved nearer the cook-house (I had fallen over
the ropes so often that, quite apart from any feelings I had left, it
was a preventive measure to save what little crockery we possessed).

The cars were all left in a pretty rotten condition, and the petrol was
none too good. How Kirkby, the one mechanic, coped at that time, always
with a cheery smile, will never be known. As Winnie aptly remarked, "In
these days there are only two kinds of beings in the Convoy--a "Bird"
and a "Blighter"!"[12] Kirkby was decidedly in the "Bird" class.

"Be a bird, and do such and such a thing," was a common opening to a
request. Of course if you refused you were a "blighter" of the worst
description.

As you will remember, I was only in the cook-house as a "temporary
help," and great was my joy when Logan (fresh from the Serbian campaign)
loomed up on the horizon as the pukka cook. I retired gracefully--my
only regret being Bridget's companionship. Two beings could hardly have
laughed as much as we had done when impossible situations had arisen,
and when the verb "to cope" seemed ineffective and life just one
"gentle" thing after the other.

I was given the little Mors lorry to drive. To say I adored that car
would not be exaggerating my feelings about it at all. The seat was my
chief joy, it was of the racing variety, some former sportsman having
done away with the tool box that had served as one! "Tuppy" also
appreciated that lorry, and when we set off to draw rations, lying
almost flat, the tips of his ears could just be seen from the front on a
line with the top of my cap.

One of my jobs was to take Sergeant McLaughlan to fetch the hospital
washing from a laundry some distance out of the town. He was an old
"pug," but had grown too heavy to enter the ring, and kept his hand in
coaching the promising young boxers stationed in the vicinity. In
consequence, what I did not know about all their different merits was