t 4 o'clock that afternoon, having first
gone through the necessary business of interviewing the R.T.O. He was
a young man of a most detestable kind. The R.T.O. has a bad name
among officers who travel in France. He is supposed to be both
uncivil and incompetent. My own experience is not very large, but I
am disinclined to join in the general condemnation. I have come on
R.T.O.'s who did not know their job. I have come on others wearied
and harassed to the point at which coherent thought ceases to be
possible. I only met one who deliberately tried to be insolent
without even the excuse of knowing the work he was supposed to be
doing. On the other hand I have met men of real ability engaged on
military railway work, who remain quietly courteous and helpful even
when beset by stupid, fussy, and querulous travellers.

M. and I struggled into a train and immediately became possessed by
the idea that it was going the wrong way, carrying us to the front
instead of the remote base to which we were bound. I do not remember
that we were in any way vexed. We had a good store of provisions,
thanks to my foresight and determination. We were in a fairly
comfortable carriage. We were quite ready to make the best of things
wherever the train took us.

A fellow-traveller, a young officer, offered us comfort and advice.
He had a theory that trains in France run round and round in circles,
like the London Underground. The traveller has nothing to do but sit
still in order to reach any station in the war area; would in the end
get back to the station from which he started, if he sat still long
enough. M. refused to believe this. He insisted on making inquiries
whenever the train stopped, and it stopped every ten minutes. His
efforts did not help us much. The porters and station masters whom he
hailed did not understand his French, and he could make nothing of
their English. The first real light on our journey came to us in an
odd way. At one station our compartment was suddenly boarded by three
cheerful young women dressed in long overalls, and wearing no hats.

"Are you," they asked, "going to B.?"

"Not if we can help it," I said. "But we may be. The place we are
trying to go to is H."

The young women consulted hurriedly.

"If you're going to H.," said one, "you must go through B."

A second, a more conscientious girl, corrected her.

"At least," she said, "you may go through B."

"I should think," said the third, "that thro