“Merry Christmas — Corporal Simpkins"

Cue (NZERS), Issue 13, 15 December 1944, Page 29

“Merry Christmas — Corporal Simpkins"

T WAS never really fond of Corporal * Simpkins. He’s one of those, thinnosed sniffy types. What’s more, he’s in charge of the fatigue roster, which goes to show just how low he really is. They won’t even let the Serjeantmajor do that job, if you sees what I mean. - ■

r Anyway, I gets a nasty jolt when he corners me yesterday morning. Ah, another fatigue, I thinks, when I sees him slithering up to me like a bleedin’ snake in the grass —not that there is any grass in our camp, just mud and stones, millions of them like hundreds and thousands on a chocolate cake. I knows, ’cos I put a few million there myself in my time. ; Well, anyway, when I sees him coming, I looks the other way and whistles « Lili Marlene,» just casual-like, hoping he’ll pass by. ‘

: But no, he stops and says to me in his slimy voice, «Oh Alf.» Strewth, I thinks to myself, what’s biting t the c-corporal ? Calling me Alf was a bit too much for any bloke to stand, and believe me I’ve stood a good deal from Corporal Simpkins. JI looks at him, careful-like, and there he was grinning. Well, that’s what he meant it to be, but the poor devil don’t know how to grin— never, happy unless he’s finding me an extra fatigue and then he just smirks smug-like, not a grin, oh no. . «Oh Alf he says again while I gapes at him, « would you like to come out with me to-night ? » « Me ? » says I, eyes a-goggle. « Yeah,» says he, oily as a sardine — those army sardines we gets swimming around in rifle oil and kerosene. « I’m going to see a bint to-night,» he says with a smirk, « and she’s got a sister.» « How old ? » says I, suspicious-like. « About 20,» he says. «My signorina asked me to bring along an amigo to-night. So I thought of you, Alf, knowing what a good, steady sort of bloke you are.» —. I wasn’t going to fall for that line of talk, not me, but I thinks of the fatigue roster.

« Sorry, Corp.», I says artful-like. « I gets too tired with all these fatigues to go put at night.» And I sighs real tired-like.

« You’ve done your share of them, Alf,» he says—just as if I were a blooming hero or something. « ; No, you can take it from me, he goes on in a grand sort of way, « you have had fatigues -this month. So you can come along with me and enjoy yourself to-night.»

« Thanks, Corp.», I says, but I hadn’t finished yet. « Only,» I says doubtfullike and sort of wistful, « I don’t think I can manage it to-night. You see, my battledress is too dirty and torn for visiting your friends.»

He looks a little suspicious at me and I wonders if I’ve gone a bit far.

« Come along ( to the' Q Store, » he says in his « fatigue-roster » voice, and

off we trots.

It seems the Q bloke owes Simpkins 1000 lire or something, and so I gets my battledress easy-like. Good fit it is, too. ' - ' /

«Be ready about seven,» the Corporal tells me, and I says « 0.K.» or something, and off I goes rejoicing in my new battledress. Well, even if the evening is a flop, I thinks, at least I’ve got a new rig-out. What’s more I likes beating these Q blokes.

Well,’ I meets the Corporal at seven and off we goes. The Corp., he’s all dressed up to —brown shoes, collar and tie, service chevrons, and a mess of brilliantine slicking his hair. He’ll out-stink the Ites, I thinks to myself.

The casa we goes to isn’t a bad little dump and the whole bloomin’ family is there to «buona sera » us. I looks round quickly and my eyes lights on a real lovely signorina—a regular Hedy Lamarr of a bint, figure, legs and all. I looks round for her sorella, and there are four of them but only one old enough for Simpkins and, I thinks to myself, she’s just the bint for him. One of those broad, peasant types, she is, with a face like an I tie cow. I gives a bit of a grin and sidles up casuallike to Hedy and we starts nattering. The Corporal had told me they both speaks English, so we gets along fine Jill he pokes his nose in with a glass

of vino and a withering look, if vou gets what I mean. J

«Come on, Alf,» he says half pleasant-like, half «fatigue-roster »- like.' «I want you to meet Maria Rosina’s sister.» And I don’t likes the way he says sister, kind of sinister

He trots me over to the bint with the cow eyes and the big bosom Twenty, he says she was, but he forgot to say stone.

« Lay off my girl,» he says darkly, as he leads me to my fate. «This is your bint for to-night. And it’s no use saying you’re tired or anything.*

. Well, I has to be pleasant to Maria while the Corp, gets all gay with Hedy Rosina, her name is really, but she’s Hedy to me. Anyway, Maria and I tries to talk, but all she can natter about is the kids. I had to meet the whole ruddy lot, thousands of them. And then Simpkins says, « What about a walk ? » and the four of us goes out into the night—a real, Italian night, with a moon and stars and just breathing romance. And me with the cowlike "Maria! Still, I thinks, I’ve got my new battledress and that’s something.

We haven’t been going far when I sees there’s something the matter with Simpkins, ’cos he keeps walking first like a snail and then races off like a whippet. I thinks to myself it must be the moon or the romance in the air, so I makes allowances for him and keeps close to the pair of them.„ The Corp./ gives, me some dirty looks once or twice when we waits for them, but, I thinks to myself, I suppose he’s not going over big with Rosina, and I tries to look a little sympathetic-like, although, of , course, I feels pretty pleased one way and another. Maria keeps nattering about the kids and her job. Works in a printing shop, she does. «I knows-the type,» I says funny-like, «full of rules and never inked.» Of course, she thinks I’m getting fresh and talks again about the kids, while I looks long at Rosina and curses Simpkinsbattledress or no battledress.

« I think we’ll sit down for a while,» Simpkins says when he gets to a kina of park near the waterfront. «I fe el tired,» he says, but what makes him tired Gawd knows. k Never does a damn thing.

He and Rosina parks on a bench under a palm-tree, and it makes me feel the new boots I’m wearing—the ones I got with my battledress.

« Good idea,» says me, pulling Maria down beside them on the bench. It’s

a bit of a squeeze on the seat, ’cos Maria goes about four axe-handles across J the beam, but it brings me up close to Rosina, which is just the -jolly job, I’m thinking, when up jumps Simpkins and he says as how it’s , a bit crowded for four and he and Rosina will find another seat. He sounds all up in the air about it, so to please him I says we’ll all go and look for another bench. But that don’t seem to please him neither, and he mumbles something about sanitary fatigues and spuds and gives me a dig in the stomach with his elbow that fair takes the wind out of my sails. What’s more, he doesn’t even say he’s sorry, which makes me think he means the elbow jolt, Gawd knows why. / j

« You do cough funny,» Maria says to me while I tries to get back my breath and Simpkins leads off Rosina, arm-in-arm and all sloppy-like. I clenches my fist, but what’s the use, I thinks, my pay-book-shows a debit anyhow. And we sits down again on the bench and I tries to make the most of what I’ve got. I puts my arm round Maria’s back, but it’s no go— ?just can’t make the distance. So I gives her a bit of a kiss on the cheek, and she jumps a couple of feet in the air and nearly bounces me « off the seat when she comes down. Gawd, the concussion’s terrible, like a block-buster in > action. And then she puts her screamers on, too, and out comes a flow of Itie that nearly knocks me off the seat again. ,

Well, Simpkins and Rosina and a couple of M.P.’s comes rushing up together and there’s a great sconedoing. I gets thrown about like a bleeding football, what with the Redcaps pulling me by one arm and the girls, by the other, Gawd knows why. I don’t know which is worse—or women, but somehow I thinks I’d rather have M.P.’s. But anyway, after about an hour of this sort of thing, they quietens down, and Simpkins does a bit of explaining, all slimy-like again and generous with my cigarettes, and at last we gets going for home.

But it wasn’t much better, that

walk. I hopes to walk with Rosina, but it’s no go.. She cottons on to Maria, who’s a bit huffy-like and het-up still — and that leaves me with Simpkins. And what the Corporal says to me is something cruel. It makes me fair shudder to think of it. « « * * So you see why I’m peeling the spuds for Christmas Dinner, don’t you ? It’s not much fun this Christmas—just a ruddy blush from dawn to dusk, what with sanitary fatigues, mess fatigues, and all. Why, I haven’t even time to mend my battledress where Maria ripped it last night. 1 Merry Christmas ? Huh ! .