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The recruiting office was just down the road in Whitehall at the old Scotland Yard office. I had an idea when I entered that recruiting office that the sergeant would receive me with open arms. He didn't. Instead he looked me over with unqualified scorn and spat out, "Yank, ayen't ye?" And I in my innocence briefly answered, "Yep." "We ayen't tykin' no nootrals," he said, with a sneer.
Once, on the Somme in the fall of 1916, when I had been over the top and was being carried back somewhat disfigured but still in the ring, a cockney stretcher bearer shot this question at me: "Hi sye, Yank. Wot th' bloody 'ell are you in this bloomin' row for? Ayen't there no trouble t' 'ome?" And for the life of me I couldn't answer.
Wellsie sized the situation up one day when we were talking about this very thing. "Maybe my shell ayen't doin' me no good," says Wells. "Maybe Dinky ayen't doin' you no good. But 'e ayen't doin' ye no 'arm. So 'ang on to 'im." I figure that if there's anything in war that "ayen't doin' ye no 'arm", it is pretty good policy to "'ang on to it."
I gulped it down, and with every grateful inhalation I felt my ribs painfully snapping back into place. Oh, Lady! Didn't I just eat that air up. And then, having gotten filled up with the long-denied oxygen, I asked, "Where's the others?" "Ayen't no hothers," was the brief reply. And there weren't. Later I reconstructed the occurrences of the night from what I was told by the rescuing party.
It ayen't 'ealthy." It is the regular warning to new men. For some reason the first emotion of the rookie is an overpowering curiosity. He wants to take a peep into No Man's Land. It feels safe enough when things are quiet. But there's always a Fritzie over yonder with a telescope-sighted rifle, and it's about ten to one he'll get you if you stick the old "napper" up in daylight.
"Yer blinkin' 'igh wif yer wants, ayen't ye? An' yer 'Aig an' 'Aig. I'm a courtin' 'er when," etc., etc. And then a fresh-faced lad chirps up: "T' 'ell wif yer Lonnon an' yer whuskey. Gimme a jug o' cider on the sunny side of a 'ay rick in old Surrey. Gimme a happle tart to go wif it. Gawd, I'm fed up on bully beef." And so it went.
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