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Donald Ross, to whom all the elders accorded, instinctively, the place of leader, was arranging the order of "the exercises." "Mr. McCuaig," he said to Straight Rory, "you will take charge of the singing. The rest of us will, in turn, give out a psalm and read a portion of Scripture with a few suitable remarks, and lead in prayer.
Under these circumstances, an outburst was inevitable. Corporal Ferry, in charge of the canteen, furnished the occasion. "No more for you, McCuaig. You've got more aboard now than you can carry." To the injury of being denied another beer was added the insult of suggesting his inability to carry what he had.
Say, he's sleepin' with that Lewis gun ever since. Just pets it like a baby. What was I tellin' you? Oh, yes, about McCuaig and Jim Berry. Well, he took McCuaig's place snipin' and a good sniper he was too. He used to hunt, you know, up in the mountains with Jim Knight every fall.
He had to tell of Corporal Thom, and how he gave himself for his comrades and how Cameron kept the faith, a long list of heroes he had to enumerate, of whom the world was not worthy, whose deeds are unknown to fame, but whose names are recorded in the books of God. And then reverently he told of McCuaig. As Barry talked, his heart was far away from London.
I ain't sayin' nothing about that, but you don't see things that I see, and you don't get the news same as I do. Now, about Jim Berry, you know, he was goin' to do some snipin' in place of McCuaig, who went to the machine gun company." "McCuaig, in the machine gun company! I never heard that."
"You don't tell me!" exclaimed McCuaig, as if struck by an entirely new idea. "Say, are you really anxious, young man?" "I am terribly anxious," replied Barry. "I know Germany a little. I spent a year there. She is a mighty nation, and she is ready for war." "She is, eh!" replied McCuaig thoughtfully.
He wandered off to the fire without further word, where, rolling himself in his blanket and scorning the place in the tent offered him by Duff, he made himself comfortable for the night. At the break of day Duff was awakened by the smell of something frying. Over the fire bent McCuaig, busy preparing a breakfast of tea, bacon and bannocks, together with thick slices of fat pork.
In the passage leading to McCuaig's compartment, he met four men, bearing on a stretcher toward the sick bay a long silent form. "Who have you got there, corporal?" he inquired in a tone of kindly interest. "McCuaig, sir." "McCuaig?" roared the sergeant major. "And who " "Medical officer's orders." "Silence there," said a sharp voice in the rear. "Carry on, men."
At that instant, the Highlander, seeing his opportunity, flung himself upon McCuaig, and winding his arms around him, hung to him grimly, crying out: "Get hold of his legs! Queeck! Will you?" When the sergeant major, attracted by the unwonted uproar, appeared upon the scene, there was a man on every one of McQuaig's limbs, and another one astride his stomach.
'There he comes! sings out McCuaig. 'Didn't see him until he got past, says Jim, pretty mad, because Jim hated to show that he'd got 'buck fever, or something, and waited for the next. 'Here he comes! says McCuaig, again. 'Bang! goes Jim.
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