ut the matter very
strongly to him. I even said that the War Office would probably deprive
him of his command if it was discovered that he had been wasting the
lives of his men unnecessarily.

"The country needs us all," I said, "even Cotter. After all, Cotter is a
non-commissioned officer and a most valuable man. Besides, it'll do the
Ambulance Brigade a lot of good."

It was this last consideration which weighed most with Haines. He had
felt for some time that our ambulance ladies were coming to have too
good an opinion of themselves. I had the satisfaction of going back to
the drawing-room and telling Janet that the stretcher bearers were to
parade at eleven o'clock, and march in the rear of the column--Numbers 3
and 4 Platoons--which went to relieve trenches.

"Rot," said Janet "We can't possibly go out on a night like this."

"C.O.'s orders," I said.

"The stretchers will be utterly ruined," she said, "not to mention our
hats."

"C.O.'s orders," I said severely.

"If we must go," said Janet, "we'll take the ambulance waggon.

"No, you won't," I said. "You'll take your stretchers and carry them.
Yours not to reason why, Janet And in any case you can't take the
ambulance waggon, because we're marching along the beach, and you know
perfectly well that the strand is simply scored with trenches. We can't
have the ambulance waggon smashed up. It's the only one we have. If a
few girls break their legs it doesn't much matter. There are too many
girls about the place."

Platoons Numbers 1 and 2 marched off at 10.30 p.m. in a blinding
downpour of rain. We watched them go from the porch of the golf
pavilion, and promised to relieve them as quickly as we could. We
paraded, according to orders, at 11 sharp, and I was glad to see that
Janet and the other girls were wet and draggled long before we started.

Haines made us a short speech. He had to shout at the top of his voice
because the storm was making a dreadful noise. But we heard what he
said. The business of relieving trenches, he told us, would be carried
out under strictly war conditions, precisely as if enemy submarines
were shelling us from the sea. There would necessarily, supposing the
submarines to be actually there, be casualties in our force. Haines told
off four men to act as casualties. The first on the list--this was the
way Tompkins' plan worked out--was Corporal Cotter.

"Corporal Cotter," said Haines, "will drop out of the ranks as the
column p