Colonel Butler's Wolf

'Quite often when I don't approve of them. To be quite honest, I find civilians too bloodthirsty for my taste—the more incompetent, the more bloodthirsty. I've lost a number of friends that way. And there was a sergeant I knew—he was shot down in a street in Cyprus, with his little son by his side. Two or three years old the little boy was, and the crowds in the street stood and watched him cry while his father dummy2.htm

bled to death. They didn't lift a finger, Mr Epton. They were civilians, of course, and he was only the son of a British soldier.'

There was a moment of silence.

'But you still obey your orders,' said Terry. 'Even when you don't like them. Isn't that dangerous?'

'Well, you see, Mr Richmond, that's what I promised King George VI to do in the first place—' Butler closed his eyes '—'And We do hereby Command you to observe and follow such Orders and Directions as from time to time you shall receive from Us, and any your superior Officer, according to the Rules and Discipline of War, in pursuance of the Trust hereby reposed in you'.'

'That's what the King laid down, and in my reckoning it would be much more dangerous if I decided that I knew better than my lawful government, because that's how you get military juntas and dictators.

Would you prefer me to be that sort of colonel?'

'Oh, for goodness sake!' exclaimed Polly. 'You're all looking so serious, and this is supposed to be Rest and Recreation Hour. Mike—come and rescue us!'

'Rest and Recreation my fanny!' The rich tones of the American mid-west sounded from behind Butler.

'This is always Drink and Dissension time, and you know it darned well, Polly-Anna.'

'Well, just rescue us anyway, Mike—they're arguing about—'

'I heard good what they're arguing about,' the American edged his way into the circle. 'And believe me it's all been said before, way back we know enough if we know we are the king's subjects. If his cause be wrong, our obedience to the king wipes out the crime of it for us. As usual William S. got there before us.'

Butler looked down into the ugly, bespectacled face. It was an earnest face that fitted the serious voice, and yet there was a self-mocking twinkle behind the thick-lensed glasses.

'So you think Shakespeare gets all soldiers off the hook?'

Richmond grinned at the American with something suspiciously like friendship in his expression.

'I think he cuts us all down to size. The Colonel's got you on the hip when he says he only does what the civilians tell him to do, seein's as how in a democracy the people are the king—

Upon the king! let us our lives, our souls, Our debts, our careful wives, - , Our children, and our sins lay on the king! We must bear all. O hard condition!

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Poor old King Harry-—and poor old us.'

'Don't you ever think for yourself, Mike?'

'Don't have to, Terry-—not when there's someone sharper done it all for me. But you don't get off scot-free either, Colonel—the Bard's got you too. Same play, same act, same scene.'

'Indeed?' Butler felt himself smiling foolishly, like Richmond. The young American, his accent horribly at odds with the poetry, was making fun of them all, and of himself at the same time.

'Sure as my name's Klobucki. You and Lieutenant Galley and Marshal Ney and Julius Caesar—

Every subject's duty is the king's; but every subject's soul is his own !'

The magnified eyes flashed. 'You may be able to beat the rap legally-—'

Michael Klobucki—Pittsburg slum Polish and top Rhodes Scholar of his year. A real protester from way back: the Chicago cops scooped him up at the Democratic Convention of '68 and he was in the People's Park business at Berkeley in '69, so don't go sounding off about Law and Order. We've got nothing against him, but he hasn't any cause to love the Government, theirs or ours. . .

'—but there's still a moral rap to come.'

Indeed there was, thought Butler. He had read about the People's Park riot, and his sympathies in that instance were for once wholly on the side of the students. Or, at any rate, it was a classic instance of ham-handed over- reaction of the sort that mocked everything law and order stood for.

And there was something else that he knew about Klobucki, but from McLachlan not Richardson: 'Don't let him fool you into thinking he's short-witted as well as short-sighted. Mike's a poet and he sees better than most of us.'

'You're just as bad as the rest of them, Mike,' Polly said severely. 'As of now I'm banning politics.'

'And poetry, ma'am?'

'Your sort of poetry. Come and watch Cumbria make mincemeat of the King's, Colonel. Excuse us, Daddy.'

Butler allowed himself to be shepherded towards the window.

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'I'm sorry about that,' Polly murmured. 'Actually they're all jolly nice if you can keep off current affairs.'

'It's current affairs I'm here for, Miss Epton.'

'Not your first night though.'

'I'm afraid we may not have a first night to spare. Has Dan anything to report?'

'Well, I know he wants to see you. He didn't have time to say what for because Handforth-Jones was just about to drag him off on a seminar.'