11th June: Returning with gifts

"Oh." The boy nodded, at last understanding and quite curious at how the dish of onions and wine would taste. It appeared something more common for the German lot. He was very willing to give it a good tasting and eating.

"A'right. You'um quite a cook." He smiled, giving the compliment. "It is no wonder that you have been picked fer a batman. How do you say, cook? Like a man that cooks."

Freddie blushed a bit at the compliment, but grinned. "I ... like it." Turning to the matter of translation, he carefully, trying to speak all the syllables clearly, pronounced:

"Ein Koch. Ein Mann, der kocht." The words weren't that different really.

"Ein Koh... Koch." The boy repeated. "That sounds like a cough." Which would not help him remember it, since cooks were better not to cough in their food! "...Mann,.. so woman is.. Womann?" Making it sound more with a German accent, but other than that saying it quite like in English.

He began to peel the onions he had been given, cleaning them just as the other lad suggested.

Freddie laught. "No! Nicht ganz! Man is Mann. Woman is Frau. Different. What is cough?"

He thought that he might remember that one easily, now that Pye had made the comparison.

"A cough is something like this." The lad coughed to indicate what the word meant. "It's nothing to do with a cough.. but.. when you cough you make that... the same word that means both the act of doing it.. .but also the thing." He shook his head. "Frau. That makes no sense." Why was woman so much different than a man?

"What then is a child and..." He looked thoughtful. "Father and mother?"

Something like Husten, then? After this demonstration Freddie was sure that he would remember the word. The next words were easy, too.

"Vater und Mutter." The soft dialect of his native area made the words sound very different from the hard pronounciation favoured in Hannover. For 'father' both words nearly sounded the same, and 'mother' became something like 'moodder'.

"A child", he cradelt an imaginary one, just to make sure what word he thought he translated, "is ein Kind."

He gave the coat a final brush and peered into the kettle. "This is fertig ... ready", he corrected himself and added hopefully: "Can you ... say what I say ... when I give it to Captain Torrington?"

"Umm... That'd be better to ask Cotton, Couse he knows bein' a batman. But.. t' dinner is served ... uh the dinner is served works, I think. Or .. or maybe, he you are, sir?" He glanced briefly at Cotton and then turned to Friedrich. "You probably could get away with saying nothing, couse officers don't really lissen to us much,..at times like that." He grinned. "Or if he has a dinner, I bet he would be all in conversation an'...well then you would be best just to give it to him and his guests without much of a peep. Mebbe jus' excuse me, to warn them not to wave their arms all around and knock their own soup into their lap!"

He shrugged then. "But I don't know.. 'couse I don' serve at tables. I jus' eat by t' fire, with me own folk."

"Excuse me!" sounded quite managable; to have to say nothing further seemed an even better idea.

Taking the kettle and the coat, Freddie did as Pye had suggested and looked at Cotton for confirmation that Pye's suggestion was good.

Cotton had been listening to the impromptu German lesson, smiling to himself the whole time. "Ah. Um. Dinner is ready, or dinner is served. Somethin' like that. If he's talkin', it's usu'lly all right to interrupt jus' to say that dinner's ready, but then it's best to let 'em know you're there."

He hooked the lid off the pot he had been using and reached for a plate so he could dish the Captain's dinner up for him, then glanced over at the officer, hoping that he wouldn't mind being used as a demonstration.

He winked at Rottländer and got to his feet, giving a polite cough to let Vickery know he was there. "'Scuse me, sir, here's your dinner," he said and passed over the the plate, and a knife and fork.

Freddie studied Cotton's demonstration closely. It seemed simple enough. He could only hope that his new master was not like the officer Pye had portrayed earlier and that he would not be called upon to answer anything.
He grinned. "Thank you, Herr Cotton. I do this!" Then he looked at the Captain. Was he supposed to ask permission to leave again? Better do it, he thought, straightening to attention.

Vickery took the offered plate and cutlery. "Thank you, Cotton." Rottländer straightened up, catching Vickery's attention. He looked over at the younger man, and switched to speaking in German. "You do not need to ask for permission every time you want to go, when you are doing your duties as a servant."

Even though Rottländer was servant to another officer, it didn't make sense for him to have to ask every time he needed to go somewhere else, after all.

Freddie nodded happily; Cotton was right, the Captain was really a nice officer.

Darting off towards Captain Torrington's tent, he called to Pye: "I come back. Then we cook!"

Pye watched the lad go and settled by looking at the kettle. He did not know whether he ought to make himself scarce while the officer was eating, and untill he knew he decided to wait for a command.

He could only hope that his stomach would not make itself known with all the nice smells from the kettle. He chewed on his lip and turned to the onions he had cleaned. All were now in a neat pile on top of the little bag that they came in.

Cotton looked over at Pye. "Ourn won't be long, mate," he said. He usually took Vickery's food out of the common pot, after all; it meant that it was much easier for him, and it was just simpler to add Vickery's rations to their own and then give him a portion.

It would be interesting to see what Rottländer had planned to cook, though.

"I'm not sayin' anything." Pye murmured looking at Cotton. "Is jus' odd.. I'm t' only un' who's not a batman or an officer 'round. Dunno if I should even be stayin' here or If I should be goin' scampers somewhere." He smiled sheepishly. "Well, wot' riflemen do, sort's off."

"You stay right where you are!" Cotton said, mock-threateningly. "I'm a Rifleman, same's you, jus' with extra duties. Ain't nothin' special about me."

"Bein' you'um a batman makes you special." Pye answered half seriously, but slumped back into his seat. "But I'll stay, couse yer tole me." He sat up straighter. "We need ter teach t' lad proper talk like. English." He nodded softly remembering that 'Freddie' was still away.

"There's nothin' wrong with a German lad talkin' German," Cotton pointed out. "You need to talk mebbe a bit slower'n a bit clearer to help him understand you, though. An' don't forget that this is a German battalion - most the men are German, or speak German." He chuckled. "You'm doin' all right, though, Pye."

"Well Burke don't speak German. N' you don't speak German, an' t' captain don't speak German, n' Newbury don't speak German." He pointed out several other names and then after a rather short while changed to add: "...I now know what Mann and Fro..:Frau mean." He smiled. "And Kind, and I know that Zwiebeln... or summat like that is a word for this ." He held one up.

"You mean I should'a speak more... more proper like. I mean, try ter speak like I was ..I dunno.." He shrugged. "Wot' like?"

"The Captain does speak German, then," Cotton pointed out. "An' I do, a bit, jus' not for talkin' to people, much, acause I don't know too much of it." He nodded. "Eine Zwiebel, an onion. Zwei Zwiebeln, two onions. mind you, I only know bits that I've picked up - an' I've bin in the 60th for three years. Some o' that was in the depot, o' course, livin' in a barracks room with 'em. You can't help learnin' a bit of German when you'm hearin' it all the time."

"You know a lot more than I do. But I shall actively learn, with Freddie's help and ..well mostly with your and Freddie's help." He was not eager yet to extend the friendlyness to the other Germans. The lad was quite enough. "It's a bes' thing ter do when you're not yet on active duty actually. ..Couse I'm learnin'." He grinned. "And that way It's spendin' time usefully rather n' not."

He straightened out a bit. "Like you did in the barracks I guess. Though.. will Freddie stay around with us.. him having his officer to take care of and probably his own 'lot'? Do you think? After he's learned what he needs from you, n'all."

Cotton shrugged. "Ain't hard, y'know." Besides which, he was about ten years older than Pye and had been with the 60th for three years. "Reckon Freddie can move around, like you an' me. I gen'rally stick with me own mess, but that's just me. Ain't no reason he has to stick with us all the time, but then there ain't no reason he can't come an' talk with us when he wants. Same's there ain't no reason you can't go an' talk with him an' his own mess, see?"

"But his mess is all German." He was not sure about that, but he was rather convinced that he was not wrong in the assumption. "...He's welcome to come to our mess though." He glanced at the little pile of onions that he had made. He hoped that the way they were cleaned would be enough for Freddie, but also that he would be satisfied with them not being chopped. He had said they ought not be cut, but perhaps the lad did not understand enough English to know that it was that he asked of him? Well he hoped that was not the case, anyway.

"So? Be a good way for you to learn a bit more," Cotton pointed out. "Be good practise for him an' all, to have to start translatin' a bit for you." He stretched for a moment before saying, "Y'know, it can't be easy for him, neither - our mess is all English."

"Hmm. True. He don't know English well. An'..well he's doin' a marvelous job though, isn't he? He understands more n' we do of his language, I think." Because he understood when Pye explained things in his own native tongue, but if Friedrich would have spoken in German, Pye would have just stared at him with a blank expression.

"..Can ask him if he....wants any of us see his mess." He finally succumb. "Mebbe he don't want t'.. in t' firs' place."