“We are rather full up at present,” he said; “but the Cemetery Area is vacant.  The Seventeenth Geordies moved out yesterday.  You can have that.”  He indicated a triangular section with his pencil.

Master Cockerell gave a deprecatory cough.

“We have come here, sir,” he intimated dryly, “for a change of scene.”

The stout Town Major—­all Town Majors are stout—­chuckled.

“Not bad for a Scot!” he conceded.  “But it’s quite a cheery district, really.  You won’t have to doss down in the cemetery itself, you know.  These two streets here—­” he flicked a pencil—­“will hold practically all your battalion, at its present strength.  There’s a capital house in the Rue Jean Jacques Rousseau which will do for Battalion Headquarters.  The corporal over there will give you your billets de logement.”

“Are there any other troops in the area, sir?” asked Cockerell, who, as already indicated, was no child in these matters.

“There ought not to be, of course.  But you know what the Heavy Gunners and the A.S.C. are!  If you come across any of them, fire them out.  If they wear too many stars and crowns for you, let me know, and I will perform the feat myself.  You fellows need a good rest and no worries, I know.  Good-morning.”

At ten minutes to eleven Cockerell found the Quartermaster-Sergeant and party, wiping their mustaches and visibly refreshed, at the exact spot where he had left them; and the hunt for billets began.

“A” Company were easily provided for, a derelict tobacco factory being encountered at the head of the first street.  Lieutenant Cockerell accordingly detached a sergeant and a corporal from his train, and passed on.  The wants of “B” Company were supplied by commandeering a block of four dilapidated houses farther down the street—­all in comparatively good repair except the end house, whose roof had been disarranged by a shell during the open fighting in the early days of the war.

This exhausted the possibilities of the first street, and the party debouched into the second, which was long and straggling, and composed entirely of small houses.

“Now for a bit of the retail business!” said Master Cockerell resignedly.  “Sergeant M’Nab, what is the strength of ‘C’ Company?”

“One hunner and thairty-fower other ranks, sirr,” announced Sergeant M’Nab, consulting a much-thumbed roll-book.

“We shall have to put them in twos and threes all down the street,” said Cockerell.  “Come on; the longer we look at it the less we shall like it.  Interpreter!”

The forlorn little man, already described, trotted up, and saluted with open hand, French fashion.  His name was Baptiste Bombominet ("or words to that effect,” as the Adjutant put it), and may have been so inscribed upon the regimental roll; but throughout the rank and file Baptiste was affectionately known by the generic title of “Alphonso.”  The previous seven years had been spent by him in the