When a Good Man Goes to War ( Sinclair )

[Lord Alistair Cromwell]

 
Alistair watched the chimneys and roofs of Ripon disappear from behind the window as the train rolled farther and farther away from the station. He took off his cap and sighed. He was wearing his officer’s service dress uniform along with a greatcoat to shield himself from the cold. He had already placed the modest bag of his belongings in the luggage compartment, and had a pen and a few sheets of parchment paper sitting on his lap. He’d just finished visiting with his brother and mother one last time after completing his officer’s training, and was off to reassignment with a unit that would undoubtedly be sent into combat soon.

He had always liked train rides. He’d taken several when he was a boy, when the family had been able to travel. He vaguely remembered holidays to Scotland as a child. He would take a train from the village close to Grantham Hall to Ripon every day from work. He’d travel back to the village from Oxford for the holidays. Each time he would marvel at the scenery. England was a beautiful country, and he considered himself very lucky to be a resident of it. Rather morosely, he wondered if this was the last time he’d lay eyes on it.

He wished he was as brave as Edgar. Happy-go-lucky, revolutionary, Edgar Abernathy the Great was the most fearless man he knew. The bravest woman he knew was his mother, because of how she had held the family together. But Edgar Abernathy had no qualms about going to war. He was the one who’d suggested they sign up together. They had trained together and then he’d been sent God knows where. His best friend from Oxford could be in Africa or France or somewhere, probably killing dozens of Huns without a sweat, and here he was, scared to death without even setting foot on foreign soil.

There was nothing to be afraid of, was there? He had been trained by the best, and he believed in what he was doing. Of course he knew that he could die, but even if he did, it would have been for something he believed in, wouldn’t it? An England free from the tyranny of Fascist swine, as Ed would say. That’s what he wanted. And so did most people apparently. When he had gone down to the pub with Edgar the other day, the bartender had refused to charge them because they were ‘serving King and country’. They treated them like heroes, even though they hadn’t even done anything yet. But they all expected them to accomplish great feats of heroism.

Alistair supposed that he’d simply use his training, and the heroism would come naturally. He doubted that ‘heroes’ tried to be heroes. Plus he wanted to be a good officer, and running around trying to do everything himself would not only make him a bad officer, it’d also make him dead. He wasn’t afraid to die but he didn’t want it to happen because of stupidity.

He picked up his pen and tapped hit against the seat cushion, trying to collect his thoughts. He had promised to write to James and Mother, so he decided to start now instead of later so that he wouldn’t forget. After a few moments, he pressed the pen to paper and began to write:

Dear Mother ( and Jimmy ),
I’ve just boarded the train from Ripon and am zipping across the countryside as we speak. I can’t tell you where I’m going—honestly, I’m not even sure myself—but I hope it’s warmer than Yorkshire in the winter! I miss you both already. Don’t worry about me. I’m excited to be going and fighting the Huns. Defeating Germany is the key to a free Britain. I’m proud to serve. The sooner we crush them, the sooner I can come home. I’m sure we’ll be home soon. We beat them once, didn’t we? We’ll simply do it again. We’ll make them wish they never crossed the Rhine.

All my love,
Alistair

[William Sinclair]

He had needed to swap trains as he had to go south to a port town in order to get shipped to his new unit, originally he had hoped to go directly south but sadly the easiest route was by train and switching at Ripon before travelling on. He was glad enough for this though since he had just been on leave and been called back a bit earlier he had to go without most of the unit and travel alone.

Of course despite being in northern England a soldier in a kilt was often a bit surprising to people but he had learned to ignore people pondering about it or not understanding it, and even if he had, he was to caught up by thoughts. He was thinking about how he would do when he actually got into the battlefields, how long he'd survive, how courageous he would be, a lot of questions went through his mind.

He was woken up from his thoughts at the sound of the steam engine as it rolled in to the station. He took a deep breath as he took on his backpack, corrected his uniform and went into the train. To his big surprise it seemed there was a lot of people travelling today because the first few compartments was full, by soldiers and civilians going on the train.

He pushed himself past the first few people almost stumbling when the train started rolling again but was lucky enough to be able to grab a door frame to not fall over. He searched a bit longer for a vacant seat, because he didn't want to stand for the entire journey, being the longest away from home he had ever been so far.

Then to his luck he found a compartment where there was only sitting an officer, not wanting to search any longer he opened the door and cleared his throat "Sorry to disturb sir, would ya mind if I sat in here?" he asked politely. Thinking that he could most likely just sit, but he wouldn't want to intrude to much on an officer, even if it was just an English Lieutenant, respect officers always ended up better in the end, he had always been told.

[Lord Alistair Cromwell]

Alistair looked up from his finished letter when the accented voice addressed him. He was at first uncertain as to who he was talking to, as he still wasn’t used to being called ‘sir.’ He was used to the servants calling him Lord Grantham and being referred to as Mr. Cromwell at work, but ‘sir’ from a man his age was still baffling. Despite his near obsession with reclaiming his fortune during his teenage years, Alistair wasn’t one for titles. Being an officer was an enormous change for him. He was barely finished with his schoolboy days and a green lawyer, and now he was in the Army. Life changed so fast. “Yeah—yes, yes of course.” he replied, nodding and moving his coat and hat out of the way so that the man could sit down across from him.

It was then that he realized that he was wearing a kilt. The accent had led him to think that he was a Scotsman, and his wardrobe simply confirmed it. His uniform and the fact that he’d called him ‘sir’ indicated that he was an enlisted man. “What’s your name, private?” he asked, tilting his head as he tucked the folded letter into his coat pocket. Since they were sharing a compartment together for the duration of the journey to the coast, he figured that he should at least try to make some conversation. “I’m Alistair Cromwell—er, Lieutenant Alistair Cromwell.” he corrected just in time. I need to get better at this.

As he waited for the soldier’s reply, he took his bag down and withdrew his sketchbook. Long train rides like this gave him plenty of time to draw, his favorite hobby aside from reading and writing. Unlike James, he had been a quiet child who kept to himself, but he’d always been told he was very intelligent. His mind was always bursting with ideas—perhaps that was why he and Edgar were such good friends. Edgar had ideas too, but he was such a gifted orator. He had a way of getting people to do what he wanted. He teased him about his ambition of becoming prime minister, but in all honesty, he would be brilliant for the job. If they made it out of this alive, Alistair promised himself he’d do everything he could to help Edgar achieve that goal. God knew he deserved it. He cared so much for the future of England, and genuinely wanted to help the downtrodden. Although he’d been born into wealth, like Alistair, he didn’t care a bit about money. He cared about people.

Alistair peered out of the window and then opened his sketchbook, pressing his pencil to the paper and trying to capture the essence of the English countryside. He’d have to make sure to draw whatever he saw whenever he got to wherever he was going. He doubted he’d be able to tell his family where he was, so maybe he could at least convey what it was like through pictures and words, so that they’d have some idea of the land in which he’d live or die.

[William Sinclair]

He waited a bit for the officer to respond who seemed a bit surprised, although he had suddenly been disturbed in thoughts and by the looks of it writings. As the officer said sure he decided to nod to the officer, "Thank you, sir" he said calmly before walking in and closing the compartment door behind him, then taking off his bag and putting it up on the shelf over the seat and took off his glengarry and then sitting down.

He listened to the question from the officer who asked his name but waited with responding until the officer had finished introducing himself, he thought to himself that introducing by rank was a weird thing in the military usually the rank patterns stated the rank, but none the less it was how things was done only this officer seemed a bit new at being an officer because he made the mistake of not saying his rank in front of his name the first time. "Well met, Lieutenant Cromwell. My names Private William Sinclair" he stated with another short smile.

He looked a bit out of the window before looking back at Cromwell "Are ya freshly commissioned? If ya don't mind me asking" he asked the officer politely hoping it was an acceptable question. As he saw the officer also liked drawing he smiled "Ah, I see you also draw?" he asked curiously at noticing the sketchbook. Not that he was sure why Cromwell would draw now, everything was moving to fast and in his own eyes the English landscape often looked the same all over.

He shrugged lightly as the thought of drawing made him think of home, his family and friends, places and people that he was starting to get further and further away from and the thought in itself was sad but he would have to keep at it and not thinking to much of home, besides he was still in England. It could be worse he thought to himself, he could lay in a extremely warm desert and be covering from German artillery shells and in a fire fight with the German dogs that threatened the empire.

The thought of defending the empire made him feel a bit more proud, and made him think about something different then his family which he was satisfied with, the call from the crown was enough to spark most young lads to fight and defend what was theirs.

[Lord Alistair Cromwell]

Alistair smiled back and nodded when the private gave his name. “It’s nice to meet you, Private Sinclair.” Having someone to talk to would almost certainly make the trip go faster. He wasn’t the most social of people but he definitely didn’t mind having company. He wasn’t sure, however, how much he could keep up the extreme formalities at least of officer and enlisted man. They did appear rather close in age, and he was a newly-commissioned officer. Granted he needed to act the authoritarian once he actually had soldiers under his command. A good leader commands respect and inspires his troops. Alistair didn’t think he’d have as much of a problem with the former than the latter.

He knew now that he’d need to find a balance between authority and familiarity. He wanted to be an authority figure, yes, but he also wanted his men to be able to trust him. I’ve plenty of time to think about that later. He looked up from his sketch at Sinclair’s question and smiled a bit bashfully. “I’m afraid I am. I’ve only just completed my officer’s training.” he admitted, raking a hand through his hair. “I signed up with my old school friends from Oxford. I went from solicitor to soldier in a matter of months.” He wasn’t really afraid of telling the man his story. It was informal yes and perhaps against protocol, but they were sharing a train compartment together, and he doubted that they’d see each other again. As usual Alistair was trying his best to make conversation. He was such an introvert that even the smallest encounters didn’t come easy to him. Often he’d find himself rambling because he simply didn’t have a clue what to talk about.

He nodded exuberantly at the man’s other question about him drawing. “Oh yes, I love to draw. I’ve been doing it since…since as far back as I can remember. It was just a way to pass the time. Still is, I suppose. I don’t have as much time as it now as I did then, when I was still in school. It’s almost as fun as reading, but not quite. I do like trying to copy the scenery though—this is a beautiful country.” He looked up from his drawing briefly with a grin before putting on the finishing touches. “I’m from Yorkshire, born and raised. What about you, private?”

Just as he had finished speaking, the food trolley came, and he paused in his drawing and reached into his pocket for some money, buying himself a ham and cheese sandwich and a hot drink. He sipped his chocolate and started to eat.

[William Sinclair]

He offered a polite smile as Cromwell replied it was nice to meet him. He though still wasn't sure what to think of Cromwell, he had never thought he'd end up in a train compartment with an officer and most likely some half-noble of sorts like most other British officers but this one did seem a bit different though he would know at some point later. And this was going to be a mighty long trip with all the military formality that was required but he could always go anti-social if it ended up being to troublesome or annoying but with a bit of luck it could end up lacking a bit of formality and help with a more friendly way of talk.

As Cromwell finally replied to his next question he nodded as he told that he was a completely fresh officer, that most likely meant he was on his way to his unit or being transferred overseas to it. As Cromwell told his stories on how he became an officer William listened carefully nodding a bit so that he showed he was listening, signing up with a friend like most others nothing special in that. At least the officer had the balls to sign up himself because he knew some officers was picked for the task especially in a time of need, but he also knew he would far from trust a solicitor in battle, despite how good a man or officer Cromwell was, he had yet to prove himself and most likely had no kind of experience with being an officer or commanding.

Again not to interrupt he just listened as Cromwell spoke and how he liked drawing. Finally something he had in common with Cromwell, despite both of them being in the army, and both most likely being transferred overseas. But drawing scenery seemed a bit dull when it all looked the same and they were going by at the speeds they were. He nodded to Cromwell as the food Trolley came and like Cromwell he bought something to drink and eat.

"Well Sir, I'm from Lanarkshire, born and raised... part of clan Douglas..." he gave a short proud smile when he thought of home and his clan. "And like you I signed up with a few friends... But I didn't come from a solicitors background, I myself was obviously a student, My father and older brother are officers in the Royal Scots Dragoon guard, so I am used to the military life." he looked out of the window for a moment as he took a bite of his sandwich. He thought of home and the people had left and still thinking he was more prepared to the discipline of the army compared to Cromwell, and what change it most likely was for both of them going from a civilian still background to the military. "And I was a boy scout" he said with a light chuckle "So taking orders, being in the field and stuff like that isn't completely strange to me." he smiled to Cromwell.

"And concerning drawing, I find the British landscape very alike, now I personally prefer the idea of drawing people, and in the rare case of landscape, places further away from here... Places exotic to us.." he leant back in the seat looking at Cromwell for a bit, thinking of what further to ask, after all Cromwell did seem very open with his stories which meant he would be easier to talk to, at least he hoped. "What made a Yorkshire lad sign up? If you don't mind me asking, sir." he asked curiously hoping to learn Cromwell to know a little better.