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against a wall to support himself and placed a hand in his pocket.
    A voice boomed from nowhere, like Zeus shouting down from Olympus. ‘You, with your ’and in your pocket!’
    We jerked instantly to our feet like wide-eyed chickens having just heard a fox bark. We knew instantly who it was, but we just could not see where he was.
    ‘Christ,’ one of the lads said as he indicated with a jut of his chin, ‘he must be two ’undred soddin’ yards away.’
    There was the RSM, silhouetted against the sky way up at the other end of the main drag, standing rigid and alone in his immaculate uniform. Our instincts were to run and hide but that would have been suicide. God would find us.
    ‘Come ’ere!’ he boomed. ‘At the double!’
    The recruit dropped everything and ran towards the RSM as fast as he could. We watched from cover while he leaned back under the RSM’s mouth and received a severe bollocking.
    Looking down on the parade ground, a hundred yards away, was the officers’ mess, and the RSM stepped out of it to survey his empire. Then his eyes locked on to the imperfection in the centre of it. If the camp was the RSM’s domain, the parade ground was his hallowed plot. There was no power on earth to help you if you desecrated this piece of terra firma. Everyone watched motionless – if you moved a finger of your white-gloved hand he would spot it, then you might as well faint and take your chances with a medical examination. There must have been 200 Marines frozen solid. If it suddenly poured down and lightning struck the parade ground no one would have moved.
    The RSM marched slowly down the gravel path from the mess, digging his heels in, his cane in his left hand swinging parallel with the ground. The Royal Marines have a unique march in the British military. Whereas the rest of the Army, Navy and Air Force, without exception, march in a brisk, tick-tock fashion that looks like a speeded-up silent movie, the Marines march much more slowly with a longer pace and a proud, historically earned swagger. That is why Royal Marines rarely integrate with other branches of the armed forces while marching. Marines arrive at the same time as everyone else, they just do it with more panache.
    The RSM came to a smart halt on the edge of the parade ground and stood staring at the bed some fifty yards away.
    ‘Who’s sleeping on my fucking parade ground?!’
    No one moved except the recruit, who turned in his sleep to get more comfortable. The RSM developed a terrible grimace and marched towards the bed. The clip of his heels echoed as they cut into the ground. I started to feel sorry for the noddy curled up in his bed. The RSM halted by the bed and glared down at the recruit all snuggled up.
    ‘WAKE UP!’ he yelled with all his vast might.
    The recruit sat bolt upright and for a second had no idea where on the planet he was.
    ‘Your fucking grot not spacious enough for you, then?’ boomed the RSM.
    If there was ever a man who wished the world would swallow him up it was that recruit.
    ‘Get that bed off my parade ground, you maggot . . . NOW!’
    The recruit fell out of the bed and started to drag it away as fast as he could.
    ‘Don’t you make a scratch on my floor or you’ll spend what career you ’ave left re-tarmacking it!’
    The recruit struggled to lift the bed and carry it off. That night his entire troop ran several times around the camp in full equipment, each carrying their own mattress.
    Before lunchtime we were awarded our green lids and passed for duty by the Admiral of the Fleet, Lord Louis Mountbatten. My father stood amongst the other parents. It felt odd knowing he was watching me in my immaculate uniform marching as a soldier. It must have felt strange to him too. I almost hadn’t called him to tell him about the pass-out parade. It was as if this was my new world, my new life, and I did not want him to be a part of it.
    The RSM, naturally, had the last words before we marched off the