They marched in, humming tunes (each a different one, and nearly all high tenor) and took seats in a room at the rear of the building with their backs against a mud-brick wall that was shiny from much rubbing by drill tunics.
Down the center was a narrow table, loaded with drinks of all sorts.

A case of bottled beer occupied the place of pride at one end; as Schubert had boasted, nothing was lacking that East Africa could show in the way of imported alcohol.

Under the table was an unopened case of sweet German champagne, and on a little table against one wall were such things as absinth, chartreuse, peppermint, and benedictine.
Soda-water was slung outside the window in a basket full of wet grass where the evening breeze would keep it cool.
"Now for Gesang!" shouted Schubert, knocking the neck off a bottle of beer, and beginning to sing like a drunken pirate.
A man whom he introduced as "a genuine Jew from Jerusalem" came out from a gloomy recess filled with tusks and sacks of dried red pepper, and watched everything from now on with an eye like a gimlet, writing down in a book against each sergeant's name whatever he took to drink.
They appeared to have no check on him.

Nobody signed anything.

Nobody as much as glanced at his account.
"What is the use ?" said Schubert, noticing my glance and interpreting the unspoken question.