Part 18

She objected. "He says they hate him."

"Perhaps you never before," I said, "came across an aggressive man who is modest. I know he thinks that; it merely shows that he can't work for popularity. But he was telling us recently of the practice hikes he has been giving his company in Panama, to show that after all the hardest work is what we shall look back on with the most pride. It was as plain as day to us, though not to him, that the men there are like our fellows here—they will do anything for him."

She dropped the subject; one not knowing Vera would have supposed that she was not even interested in it, but I knew that she had learned what she wanted. Idly she looked down the company street. "What are those men doing?" she asked.

A bunch of the men, growing every minute, had been singing to the tune of Solomon Levi words that were not clear to us, being too far away. "It must be the new company song," I said. "I've been told it's good. The fellows are learning it.—See, they're coming this way. I believe they mean to sing it to the captain!"

Our other visitors were returning, headed by the captain and Frances. The men, grouped by the water barrel at the head of the street, waited till he was near, pushed their leader out in front, and in hoarse whispers commanded him to begin. You must understand that Vera promptly, but without hurry, had got me close enough to listen. He sang the solo.

"One night as I lay dreaming, Underneath the stars, The buzzard stole between the tents To sell us chocolate bars. The captain took him by the scruff And kicked him in the seat, And said 'You greedy buzzard, Get out of the company street!'"

The delighted men roared the chorus.

"Poor old buzzard, get away out of here! Poor old buzzard, get away out of here For we are Captain Kirby's men, We neither drink nor swear, We never wash our hands or face Nor change our underwear. We never do a thing that's wrong, As you can plainly see, For we are Captain Kirby's men Of old H company!"

Then, evidently immensely pleased, and laughing to themselves, the fellows melted away in all directions.

As for Vera, she was not daunted by the primitive simplicity of the words. She looked at the captain and noted his confusion, looked at me and made no answer to my question, "Now don't you see they like him?" But she gave me a kindly little push toward Frances, and said, "Go and talk with her. I've brought her all this way to see you." And in another moment she had the captain as her partner, and was making him tell her all the little things she would not listen to from me.

It was nice to see Frances. She told me all about you, and asked about David; and the street being now very neat with the laundry put away, and my tent not very far, she walked down and looked at it, and met every one of the squad, yes, and knew all about every one in advance, by which I see that you have read her all my letters. The boys were greatly struck with her; when our visitors had gone and I came back to our fire, Clay in his Southern way paid me the nicest compliments for her, and Pickle swore that she was a peach. Then when I thought the subject was exhausted Knudsen came out of a brown study with the remark, "She's almost as handsome as her sister, and besides she's the real thing."

And truly, mother, stunning as Vera is, there's something about Frances's eyes and mouth that is particularly pleasing, don't you think?

There next taking place an Episcopal service in the open air, I went to it. It was under the trees near the farmhouse. A rustic cross was made and set up, there were a few flowers at a simple altar, and the rail was just a piece of white birch nailed up between two trees; nothing could be more appropriate. At least a hundred and fifty men attended; I couldn't ask to hear a better sermon; and finally, the minister giving such an invitation to communion as a man of my free beliefs could accept, I stayed to it. Dusk was falling as we came away, and we were called together for Retreat.

Troops of the townspeople have visited the town all day, some looking as if they had come from a distance. They have gawked all about, have listened to the band concert, and stood about and watched our religious service as if it had been a show. But the best was at Retreat. The band had finished the Star Spangled Banner, the captain turned and brought us to attention, then pivoted about and stood at attention, looking straight in front of him. A little group of country folk had pressed up very close, and seeing him look so fixedly at something, they all swung about and stared too. Failing to find any unusual object nailed to the barn which was immediately in front, they turned back presently, puzzled or reproachful. When at the end of the bugle call he turned to dismiss us, the captain could scarcely maintain his military gravity.

I finish this at the squad fire, with the fellows discussing the revival of the rumor concerning the ball cartridges. They have not been found; some fool is still toting them about; they are in A company, B company, and so on down the list.

Tomorrow we move on again, my cartridge-belt is full, and I have got everything ready for our early start. The night is clear and cold—but we are hardened to anything now. Love from

DICK.

PRIVATE GODWIN'S DAILY LETTER

In camp at Ellenburg Center. Sitting before the tent, on my blankets. Monday the 2d October, 1916.

DEAR MOTHER:—

The other companies are cheering in the distance, and I suppose I know why. For our company has been spared a great affliction, which would have been very cruel after a hard morning's work. We came into camp a long hour after everybody else, and had just pitched our tents and had dinner when our captain called us together in a close bunch, and told us that the regimental commander had been dissatisfied with the deployments of the other companies, and was having them out to drill; but that our work had been satisfactory, and that in consideration of our hard service on recent days, we were to be excused. You see we have worked hard on Friday (digging and defending trenches) Saturday (when our skirmish work in the mud and wet was the severest, he said, that a company on the hike has yet had) and today, when we started first and finished last. So I imagine that if it was proposed to include us in this afternoon's drill the captain fought hard to have us excused. I hope it's also true that our skirmish work is good. We cheered the announcement and enjoyed our leisure; and now the other companies are expressing their delight at being released from their two hours' work in a stubble field.

Last night, after I had mailed my letters, I stood about and watched the camp with its always varied picturesqueness—the many fires, the drifting smoke lit up by flames, the groups here and there, the undertones of talk, the singing. The buzzard song has instantly become popular, and the lieutenant's platoon have a chant of praise to him—I don't know all the words as yet.

"He's on the job, boys, To find some nice wet moss to lie on, For today we march Thro' (dum ti dum) to Ellenburg, Dum, dum, ti dum dum (here memory fails) Prepare to rush, Thro' mud and slush, God help the man that tries to shirk!"

Besides these there have come to us from other companies, and indeed from earlier camps, other ditties, not vicious but unquotable, horribly amusing men's songs.

I gave up watching at last, and made my bed, which was not so easy as usual, since my poncho, being old, has taken to stiffening in its folds after wetting, and when I shook it out, just plain cracked. Besides, its intimate acquaintance with barb-wire has resulted in various tears, notably a long slit and some "barn-doors." So seeing its usefulness departing, I chiefly made use of my blankets and overcoat, in which latter I slept, and found myself perfectly warm.

Today we were up earliest, packed in a hurry (which never, however, allows leaving the ground untidy) and were off as an advance flank guard to protect the march of the baggage train and main body on the straight road here, we going on a parallel line over whatever country we found. We marched out of camp, went a mile to the west, and then turned south—and a little ripple of joy went through the company. For it was our first step toward Plattsburg and home. The men are all looking forward to the breaking up of camp—not that they are feeling any hardship, but that they are anticipating the set end of things, and thinking of home life again.

Today's work will not make an interesting story. We followed our south road till it petered out, passed through pretty glades and around attractive knolls, and finally climbed a steep ascent to where, by a schoolhouse at a corner, we rested for a while. A platoon was sent north against a squad of cavalry; the rest went on, deployed here, deployed there, sent out squads and recalled them, then lay low in ditches and watched the movements of some of the enemy (horsemen and a machine gun) cautiously coming forward along a crossroad against the corner toward which we were heading, and which we knew to be held in strength by our first platoon. They consulted, came on within range, and then sent out a man to reconnoitre. Reaching the corner, he wheeled and dashed back, waving his hat and shouting. A burst of fire from the corner pursued him; and our Squad Seven, crazy to do something, let off a couple of clips at the men on the machine gun, who were frantically trying to turn it about. The cavalry got away, all but their messenger, who was summoned back. As for the machine gun, it would not reconcile itself to capture till, as the captain said, an umpire went out and picked it by hand.

We were given another rest, this time by an odd-looking building which Corder guessed was a creamery. The fact being established, our boys were greatly excited, and some filled their canteens at wholesale prices—surreptitiously, for the thing was quite as wrong though not so reckless as another performance I have seen, the filling of canteens at wells. If we escape typhoid from such water it will be because of the inoculation.

Ordered on again, our platoon was detached and sent across country to come upon the flank or rear of any cavalry that might be lurking for us. We sent out a squad and lost it; then the three remaining squads went on and on and on, and grumblings became louder and louder as the men began to suspect that the leader did not know where he was going, nor what he was trying to do. Good David, mindful of our pact, tried in vain to cheer the boys up; but no, they would grumble, and (as inexorably follows) made their work the harder. It was a long three miles over stiff country, with a fence, usually barb wire, every hundred yards—and bogs! "What made me sore," says Knudsen at my side at this moment, "was that first swamp we came to. It was perfectly visible, with a good dry meadow on either side to travel in—but Jones had to bring us through it." Fence, bog, fence, thicket, fence, small pasture with an inquisitive bull (we went across smartly!) fence, rough climb over rocks: such was the order of our going, till at last we heard the captain's distant whistle, and found the remainder of the company resting comfortably by the roadside waiting for us. But there was no soft place for the second platoon, for on we went at once, two miles more to camp, where the other companies had long since pitched their tents, had fed themselves, and now were streaming out toward town to fill in the chinks in their stomachs. The best ice cream, I am told, is at the millinery store.

For the first time since Friday I was able today to get a swim—or rather a dip in an ice-cold stream, below a broken dam. Picturesque, so many men's naked bodies, undressing, bathing, dressing, with the rushing stream, the rocky bank, the overhanging trees. Then I cut my toe and had to have it dressed at the doctor's tent, where I had a glimpse at another side of camp life.

I met one of our fellows coming away grumbling. "My blisters were dressed by an artilleryman who disgusted me with his profanity, and who put the plaster on the wrong spot." But I was tended, having a more important wound, by one of the doctors. And after my experience I can declare that all doctors are divided into three kinds.

One was a volunteer, one of our own company, by the way, whose feet having given out was transferred to the medical corps, and keeps an especially kindly eye on all H company men. But he being busy, I fell into the hands of the regulars, and had a chance to judge of the opinion common among the rookies—"they treat you like a horse." Now regular officers must be short and sharp with their men, and the doctors among them are taught to be suspicious by the sojering they necessarily detect. It must be a struggle to keep sweet the milk of human kindness.

The man who dressed my foot had succeeded in remembering that the majority of men were neither cowards nor dishonest. He was considerate of me and of the orderlies under him. But alongside was a scowl. A poor fat bandsman with a lame foot was not excused from marching the next day. The orderly who had mislaid the iodine was scalped. The orderly who had charge of the medicine chest was also scalped. The man whose foot this doctor was dressing was so certainly a man of character and a person of civilian consequence that he was not scalped for presuming to turn his ankle; but I felt the certainty that under actual campaign conditions he would have fared no better than the others. It was borne in upon me that a gentleman who is gentlemanly only to gentlemen is not a gentleman at all.

Though I have not spoken much of them, we have our daily conferences whenever the weather will permit. Today we first had battalion conference, when Major Goring spoke of recent manoeuvres—and we men were interested to see that even he spoke of Friday as an extremely successful day, and Saturday as an unusually hard one. Then supper, then bed-making (which is desirable before the light goes—by the way, I am writing no longer in the afternoon but the evening) then regimental conference, when Major Downes spoke against time for an hour (and mighty well, upon the Philippines and army experiences there) in the hope that General Wood would come, which he didn't. Now I am writing while sitting upon a firkin of apples that I had sent from our neighbor Williams, waiting for the squad to come and help me eat them. Very bad writing this, I know, by the light of the fire, holding the paper first folded, then bent, then skewed, anything to stiffen it and catch the light, while every moment I must shift it as I move my hand along the line.

The boys are gathering for a feed—the apples, Some honey, bread, shredded wheat, cream from the local creamery (Knudsen's inspiration), the first such feast since the hike began. We have invited our neighbors, Squad Nine. So, since there is no more to tell, I will close this.

"Pass up your cups," says Clay.

Love to you from

DICK.

PRIVATE GODWIN TO HIS MOTHER

On the road to Ledger Corners. Tuesday the 3d October.

DEAR MOTHER:—

I write on my back in the usual roadside ditch, our column having halted after firing has broken out in our rear. My pack was on wrong this morning, hanging too low, so that the straps cut me; I was glad to stop, so as to adjust it. Usually it is no trouble: in fact in some of the skirmishes I have not thought of it at all except to remark how little it cumbered me.

But the pack can be, I have found, a detriment in case of a fall. Yesterday, going through a boggy wood, with rocks and slimy fallen trees, I slipped and plunged forward. Without the pack I could have saved myself; but the heavy roll, shooting ahead, was just enough to overbalance me and bring me down among the stumps and boulders. To protect my face I twisted as I fell. This brought the pack under me, my head was lower than my hips, the pack wedged in a hole, and I should have had difficulty in rising had not the boys yanked me up.

Our feed at bed time was a success. We were warned of a hard day to follow, the march being extra long, and the road being so unsafe for trucks (on account of weak culverts) that we must carry our own dinners, which we must eat cold. In consequence we were given this morning an emergency ration, consisting of a slice of Bologna sausage, two pieces of dry bread, and two hard boiled eggs. These we put in our meat cans, with such chocolate as we could get from the buzzards; we are carrying them now, and are wondering if the cooks will get to camp in time to give us coffee.

Behind me, after quiet, the fire has broken out again. The boys listen critically. "We shan't have to go back for that." There is a whole battalion behind us that can stand off any attack.

(Later.) The hike today has been steady plodding, halting at the regular intervals, also at times of attack from the rear. At first the boys sang a good deal, new songs and old. But the last two stretches, though we have had continual jokes and laughter, have been a persistent grind. For the first time we have had climbing, pretty steady from our start to the height of land, a rise of 502 feet, after which we stumbled down a very stony track till we reached a better road at Halfway House, an uninviting structure between two unknown terminals. We had one fine look-off at the highest point, over a gently descending slope of miles to a strip of Champlain, and beyond, floating above the haze, the Green Mountains of Vermont. Now we are resting again, the boys talking, smoking, studying the map, and singing quietly.

In camp at Ledger Corners. At the mouth of my kennel.

The day's hike, ten or twelve miles, is finished, a very dreary performance indeed. The way was very dull; and though the boys were at first inclined to say they were glad not to be on skirmish duty, we having worked so hard of late, before the trudge was over we were all tired of the monotony, and would have been glad of a brush. And we got just as tired and hungry as if we had had an extra four or five miles of cross-country work. At last after passing through a district whose only beauties were its few high views and the gorgeous colors of its maples, and whose general sparseness of people, unattractive fields, and ill-kept houses (chiefly of plastered logs) became after a while depressing, we came to almost the only smooth field that we had seen. The first of the trucks, after its journey of thirty-six miles, was just arriving; nevertheless it was not long after we had pitched camp that coffee was ready, with which we wetted our dry snack. You should watch us veterans pitch camp. Every tent is erected in fifteen minutes at most, less if rain is threatening. I always hurry off early for the hay, leaving Bann to finish pegging down, and to ditch if necessary. My haste saves delay; today I got into the hay-barn just before a quartermaster came and formed a line. I always lug away a full poncho; though the hay almost fills the tent at first it soon packs down, and I want this amount to make sleep easy, and to make sure that even if rain gets under the tent, we shall sleep on an island in comfort. Tonight the weather promises to be fine, so that Bann did no digging except for sods to lay on the edges of the tent to keep out the wind.