The Brighton Boys in the Trenches Page 8

  CHAPTER VIII

  GETTING OVER AND ON

  This encounter, though witnessed by only a half dozen, gave JedShoemaker a new standing in the camp.

  The shoot came off and it was a success in that a fine degree of nearlyequal interest in the contesting teams was shown.

  Shoemaker's team received about as much applause as did the boys thatHerb led; and when the mountaineer's boys came out the victors by theexceedingly small margin of five in the total scores they got all thatwas coming to them.

  Then Jed was seen to go across to the inspector-general, Colonel Short,and make a request, whereupon the individual highest scores were readout, Herbert leading in them.

  In the cheering that followed it was plain that the Kentuckian was theleader; and when the two, Jed and Herb, advanced before the officers'stand and warmly shook hands there was another burst of applause, led byCaptain Leighton.

  The general, joined by certain other officers, came down from his seatand as the regimental audience filed away he summoned both teams to lineup. He then addressed them:

  "Men, this final test of marksmanship is the crucial one in theselection of snipers--we used to call them sharpshooters in the olddays--to form the first platoon, and others will immediately follow. Iknow of no better way than to pick by scores and general deportment, forthe first platoon, thirty-nine men in all. Lieutenant Loring will leadyou."

  There was a very decided handclapping, for Loring, though young, wasdeservedly popular and had the distinction of having served as a regularand corporal with Pershing in Mexico and as a private in thePhilippines.

  "With the formation of the other platoons, to form the first company ofexpert riflemen from this camp and the first of the kind in the army, Ibelieve, your commander will be Captain Leighton, now of our Company H."

  The men all were pleased with this choice. Herbert noticed that evenGaul, who had scored fairly well in the shooting, vigorously clapped hishands.

  "The sergeants of this first platoon," continued the general, "will beBerry and Small, and the corporals of the four squads are Whitcomb,Phillips, Shoemaker and Lang."

  Loud applause followed this combined announcement of non-commissionedofficers.

  The general further remarked upon the necessity of continued drill andtraining together in the new formation and added:

  "Hold yourselves in readiness, men, for orders that may come fromWashington at any time respecting new duties. Your squads, LieutenantLoring, may be divided up in France, each serving on active duty with aplatoon reduced to three regular squads and one of yours. It is the ideato place these men in certain positions where organized sniping is mosteffective, the snipers, of course, to be protected by the regular men.And now, I hope and feel sure that each and every one of you, whenbefore the enemy, will give a good account of himself and do his duty inour great cause!"

  And the general received the greatest cheering of the occasion.

  * * * * *

  Old Ocean! The rolling, billowy blue, apparently endless, with nothingbut the paler sky, sometimes the gray, threatening sky, dipping into thedark water on every side. And the vessel; its never ceasing enginesthrobbing, turning, whirring, sending the great hull on and on and on,over swells, through shorter billows, sloshing into whitecaps, and thetwo insignificant humans up there at the wheel directing the mappedcourse of this great bulk of steel so that her road was as clear, ascertain, as though with wheels under her instead of astern, she followeda turnpike on the solid earth. But by no means alone. Not far behind, soclose indeed that the white divided waters were always visible, anothertransport, also full of troops, sailed the blue sea, and back of thatstill another plainly in sight in daytime and at times discernible atnight.

  And on every side the greyhounds of the sea. Uncle Sam takes chances insending his troopships over the ocean, for well he knows that, lurkingin many places, the enemy submarines, the U-boats that have done most tomake the history of this war so remarkable, and have added so greatly toits horrors, seek their prey like man-eating sharks ready to attackhelpless swimmers.

  The convoy vessels, with their sharp-eyed watchers and heavy guns, bringto port in safety the transport ships.

  "Sorry for you, old chump," was Herbert's remark to Roy, as the latterstood by the rail in the wee small hours of night and made as though tocast his entire stomach into the briny depths far below. From bits ofhis strained conversation one would imagine that the boy might attemptto cast himself overboard so as to keep company with the stomach whichso far he had been unable to detach, and so Herbert chose not to leavehim. "Say, old man, what you want to do----"

  "Oh, you go plumb to thunder across lots with what I ought to do!"groaned Flynn. "You've told me about ten billion fool things I ought todo. There's only one thing I ought to do and that is die. If you feltlike me you'd say: 'Here goes nothin',' and hit the briny kerplunk inabout two seconds. Take it from me, Herb, it isn't just awful; it'sworse than war. I'd rather go up to a forty-two-centimeter just as shegoes off and feed me face with the shell comin' out of her than beseasick. I'd rather swallow shrapnel, time fuse and all, and have it gooff and turn me inside out than have this darned old heavin' pond coax aten-dollar dinner out o' me. Say, I feel it comin' again!"

  "Forget it," said Herb. "You come on and lie down and that'll make youfeel better. Try it, at any rate. Come on now, or I'll carry you down!"

  Much of this sort of dialogue went on every night, Roy finding, as did afew others, that the doctor's medicine was not effective.

  It was a relief to the boy, as well as to Herb who had lost sleepremaining up with him night after night, when the ship entered a narrowharbor across a wide, unruffled bay somewhere on the long coast ofFrance and warped up to a newly-timbered and planked dock having all ofthe earmarks, as it were, of American construction.

  Indeed, a dozen carpenters who were unmistakably Yankee in get-up andmovements, and who later proved it by their speech, were still at workon the office building that flanked the wharf. These fellows came in fora guying.

  The boys in khaki leaning over the side, perched on cabin roofs,lifeboats, stanchions, railings and in rigging, feeling more than gay atseeing land again and the fact of having had a safe trip againstpossible dangers, had to let their exuberance be felt.

  "Yip, yip, yip, yip! Get the dog-catcher's net! There's a son-of-a-gunfrom the land of the sun; eh, Yank?" shouted Roy, leading the fun, asusual.

  "Sure, those ginks are all from God's country!"

  "Hey, Yank! Does your mother know you're out, over here?"

  "Hush, fellers! Salute; that there boob's General Hatchet-and-Saw andyonder's Colonel Sawdust!"

  "Dollars to doughnuts they're makin' better wages than John D---- rightnow!"

  "Glory be! Wish I was a nail driver 'stead of a dough boy!"

  "That good-lookin' fellow looks like he came from good old Pittsburgh!That's my city!"

  "Huh! Don't see black soot on him! Most clean people come from Detroit!"

  "No; St. Louis. We wash out there more than once a month, fellow!"

  "In the Big Muddy, I reckon!" shouted the Pittsburgher.

  "And you need it twice a day!" was shouted back.

  "Hey, you wood butchers! Made any coffins for the Booches yet? Soon's weget there they'll need 'em!"

  "Listen to him! Booches! Boshes, man; that's the way to pronoun----"

  "Hi, yi! Can the college education! Everybody knows it's Bewches! Don'tshow yer ignor----"

  "Give him the Iron Cross! Boches, you simp! Ask these natives over here;it's their word."

  "Bet you can't ask 'em anything; they'll mostly beat it when you try tobuy eats!"

  "Say, Yank, hey! You with the square! Had any frogs' legs yet? Orsnails?"

  "Oh, glory! Gimme some snails right now; nice, fat ones, alive, freshand salted! I could eat thousand-leggers or rattlesnakes right now!"

  "Hooray! Wonder where we mess!"

  "Next week! An' I feel like
we messed last in Noo York."

  "Me! I'll be glad to get down on terra cotta again!"

  "Aw, terra firma, you blamed ignor----"

  "Listen to the perfessor! Say, can't you see a joke?"

  "Say, fellers--everybody! Let's give a big hooraw for the noble land ofFrance. Now, then, are you ready? Hip, hip----"

  The yell that followed might almost have made the French think that theBoches had made a land attack from the sea, did they not know that nowsuch was impossible.

  And now, even if the mess had not been called for many hours after thelanding, the khaki-clad boys would not have gone hungry, for as theyfell in line on command and filed down from the ship hundreds ofkindly-faced girls, lads, women and even old men, greeted them smilinglyand tendered each soldier a dainty, ample bit of delicious food: meatysandwiches, tasty little cakes, cups of milk and sour wine--lookingsurprised, indeed, when the latter was refused by many, Herb and Roybeing among this number.

  Lieutenant Loring, standing near and noticing this, said to the boys:

  "You are right, fellows, of course, morally considering the matter, buthere it is a little different from our country. The water is generallyvile and often you will have to endanger your health or go thirsty;besides, there is so little alcohol in this common wine,'_vin-ordinaire_,' they call it, that it is really not intoxicating.That may let you down occasionally for a drink of it when you can't getmilk."

  Again, when thousands of long cigarettes came their way, Herb and Roywere among a very few who refused them. The donors were taken aback,indeed. But the boys' messmates, those of their company, had long sinceacknowledged the sanity of the arguments against tobacco, even thoughfailing in the practise of abstinence.