“A month and a half was long enough for us on the Cheman de Damns front. We parteed ’bout March fifteenth or so and got on another one of them funny little trains—didn’t stay on long—only ’bout fifteen hours.
“Detrained at Chateau-Brienne and started hiking over the road to our rest-camp. We was due for a rest, also furloughs. But I ain’t seen neither of them things so far. That country down there sure was the darb for us. It was just turnin’ off kind of spring-like and warm, too. We were the first Americans to go through that section, and the people—honest, O. D., they must have thought that we were American Joans of Arc. Everybody came rushin’ to the doors and waved to us. The mademoiselles threw us kisses by the bushel. I got so excited that I muffed most of ’em that came my way.
“After bein’ up in that mud-coated front country where you hardly ever saw human bein’s, just soldiers, and where all of the houses had holes in ’em and the gardens were all torn up by shells, it was great to get back where the fields was green and people smiled and said nice things. I was gettin’ to this French stuff ’bout that time and I could compree a little of what they said.
“Our first stop was at a little town called Dienville. We blew in with the band playin’ and everybody happy. The villagers gave us the hell of a fine welcome and made us feel to home toot sweet. Right after I put my horse on the picket-line and camouflaged my equipment I started lookin’ for something to monjay and a place to cushay. First store I hit was a baker shop—boulangerie, they say in Fransay. The shop was full of women and little girls. They was talkin’ a mile a minute. That’s the fastest thing they do in this country, you know, parley—and every few minutes I could hear ’em say ‘Américains—Américains.’
“Finally I asked ’bout monjayin’ and they told me where the restaurant was. I never had tried to get a chambre before, but I got parleyin’ ’bout a place to cushay, and a little girl ’bout twelve years old and pretty—listen to me, O. D., that child was the darb of a petite mademoiselle. She asked her mother how ’bout my stayin’ with them, or it sounded that way to me. Course I said in my foolish French, ‘Keskesay?’ which means, What did you say?
“The mademoiselle was a little timid. Guess I’m kind of hard to look at, anyway. She got closer to her mother, but she didn’t hide them pretty blue eyes. Looked me straight in the face and said her mother, the madame, would fix me up on the cushay stuff. Then I got kind of brave myself and went over to her and her mother. The girl put her hand in mine toot sweet and said, ‘Comrade.’ I never was much for bein’ ’round children, but I grabbed her and threw her up and down like I have seen daddies do. She kissed me smack on the cheek and said her name was Louise.
“That little mademoiselle’s kiss was the first one I had in a long time, O. D. Sometimes I still get the taste of it, as I ’ain’t had another since. Louise and the madame was more than jauntee, which as I compree it means nice, or kind. They fed me dey zerfs, der lay—that’s eggs and milk—and beaucoup pom de tear fritz for every monjay. I cu-shayed in a real lee—Frog for bed—that night, and honest it took me near three hours to get asleep, the bed was so soft. Next mornin’ I fooled ’em and didn’t answer reveille—cushayed till ’bout nine bells and got up, shaved with real hot water, washed as far down my neck as my hand could go and sure felt fittin’ for anything.
“Louise had beat it to school, but the madame saved a big bowl of café-ooo-lay—O. D., if you ever drink a bowl of real French café-ooo-lay you’ll never be satisfied with that stuff they serve in Childs’ or the Waldorf. It’s coffee with beaucoup hot milk, and it sure is the darb. Along with that café-ooo-lay I had a hunk of regular du pan. Frog bread is bon when it’s made right—and some du burre—butter, you know. Madame kept parleyin’ somethin’ ’bout dey zerfs—which are eggs in American—but I told her that I’d wait till dinner to monjay the omelet.
“While I was gettin’ away with the petite dayjunay—as madame called what I was monjayin’—she told me that her marrieh, her husband, was a lieutenant in the Frog artillery—swasont kans—which means the same as our three-inch pieces. Showed me beaucoup pictures of the old man and lots of souvenirs. He’d been in the guerre three and a half years—wounded three times. I began thinkin’ that us Americans didn’t have so much kick comin’ bein’ as how we were about four years late in gettin’ in against the Kaiser.
“When Louise came home from school she took me out for a walk. Say, you ought to have seen the guys pike me off. ‘What you doin’, Jimmy, teachin’ kindergarten?’ lots of ’em asked me. I told ’em no, that she was my fiancée and was goin’ to partee to Amérique with me. Louise compreed that line and said, ‘Oui’ all the time.
“There was a band concert in the little square that afternoon, and, believe me, the Frogs sure enjoyed it. They hadn’t heard any music since the guerre started, except the church organ, I guess. I had a flock of little mademoiselles hangin’ on to me by that time, as Louise was mighty popular with ’em all. Course, as luck would have it, I had a bar or two of chocolate in my jeans, and I handed it over to Louise and her little friends. Boy, they thought I was a regular Santa Claus after that.
“When we left Dienville two days later all the kids in the village was cryin’ because the Americans was parteein’. I sure got to hand it to those people in that place, they was the old darb for us. Course things has changed a good deal since then—we ain’t new to the Frogs any more and lots of ’em with stuff to sell have found out that we get a darn sight more frankers a month than the Frog army pays.
“We hiked ’bout five days or so, stoppin’ every night in some village and finally got to the area which was to be our rest-camp. Just got settled in the billets when we got an order to partee toot sweet. We was kinda sore, but most of us said, ‘Say la guerre,’ and let it go at that. Nobody knew what the hell it meant as we was miles from newspapers and telegraph wires, and never got any news of the guerre. That’s how we started the seventeen-day hike from down around Joinville straight up to the Toul front.
“That hike was one of the worst things we bucked against durin’ this guerre. There wasn’t but two days on which the sun came out at all. It rained day and night. The roads was all mud and so slippery that the men and horses was slidin’ all over the place. There wasn’t no way to carry fresh rations, so we monjayed ‘corn willy,’ black coffee, and hardtack seventeen days straight. The horses had a hell of a time, too, as there never was enough hay and oats for all of ’em to monjay at one time. Guess we covered ’bout twenty-two kilofloppers every day. Never got up later than three bells in the mornin’ and generally got to cushay around nerver. That’s nine o’clock in this country.
“When we hit a town at night we had to stretch a picket-line for the chevaux, then water and feed ’em. After that we could feed ourselves and hunt a chambre or hayloft to cushay. As a rule, the chambres was all for the officers when we got to ’em. We sure had a tough time hikin’ across this damn country. Never did get warm the whole time. ’Bout that time my old feet began to get malade. Whenever you hear a Frog say malade you’ll know they’re talkin’ about bein’ sick. They was so cold all the time until they would swell up overnight and in the mornin’ you had a fat chance of gettin’ your shoes on, as those darn hobnails used to shrink up like a pair of white-flannel britches do after washin’ ’em. One mornin’ the old feet was so bad that I had to wear a pair of those wooden boats ’round. The doctors call feet like I had trench feet. I’ve had ’em ever since. Wear tens now; used to wear eights and a half back in civilian days.”