“Now, men, once more, very softly,” and he played the harmony plaintively and fetchingly.
He’s got ’em, and the moment has arrived for sprinkling the sawdust.
“Before we go on with our little program, men,” he said, “let us just bow our heads for a minute in prayer and ask God to help us make the good fight, help us to do the work we came over here to do like men.” The men bowed their heads and he added:
“Just before we ask God’s blessing on these brave men, if there is a boy out there who feels that he has not been living quite as he knows his mother would like to have him live, if there is a boy out there who feels in an especial way the need of God’s help at this hour, will he please raise his hand.”
The place was very still. A hand went up way in the back.
“Yes,” Rodey said. “God bless you, boy.”
Then another and another, and soon scores of hands were held up, while they had their heads bowed.
Then Rodey prayed one of those conversational prayers, and he made it a personal appeal for each one of the boys whose hands had gone up.
It was not Rodey’s plan to send the boys back to their barracks with only seriousness and longing in their heads. He’s one of the most adroit handlers of an audience in Europe. He’d got the main idea planted and now he broke into smiles and there was an infectious laugh in his voice.
He was again talking to red-blooded men who were going out to fight. So he told a few corking stories, humorous but clean, and got down to them instead of talking over them. He was one of ’em. He wanted to send them away with a good taste in their mouths.