“Thank you for saying that, Tom. You know, there are times when it galls a fellow to find himself just an ambulance driver—a fellow who, if he had his way, would be doing stunts in the air, and striking blows against the Kaiser. But, gee! that’s foolish, and I suppose there is some honor about it. See here!”
He opened his coat and showed them a decoration which, modest fellow that he was, he had actually kept hidden out of sight.
“Why, that is the Croix de Guerre, and something anybody might be proud to wear! Do you mean to say they decorated you with it, Neal Kennedy?” gasped Jack, touching the emblem almost reverently, for he knew it was the hope of every French soldier to march home some day with such an embellishment on his breast.
“Oh, they seemed to think it was some sort of especial act of bravery, just because I drove my ambulance on the field while the shells were bursting around me and loaded up with some of the poor fellows, escaping by an inch when the Germans came rushing up. I just couldn’t help it. I felt mean that day, as if I was being cheated out of all the fun.”
“Shall we get aboard, and go along with you, Neal?” asked Tom, fearing lest by lingering there all of them were losing precious time.
“Sure thing, fellows,” they were immediately told. “Plenty of room here on this seat. Just chuck your stuff inside, and we’ll be off. As luck has it, I know where the American fliers have their roost far back of the lines. To tell you the honest truth it’s against rules, but I’ll take you in and, more than that, sheer a bit out of my way just to drive you over toward Bar-le-Duc. It sounds mighty fine to hear good old United States spoken after all this foreign chatter.”
This was good news to the chums. It certainly seemed that they were playing in great luck to run across first of all an old acquaintance in such a remarkable fashion, and then learn that he could drop them at the camp of the Lafayette Escadrille without any particular trouble.
They could not make fast time of it, such was the choked condition of the road. There was always a multitude of vehicles going and coming, together with marching troops, and even batteries on the move to the front to take their turn at engaging the foe.
The sounds beyond gradually increased in volume as the ambulance crept gradually closer to the region where French and German big guns answered each other, though many miles apart.
“We’ll be there in time for supper, boys,” the driver of the Red Cross ambulance kept assuring his two impatient passengers every now and then. “And let me tell you those fellows of the Lafayette Escadrille are a pretty lively bunch, all right. I’ve talked with some of them lately, and I’ve known a few of them who are gone—Chapman, Prince and Rockwell.”