“Funny thing about that battle. I was all through it, and I never knowed till afterward in Paris that it was the battle of the Marne.
“Then I got to Paris. Paris was awful, half dead, Zeppelins comin’ over most every night, government in Bordoo. I got to the Embassy——”
“Mr. Solslog,” I interrupted, “how on earth did you get about knowing not a word of French?”
“Oh, I made mistakes, in course. But an American can do anything, suh; can git anywhere he has a mind to, I mean. They was always some one who could say a few words of my language—English Tommies, American reporters—they was everywhere I went.”
“But money?”
“I had a hundred and forty francs when I got to Paris. I paid for everything,” he said proudly, “and they never cheated me so’s I could notice it. They’re great people, the Frenchies. Once I worked for ’em two weeks in one of their field hospitals, just because I liked ’em. ‘Muhsoor luh American,’ they called me. ‘Muhsoor’—that’s French for ‘Mistah’ and my sis——But I told you that beefore.
“I got a pass from the Embassy——”
“How did you do that?”
“I told ’em about my sistah. They hadn’t had word about her, so I got the pass. Then I got a pass from General Caselnow and went to the front.” His tired eyes gleamed restlessly as he went on. “You-all here cain’t imagine it, I reckon, how dirty it is and how it stinks. War is mostly bad smells. The men cain’t wash, they’re covered with live things, flies is awful, rotten horses and rotten men have to lie about, sometimes for weeks, till people can bury ’em. Soldiers marching through a town you can smell for blocks sometimes.