The Battalion Commander, Major Griffith, was so glad to see us that he sent for another bottle of the murky grey water that came from a well on one side of a well populated graveyard not fifty yards from his post.
"A good night," he said; "haven't seen it so quiet in three years. We have inter-battalion relief on. Some new companies are taking over the lines. Some of them are new to the front trenches and I'm going out with you and put them up on their toes. Wait till I report in."
He rang the field telephone on the wall and waited for an answer. An oil lamp hung from a low ceiling over the map table. In the hot, smoky air we quietly held our places while the connection was made.
"Hello," the Major said, "operator, connect me with Milwaukee." Another wait——
"Hello, Milwaukee, this is Larson. I'm talking from Hamburg. I'm leaving this post with a deck of cards and a runner. If you want me you can get me at Coney Island or Hinky Dink's. Wurtzburger will sit in here."
"Some code, Major," Lincoln Eyre, correspondent, said. "What does a pack of cards indicate?"
GRAVE OF FIRST AMERICAN KILLED IN FRANCE Translation: Here Lie the First Soldiers of the Great Republic of the United States of America, Fallen on French Soil for Justice and for Liberty, November 3rd, 1917
"Why, anybody who comes out here when he doesn't have to is a funny card," the Major replied, "and it looks as if I have a pack of them to-night. Fritz gets quite a few things that go over our wires and we get lots of his. All are tapped by induction.
"Sometimes the stuff we get is important and sometimes it isn't. Our wire tapping report last night carried a passage something like this:—The German operator at one post speaking to the operator at another said: