A horrified look ran up and down the scantily clad ranks, but the “March!” followed grimly and inevitably. The captain, who had been a real estate broker two short months before, had forgotten to have them call off, and they broke into a milling mob.
“As you were!” he howled.
The ranks formed again, after a considerable delay, during which several men tried to sneak around the corner of the barrack, and the captain finally got them marched away. To Tommy, as well as to the late realtor, and most of the rest, it was a doleful hike. With every step, the man in front scuffed snow and equally cold mud up against his bare, raw knees, and soon his boots were full.
In other parts of the great field where they marched there were other processions of unfortunates, one of flying cadets, one of cadets, and also several companies of mechanics. They, however, had the advantage of expecting the march, and were fully dressed. Most of the flying lieutenants were not. But at last it came to an end, and in the doubtful shelter of the barrack once more Tommy wiped the mud from his cold wet knees with a towel.
“Where can I take a bath?” he asked Long John.
John cackled with raucous glee.
“Bath?” he snorted. “Hey, guys, here’s an _hombre_ wants to know where he can take a bath.”
“Bath?” said Fat. “Why, Paris is the last place I had a bath, and I don’t expect to have another one till I die and go back there. You’ll get no baths here. There’s a bath-house in town, but you can’t go there, for the post’s been quarantined ever since it was started. The M.P.’s know that anybody that goes A. W. O. L. will want a bath, so they keep a special guard over the bath-house to pick you up, just like at the barrooms.”
They dressed, went to the mess hall for beans, washed their mess kits, and then formed in sections to march to classes. First Section 13 spent an hour standing around in the blast from the propeller of a rotary motor, and then went to an unheated barrack to handle the icy parts of a Lewis machine gun. After which they were allowed to escape to the Red Cross hut and buy some hot coffee. Hardly had they reached this haven when an orderly entered.
“Lieutenant Lang,” he bawled. “Is Lieutenant Lang here?”