"The next time," Biquet exclaims in desperation, "I shall ask to see the old man, and I shall say, 'Mon capitaine'—"
"And I," says Barque, "shall make myself look sick, and I shall say, 'Monsieur le major'—"
"And get nix or the kick-out—they're all alike—all in a band to take it out of the poor private."
"I tell you, they'd like to get the very skin off us!"
"And the brandy, too! We have a right to get it brought to the trenches—as long as it's been decided somewhere—I don't know when or where, but I know it—and in the three days that we've been here, there's three days that the brandy's been dealt out to us on the end of a fork!"
"Ah, malheur!"
"There's the grub!" announces a poilu [note 1] who was on the look-out at the corner.
"Time, too!"
And the storm of revilings ceases as if by magic. Wrath is changed into sudden contentment.