"No," said Professor Sands. "I was in bad health at the time."
"So was a lot of others," sneered Budd. "I wasn't feeling what you might call well myself; but I stuck to it till they biffed me in the leg—the hounds!—and put me out of business."
"Of course, you draw a pension," ventured the professor.
"No," said the cook, "I never asked for no pension. They've given one to about every feller what wasn't dead when the war broke out, but there hasn't been a bill passed yet that takes me in."
"Indeed?" His listener was politely observant.
"Yes, that's the truth," went on the cook. "I declare I feel real dopy or dotty or something. They pensioned every beat that came back with a knapsack full of rebel watches, but they left out old Jim. He don't wear no medals; he don't parade on Decoration Day to scatter posies; he don't get no free beer while the band plays 'Georgia'—'Hurrah for the flag that makes us free!'" he chanted hoarsely. "Hurrah for the Devil! that's what I say. Hurrah for the man without a pension!"
"You interest me," interposed Professor Sands.
"Oh, do I?" cried the cook. "By blood! I've half a mind to interest you more. But don't look at me like that—I tell you, I don't like your eye!" He tried to shield himself from that unmoved gaze. "You're interested, are you? You'd like to put my case before your influential friends back East? You with your little bag of rocks and your little hammer and your gloves! Did you ever in your life see anyone who wasn't a nickel-plated angel? Did you ever run across a real live blackguard out of a story paper? Did you ever see a man who couldn't show his face in a settlement by the light of day, and had to take up any job that kept him out of sight? I don't know why, but I've got to shoot my mouth off now if it hangs me. I've got to blab or go stark mad!"
"I understand," said the professor.
"I was one of them patriots," Budd went on, speaking almost mechanically, as though hypnotized, "who enlisted for the boodle and then skipped out to work the racket somewhere else."