“What’s the trouble? What’d he do?”
There was something in the twang, or in the tone of this; something quite intangible, that caught Don’s quick ear, even above the excitement of the occasion. He had heard this man talk a little before in typical American, to be sure; yet it seemed to be not wholly natural. The boy eyed the cook; then addressed the sapper:
“You, little fellow, get a rope off the curtains or in the box maybe and tie this——”
The driver replied to the cook’s query:
“I ain’t done nothin’! This feller’s a German an’ workin’ fer the Heinies; he just told me so. Git him, not me! I’m American all over, I am, and I kin prove it!”
“Headquarters will make you prove it. Keep your hands up.”
“That ain’t no way to treat a fightin’ man!” said the cook angrily. “You put up yer gun an’ we’ll take care o’ this feller. He’s reg’lar, all right; I know him.”
Don kept his eye on the speaker, but made him no reply. Again he spoke to the sapper:
“Come on, you! Don’t stand there like a wooden man! Get a piece of rope, I said!”
“Don’t you pay no attention to him, Shorty! He ain’t nobody we got to mind. Put up yer gun, feller, or I’ll make you put it up!” The cook’s hand went back to his pocket. Don didn’t wait for him to draw his weapon, which he knew he was going to do; the boy, as once before on a somewhat similar occasion, dropped the muzzle of his automatic a little and fired. The cook twisted about in a rather comical fashion and flopped on his hands and one knee, quite as though John Barleycorn had seized and thrown him. The others in the camion had come tumbling out from the front and rear of the car and were pushing forward.