He swung along at a great gait for one who walked. Life for months without a roof had been hard, but it had toughened wonderfully those whom it did not kill, and John with a magnificent constitution was one of those who had profited most. He felt no weariness now although he had come many miles.
About one o'clock in the afternoon he sat on a stone by the roadside and ate with the appetite of vigorous youth good food from his knapsack. While he was there a German sergeant, with about twenty men in wagons going toward Metz, stopped and spoke to him.
"Hey, you on the stone, what are you doing?" asked the sergeant.
John cut off a fresh piece of sausage with his clasp knife and answered briefly and truthfully:
"Eating."
The sergeant had a broad, red and merry face, and facing a man of good humor he was not offended.
"So I see," he said, "but that wasn't what I meant."
John, without another word, took out his passport, handed it to him and went on eating. The sergeant examined it, handed it back to him and said:
"Correct."
"I show it to everybody," said John. "When a man speaks to me I don't care who he is, or what he is, I hand it to him. I, Jean Castel, as you see by the name on the passport, don't want trouble with anybody."