UNDER WAY
The bugle sounded. We might get out.
Versailles. How these platforms swarmed! Ten convoys, like ours, with their carriages decorated in the same way with flags and branches of green leaves, scribbled over with harmless inscriptions and caricatures, had turned out, topsyturvy, this crowd of soldiers in chequered uniforms. The hubbub was tremendous. Everyone seemed in the best of spirits. There were flowers in every cap. We were forbidden to go far. As a matter of fact, no one thought of such a thing, we had to take care not to lose our company, and section. We hardly ventured as far as the fountains of drinking water. Having awaited my turn for it, I went up just after Judsi. I actually felt inclined to smack him on the back, he was so tantalising with his trick of drinking with his lips glued to the tap.
Guillaumin told me when I joined him that the halt was to last for an hour. We might take a turn! We amused ourselves for a moment, by watching some horses being entrained—by no means an easy job. They were hoisting them in with slings. Their place of export was marked "Remount depôt Saint-Lô." Guillaumin nudged me with his elbow.
"Some concentration, what!"
It was true. All the Brittany lines, most of those from Normandy and Atlantic coast, converged there, bringing with them the blood of a third, or almost a third, of France.
We got back into the train. Evening was coming on. Guillaumin and I were to keep order in the truck; forty men in our charge. To begin with everyone had submitted to the restrictions concerning the arrangement of packs and rifles. Now the confusion began. A lot of them had got hold of their packs again to make a pillow, and most of them began to shed their equipment.
Lamalou set about moving the seats. I interfered. He began to argue about it. Guillaumin had to join in, and Bouillon too.