"It will make a wonderful book," I agreed. "Are you going to syndicate it first?"
Young Mr. Hamlin frowned importantly.
"I was thinking," he said, "of asking John for letters to the magazine editors. So, they'll know I'm not faking, that I've really been through it all. Letters from John would help a lot." Then he asked anxiously: "They would, wouldn't they?"
I reassured him. Remembering the Kid's gibes at John and his numerous dependents, I said: "You another college chum of John's?" The young man answered my question quite seriously. "No," he said; "John graduated before I entered; but we belong to the same fraternity. It was the luckiest chance in the world my finding him here. There was a month-old copy of the Balkan News blowing around camp, and his name was in the list of arrivals. The moment I found he was in Salonika, I asked for twelve hours' leave, and came down in an ambulance. I made straight for John; gave him the grip, and put it up to him to help me."
"I don't understand," I said. "I thought you were sailing on the Adriaticus?"
The young man was again pacing the floor. He halted and faced the harbor.
"You bet I'm sailing on the Adriaticus" he said. He looked out at that vessel, at the Blue Peter flying from her foremast, and grinned. "In just two hours!"
It was stupid of me, but I still was unenlightened. "But your twelve hours' leave?" I asked.
The young man laughed. "They can take my twelve hours' leave," he said deliberately, "and feed it to the chickens. I'm beating it."
"What d'you mean, you're beating it?"