Thereupon the even, drawling, dryly humorous voice began to speak. This is what it said this time:
"An' then Terry says, 'You're too skinny to fight, an' you ain't big enough to kill, an' I wouldn't feel much lonesome if you was somewheres else. You're what I call superfalous.'" The voice dwelt on the magnificent polysyllable lovingly. "An' th' mayreen hobo, he lays his head down on th' table an' weeps some weeps into his glass. It was empty. It always was. 'That's th' wye it gaos with me,' he says. 'I can't never myke no friends. F'r twenty year I've been sylin' th' seas fr'm the North Paole to th' South, fr'm th' East Paole to th' West, chysin meridiums fr'm wyve to wyve, lookin' f'r a friend. But ev'rywhere I gaos—'
"'Hell,' says Terry, 'if you feel that bad about it, we'll have one more. Casey,' he says to me, 'is they an East Pole? It sounds reas'nable, some way.' An' then," the voice mused blissfully, "we had th' tamarin' cocktails, an' then we went to ride with the accidental caraboo. That was a batty day."
"Ain't I never told you about that day?" Suddenly the voice was coy. "Oh, I don't dast to tell," it murmured. "Local 23 o' th' Christian Temp'rance Union'll be gettin' after me f'r makin' it look like th' Army still drunk. I don't want to spread no false impressions. Ev'rybody knows that since th' vile canteen was took away, an' we was give a real chance to lead th' sinful life, there ain't one soldier in ten would even pass a saloon, willin'ly. No, sir," the voice remarked thoughtfully, "I don't reckon there's more'n one in twenty in th' whole Army would let a s'loon get by him, if he had to walk a mile out of his road.
"Who this superfalous man was," said the voice, "I don' know. An' where we was, I've been tryin' to find out ever since. We started in on beer, but we switched to th' tamarin' cocktails, an' we ended in th' Lord knows what. Don't you never drink a tamarin' cocktail, 'nless you want Local 23 startin' a grand guard patrol across your trail.
"That day begun," the voice continued, "with a terrible painful talk me an' Terry had with th' Old Man. It was th' summer we laid in Maniller after th' Samar campaign, an' me an' Terry an' the Irishman named Schleimacher had that patriotic go with th' gu-gu theayter. That coincident shook the Old Man's faith in us way down to th' roots, an' f'r weeks afterwards he kep' us doin' double guard an' double kitchen police an' stunts like that till we was all wore out. So this mornin' we bucks up an' tells him we needs some more passes an' a day off.
"'H'm,' says the Old Man. 'If I done my duty by sersiety, you two'd never get out together, less'n one was in a submarine an' th' other in a b'loon, and then I'll bet,' he says, 'you'd manage to get your trails tangled some ways. H'm. Who am I to butt into the stars in their courses and get a sore head? I can't keep ye in quarters no longer; y'r luck at poker is causin' too many hard feelin's. An' I don't dass to let ye out sep'rate, f'r each of ye needs th' other one to bring him home. H'm.' He gives us th' passes an' then, just when we thought we was saved at last, he calls us back. 'How much money have ye got, anyway?' he asts.
"We hates to name th' size. Th' cards had run favorable since last pay-day.
"'That had ought to keep ye in fines f'r quite a spell,' he says, when we told him. 'H'm. Give it here. I'll help ye save it.'
"We hands over, an' he peels two skinny little bills off them nice fat rolls. 'I'll let ye have five apiece,' he says. 'That makes three dollars f'r chow, an' a dollar to hire carrermatters, an' ten beers apiece. Ten is all ye need. Y'r stummicks is only supposed to hold a pint and a half, anyhow,' he says. 'I'll send th' rest of th' money over to the Adjutant's safe, where you can get at it handy after summary court to-morrer. H'm.'