“No. Don’t believe it is. But sounds enough like French to use it O. K. The Frogs understand it all right. Well, we’ll get strapped up and on the way. Got to try and make the outfit to-day. There’s somethin’ up in our comin’ up here so sudden and we can’t afford to miss anythin’. Got a hunch, O. D., that the Boches is goin’ to get an awful beatin’ up in these parts. Heard Frenchmen say it wasn’t possible to drive the Germans out of the positions they’ve got ’round Verdun and St. Mihiel. Put a bunch of Americans in there. I’ll bet all the pay they owe me, and that’s three months now, that we’ll take Metz. Say, O. D., I ’ain’t got over four francs. How are you set on frankers?”
“I just got paid a few days ago. Let’s see,” said O. D., counting his money. “Oh, about sixty-five francs. How much do you want?”
“I’ll ask madame how much we owe,” answered Jimmy. “Madame, combien?”
The madame told him to wait a minute. She got an old pencil and a piece of paper and started figuring.
“It’s a fact, O. D., these Frogs can’t tell you how much a glass of van rouge costs without workin’ it out on paper. Ain’t it the limit. Look at her now.”
Finally the madame reached a conclusion of figures.
“Dix francs,” she told Jimmy.
“That’s ten francs or two dollars,” interpreted Jimmy to O. D.
O. D. gave her a ten-franc note without another word.
“That’s five francs I owe you, O. D. Keep ’count of that, will you?”