Old King Cole sat hunched up, his helmet over his eyes, looking down at his heavy shoes. Kahl, a light-weight boxer from Pennsylvania, was attacking a tin of corned beef, trying to open it with his bayonet. Wormrath, from Cleveland, who carried a khaki-colored handkerchief which he had used for three months, sat with his arms around his knees, his eyes looking far away and moist.
“What’s the matter, King?” Hicks called, anxious somehow to make himself again a part of the platoon as soon as he could.
“Oh, this damned war makes me sick. Always movin’ around. They never let you stay one place a minute.”
“Join the marines and see the world,” some one called.
“Through the door of a box car,” some one else amended.
“You’ll be up here long enough, old fellow. You ought to come from my part of the country, King. They do a lot of cutting and shooting there.”
“Yeh.” King Cole was ironic. “They do a lot of cuttin’ and shootin’. They cut around the corner and shoot for home.”
Kahl laughed exultantly. He felt that at last the time he had given to training was to be of some purpose. He abandoned trying to open the tin of meat because he feared that he would dull his bayonet. And he wanted it to be sharp, so sharp. Those dirty Huns. He drew his finger along the edge of the shiny piece of steel. That would cut, all right. That wouldn’t be deflected by a coat-button from piercing the intestines.
Lieutenant Bedford, bent forward as usual, the end of his nose wiggling nervously, came among them with Sergeants Ryan and Harriman.
“There won’t be any smoking or any matches lighted after dark to-night, fellows. We are only about a mile from the German front line. As near as I can make out they are advancing and it is our job to stop them. We’ll probably move forward some time after dark, so have your stuff by your side.”