In the somber shadow of gaunt, historic Verdun the eleventh day of the
eleventh month of 1918 crawled slowly toward its epoch-making eleventh
hour. The progress of each advancing minute was accompanied by a
bombardment that started in a rumbling basso-profundo of fourteen-inch
naval guns and reached its crescendo of barbaric medley in a crackling
cataract of machine-gun fire.
“You can’t tell me that this _guerre_ is goin’ to _finee toot sweet_,”
asserted Jimmy McGee to an infirmary orderly. “Listen to that
hell-bent-for-election noise.” He paused to allow himself and the
orderly to appreciate the significance of his assertion.
Both had grown accustomed to the thunder of barrages and the din of
battles, but their ears were not listening to any ordinary bombardment.
Their pals in arms were putting over the heaviest artillery fusillade
that had ever made the base of Verdun’s brave citadel tremble. The noise
was magnificent and awe-inspiring. The men held their tongues awhile.
Then Jimmy spoke.
“Maybe it’s possible, but I doubt it. How the hell can they stop a thing
like this _guerre_ so quick?”
“Damn if I know. Sounds like bull to me, but the radio order says that
we stop fightin’ at eleven o’clock. That’s all I know,” answered the
orderly.
“I’m going to breeze ’round a bit. If it’s straight dope I’ll blow up to
the position. Want to get a picture of O. D.’s grave. Camouflage me if
any of them guys get wonderin’ where I am. The old wing’s gettin’
_très-bon_ now, anyhow. They might just as well let me go back to the
battery,” and Jimmy took his bandaged left arm out of its sling just to
prove his words.
“Go on, I’ll cover you up,” said the orderly.
Jimmy wandered through the different barracks of the regimental
_échelon_ and finally landed at Headquarters Office.
“What’s the dope, Barney?” asked Jimmy of a bespectacled sergeant who
sat humped over a desk full of morning reports.
“The _guerre_ is _finee_ at eleven o’clock,” was the answer in slow,
methodic tones.
[Illustration: “I WANT TO GET A PICTURE OF O. D.’s GRAVE”]
“Guess it’s straight enough if Barney believes it,” muttered Jimmy,
closing the door.
He found Joyce, borrowed a pocket camera from him, and started for the
front. Jimmy evaded Verdun and picked the straight road from Thierville
to Bras. From Bras he intended following the muddy trail that led
directly to the present position of his outfit.
A continuous stream of nondescript traffic flowed past him going in the
direction of the _échelons_. Captured Boche wagons, ammunition limbers,
ration-trucks, caissons, staff cars, and ambulances were some of the
vehicles that passed Jimmy as he plodded along. Their presence on the
road at ten-thirty in the morning was a significant thing in itself. He
knew that such heavy traffic was forbidden on roads that were under
enemy fire during the hours of daylight. But the rattle and clatter of
the motley traffic could not drown out the fury of the American
bombardment.
“Well, it’s _finee_, old man,” shouted a man in fatigue clothes riding a
balky mule.
“_Oui_,” responded Jimmy, unenthusiastically.
At Bras Jimmy stopped at one of the ambulance stations to watch them
load on some boys who had just been wounded.
“Where the hell are you bound? The _guerre’s finee_.”
Jimmy looked at the speaker. He was Mike Merrowitz, of his own outfit.
“Goin’ up to the battery. What the hell did you do to your arm, Mike?”
“Nothin’ much. Was mendin’ a broken wire early this mornin’ and a piece
of shell got me there. Doc said they might have to cut it off at the
elbow. But I don’t believe it’s that bad. Remember my tellin’ you that
I’d go through this _guerre_ and get walloped on the last day? Well, the
damn thing is _finee_, anyhow. Take care, Jimmy,” he admonished, looking
at his bandaged arm.
Jimmy McGee could only nod his answer. The idea that a man could go
through the war as long as Mike had and then get hit during the last
minute of play was beyond him. He began wondering if it was all a
mistake about the _guerre_ being finished. The banging of the guns
certainly didn’t help him to renew his faith in all the statements that
he had heard to the effect that fighting would end at eleven o’clock.
It was exactly ten-forty-five when he started out on the second lap of
his trip.
“Fifteen minutes to make good in,” muttered Jimmy to himself.
Along the sides of the slimy trail strange things were happening. Men
began to appear on the surface. Horses and mules browsed around, hunting
for a green patch of grass.
“What time have you got, buddy?” asked Jimmy of a man who was stripped
to the waist and washing in an honest attempt to remove some of the dirt
that had accumulated on his body since the wash of two months ago.
The man stopped and picked up his wrist watch. “Five minutes before
knocking-off time, Jack,” was the casual reply.
“Five minutes,” repeated Jimmy McGee, doubtfully. “Say, do you think
it’ll _finee_ at eleven?” he asked.
“Sure,” was the confident reply. “It started in ten minutes; why the
hell can’t it end in a few minutes?”
“Guess it can, but it seems funny as hell to talk ’bout the _guerre_
endin’. Why, there’s been times lately when I thought the damn thing
would never _finee_,” stated Jimmy, very solemnly.
“It will be strange to have it all finished. But I can get along without
it. Say, I wonder when the hell we’ll go home, Jack?”
“Great God! I’d never thought of that. If this _guerre finees_ to-day we
ought to get a crack at the first boats. Been over here long enough. Can
you imagine gettin’ back to the old life, wearin’ garters and stuff like
that?”
“Too much for me, Jack,” admitted the man as he scrubbed away.
The bombardment seemed just in the act of flinging all of its violence
into their ears when the roar of cannon and the shrieking of shells
toned down to a puny whisper. A few seconds of scattered “booms” passed.
Then a silence unknown to that part of the world settled over the
vicinity of Verdun.
The guns of war had been hushed as if by the magic command of some
invisible master voice.
Jimmy and the man looked at each other, stunned into dumbness by the
miracle of silence. Five minutes passed in strange quietude.
“Guess I’ll blow up to the guns and see how the boys are takin’ this
stuff,” said Jimmy, slowly.
“Well, it’s _finee_, sure as hell,” declared the man. He was reading his
shirt and snapping his catches between thumb-nails.
“So long, bud; I’ll meet you in Boston,” was Jimmy’s parting shot.
“In Boston, eh?” replied the man as if a new and pleasing idea had
occurred to him. “_Oui_—in Boston.”
The pockmarked hills that sloped down to meet the trail and mingle muddy
rivulets with the slimy water that stagnated in its shell-holes took on
a new lease of life as Jimmy surveyed them. Dark rings of smoke curled
upward. The forms of men and animals began to appear, slowly at first,
as if the bowels of the earth were giving up their recent inhabitants
with great reluctance. Gradually whole processions of men moved against
the horizons made by the dip and rise of Verdun’s storied hills. Mules
and horses scampered at liberty and joined their braying and neighing
with the sounds of human life that were heard in the great silence that
obtained.
Turning an abrupt curve Jimmy McGee was almost upon his battery. Even
Jimmy, who had grown to believe that he had seen every sight that the
front could offer, admitted that the scene before him was unusual.
Humans and creatures who had been spending most of the last two months
below the surface were breathing God’s free air once more without
risking their lives by so doing. Men in undershirts, some without any,
most all of them bareheaded, were stretching, washing, shaving, talking,
and doing many other simple and ordinary things as if they were all
undergoing a novel experience. There was not a clean-faced man in the
crowd.
The four guns that had been participating in the final barrage of the
war stood in their crude emplacements like stage-settings in a scene
that had been deserted by all of the actors. They looked forlorn and
lonely in their abandonment.
Equipment, most of it soiled, stained, and rusty, was piled in little
heaps. A batch of rations had been uncovered and lay exposed to the
possibility of unlawful seizure, as guards were a nonentity. Smoke
issued from a field range that was in operation. The rattle of mess-kits
announced the fact that the small line of men who had formed for mess
were hungry.
Jimmy made for a group of men who were standing around a bucket of
water, waiting their turn to wash.
“Hello, Sammy; how’s the boy?” asked McGee of a short, stocky lad in the
waiting line of toilet-makers.
“_Bon_, Jimmy,” responded Sampson. “What do you think of this guerre
being _fineed_?”
“Gosh! I can hardly believe it.”
“I keep thinking that it’s liable to start up any old time,” admitted
Sammy.
“Are you goin’ down to the _échelon_, Sammy?”
“_Oui, toot sweet_. Wait till I get a ton of this dirt off and I’ll hike
along with you.”
“All right, I’m goin’ to look ’round just a bit. Will see you at the
kitchen.”
“_Trey-beans_.”
Jimmy toured the position and inspected his Betsy.
“Well, old girl, you’re _finee_ now,” he said, patting the barrel of his
faithful piece affectionately.
He talked with all the boys he met. The one big question that they put
to him was, “Know when we go home, Jimmy?” But that was a query beyond
his power to answer. A few hinted that the division might be sent into
Germany as a part of the Army of Occupation. These suggestions were
routed by indignant denial of such a possibility.
“They’ll never send this outfit to Germany. We’re slated for home. Let
them guys that just got over here take a crack at that stuff,” snapped
Pop Rigney.
Later, after they had mess, Jimmy and Sammy started cross-country for
Thierville so that they might pass O. D.’s grave and make a picture of
it.
Jimmy found the mound of earth that covered the mortal remains of his
pal, and after arranging the helmet on the crude little cross he
photographed the grave and walked away with the remark, “O. D. was sure
one white man, Sammy.”
They continued in silence until the outskirts of Verdun were reached.
“Gee! there’s something goin’ on in town,” declared Sammy.
The sound of pealing bells and stirring music reached their ears. They
quickened their step. Cheering and shouts sounded above the music.
A bearded poilu came tearing out of a ruined house, waving a bottle over
his head.
[Illustration: “A BEARDED POILU CAME TEARING OUT OF A RUINED HOUSE,
WAVING A BOTTLE OVER HIS HEAD”]
“_Finee! La guerre finee!_” he shouted, and offered them the bottle.
They drank and shouted back:
“_Oui. Finee._ Hurrah!”
The grizzled poilu and the two Americans sallied down the narrow street
to locate the music. Progress became difficult after the trio reached
one of the main streets. Soldiers—for there were very few civilians
residing in the battered remnants of Verdun—piled out of every doorway
and alley, most of them singing and shouting. Finally, after stopping to
drink the success of the armistice with at least ten different parties
of poilus and Yanks, Jimmy, Sammy, and their new friend found themselves
in the square where a parade was forming.
A hastily organized band crashed out the stirring music of “Quand
Madelon.” The mob cheered itself into action and started off behind the
band. Flags, mostly American, waved above the surging crowds. Another
band, half American and half French, swung into the square playing the
“Marseillaise.” Then “The Star-Spangled Banner” brought a thunderous
volley of applause.
“_La guerre c’est finie_,” was the predominating cry. “_Vivent les
Américains!_” was the second in strength.
Most of the demonstrations came from the throats of the French whose
natural dramatic and emotional temperament responded to the occasion
more quickly than did the less demonstrative make-ups of the Yankee
soldiers. But it was only natural that the French should have indulged
in greater feelings and demonstrations than their brothers in arms, the
Americans, for they had borne the yoke of war years longer. It was
wonderful to see the worn lines on veteran poilu faces as their
sternness relaxed in smiles and laughs.
Jimmy and Sammy found themselves drinking wine and other liquors with
many strange men. The password to good-fellowship was “_Finee, la guerre
finee_,” and when the liquor began to assert itself in the blood of the
men who acclaimed the Allied triumph on the streets of Verdun
good-fellowship reached its zenith.
That night the men of Jimmy’s section were gathered around a
cheery-looking beer keg in a comfortable barrack at Thierville hashing
over the _guerre_ and its swift dramatic dénouement. The flight of the
Kaiser and the downfall of his military empire had dwindled into a
meaningless fact before the expanding idea of an early departure for
home.
“Home! Great Lord, it ain’t possible!” ejaculated one man as he looked
wistfully into the blazing fire that roared up a great open fireplace. A
bit of silence followed on the heels of his remark. Then Limy Mills and
Vine started singing the chorus of “There’s a Long, Long Trail
Awinding.” Twenty throats, unsteady from an emotion that was new and yet
old, joined in the singing.
Jimmy McGee, sitting in a far corner of the room, looked up from the
letter that he was writing to Mary O. D. and listened while a strange
yearning for something that the song suggested mastered his feelings.
Four days later Jimmy McGee’s outfit rolled down the “Sacred Road” of
France. No officer or enlisted man knew its destination. All that any
man could be certain of was that he was headed for the rear.
Jimmy, lacking a roll and stripped of sundry equipments that he had
carried over the same road three months before, followed behind his
Betsy.
“What outfit, buddy?” asked an engineer who leaned on his shovel to
watch the decrepit parade pass.
“Twenty-sixth division,” answered Jimmy.
“You guys are goin’ home _toot sweet_, ain’t you?” questioned the
engineer.
“So they tell us, buddy,” responded the Yankee veteran as a man does who
speaks from another world. His thoughts were four thousand miles away,
they stretched across the ocean and reached a certain, slender somebody
who answered the name of Mary O. D. in the thoughts of Jimmy McGee.
“Gee! It sure will be tough tryin’ to tell her and her mother ’bout
O. D. I wonder what Mary’ll think of me,” and Jimmy McGee trudged along
to accept the future, even as he had accepted the _guerre_.
THE END
Transcriber’s Note
In this book, text shown in italics as originally published is enclosed
in underscores _like this_.