GETTING OVER AND ON
This encounter, though witnessed by only a half dozen, gave Jed
Shoemaker a new standing in the camp.
The shoot came off and it was a success in that a fine degree of nearly
equal interest in the contesting teams was shown.
Shoemaker's team received about as much applause as did the boys that
Herb led; and when the mountaineer's boys came out the victors by the
exceedingly small margin of five in the total scores they got all that
was coming to them.
Then Jed was seen to go across to the inspector-general, Colonel Short,
and make a request, whereupon the individual highest scores were read
out, Herbert leading in them.
In the cheering that followed it was plain that the Kentuckian was the
leader; and when the two, Jed and Herb, advanced before the officers'
stand and warmly shook hands there was another burst of applause, led by
Captain Leighton.
The general, joined by certain other officers, came down from his seat
and as the regimental audience filed away he summoned both teams to line
up. He then addressed them:
"Men, this final test of marksmanship is the crucial one in the
selection of snipers--we used to call them sharpshooters in the old
days--to form the first platoon, and others will immediately follow. I
know of no better way than to pick by scores and general deportment, for
the first platoon, thirty-nine men in all. Lieutenant Loring will lead
you."
There was a very decided handclapping, for Loring, though young, was
deservedly popular and had the distinction of having served as a regular
and corporal with Pershing in Mexico and as a private in the
Philippines.
"With the formation of the other platoons, to form the first company of
expert riflemen from this camp and the first of the kind in the army, I
believe, your commander will be Captain Leighton, now of our Company H."
The men all were pleased with this choice. Herbert noticed that even
Gaul, who had scored fairly well in the shooting, vigorously clapped his
hands.
"The sergeants of this first platoon," continued the general, "will be
Berry and Small, and the corporals of the four squads are Whitcomb,
Phillips, Shoemaker and Lang."
Loud applause followed this combined announcement of non-commissioned
officers.
The general further remarked upon the necessity of continued drill and
training together in the new formation and added:
"Hold yourselves in readiness, men, for orders that may come from
Washington at any time respecting new duties. Your squads, Lieutenant
Loring, may be divided up in France, each serving on active duty with a
platoon reduced to three regular squads and one of yours. It is the idea
to place these men in certain positions where organized sniping is most
effective, the snipers, of course, to be protected by the regular men.
And now, I hope and feel sure that each and every one of you, when
before the enemy, will give a good account of himself and do his duty in
our great cause!"
And the general received the greatest cheering of the occasion.
* * * * *
Old Ocean! The rolling, billowy blue, apparently endless, with nothing
but the paler sky, sometimes the gray, threatening sky, dipping into the
dark water on every side. And the vessel; its never ceasing engines
throbbing, turning, whirring, sending the great hull on and on and on,
over swells, through shorter billows, sloshing into whitecaps, and the
two insignificant humans up there at the wheel directing the mapped
course of this great bulk of steel so that her road was as clear, as
certain, as though with wheels under her instead of astern, she followed
a turnpike on the solid earth. But by no means alone. Not far behind, so
close indeed that the white divided waters were always visible, another
transport, also full of troops, sailed the blue sea, and back of that
still another plainly in sight in daytime and at times discernible at
night.
And on every side the greyhounds of the sea. Uncle Sam takes chances in
sending his troopships over the ocean, for well he knows that, lurking
in many places, the enemy submarines, the U-boats that have done most to
make the history of this war so remarkable, and have added so greatly to
its horrors, seek their prey like man-eating sharks ready to attack
helpless swimmers.
The convoy vessels, with their sharp-eyed watchers and heavy guns, bring
to port in safety the transport ships.
"Sorry for you, old chump," was Herbert's remark to Roy, as the latter
stood by the rail in the wee small hours of night and made as though to
cast his entire stomach into the briny depths far below. From bits of
his strained conversation one would imagine that the boy might attempt
to cast himself overboard so as to keep company with the stomach which
so far he had been unable to detach, and so Herbert chose not to leave
him. "Say, old man, what you want to do----"
"Oh, you go plumb to thunder across lots with what I ought to do!"
groaned Flynn. "You've told me about ten billion fool things I ought to
do. There's only one thing I ought to do and that is die. If you felt
like me you'd say: 'Here goes nothin',' and hit the briny kerplunk in
about two seconds. Take it from me, Herb, it isn't just awful; it's
worse than war. I'd rather go up to a forty-two-centimeter just as she
goes off and feed me face with the shell comin' out of her than be
seasick. I'd rather swallow shrapnel, time fuse and all, and have it go
off and turn me inside out than have this darned old heavin' pond coax a
ten-dollar dinner out o' me. Say, I feel it comin' again!"
"Forget it," said Herb. "You come on and lie down and that'll make you
feel better. Try it, at any rate. Come on now, or I'll carry you down!"
Much of this sort of dialogue went on every night, Roy finding, as did a
few others, that the doctor's medicine was not effective.
It was a relief to the boy, as well as to Herb who had lost sleep
remaining up with him night after night, when the ship entered a narrow
harbor across a wide, unruffled bay somewhere on the long coast of
France and warped up to a newly-timbered and planked dock having all of
the earmarks, as it were, of American construction.
Indeed, a dozen carpenters who were unmistakably Yankee in get-up and
movements, and who later proved it by their speech, were still at work
on the office building that flanked the wharf. These fellows came in for
a guying.
The boys in khaki leaning over the side, perched on cabin roofs,
lifeboats, stanchions, railings and in rigging, feeling more than gay at
seeing land again and the fact of having had a safe trip against
possible dangers, had to let their exuberance be felt.
"Yip, yip, yip, yip! Get the dog-catcher's net! There's a son-of-a-gun
from the land of the sun; eh, Yank?" shouted Roy, leading the fun, as
usual.
"Sure, those ginks are all from God's country!"
"Hey, Yank! Does your mother know you're out, over here?"
"Hush, fellers! Salute; that there boob's General Hatchet-and-Saw and
yonder's Colonel Sawdust!"
"Dollars to doughnuts they're makin' better wages than John D---- right
now!"
"Glory be! Wish I was a nail driver 'stead of a dough boy!"
"That good-lookin' fellow looks like he came from good old Pittsburgh!
That's my city!"
"Huh! Don't see black soot on him! Most clean people come from Detroit!"
"No; St. Louis. We wash out there more than once a month, fellow!"
"In the Big Muddy, I reckon!" shouted the Pittsburgher.
"And you need it twice a day!" was shouted back.
"Hey, you wood butchers! Made any coffins for the Booches yet? Soon's we
get there they'll need 'em!"
"Listen to him! Booches! Boshes, man; that's the way to pronoun----"
"Hi, yi! Can the college education! Everybody knows it's Bewches! Don't
show yer ignor----"
"Give him the Iron Cross! Boches, you simp! Ask these natives over here;
it's their word."
"Bet you can't ask 'em anything; they'll mostly beat it when you try to
buy eats!"
"Say, Yank, hey! You with the square! Had any frogs' legs yet? Or
snails?"
"Oh, glory! Gimme some snails right now; nice, fat ones, alive, fresh
and salted! I could eat thousand-leggers or rattlesnakes right now!"
"Hooray! Wonder where we mess!"
"Next week! An' I feel like we messed last in Noo York."
"Me! I'll be glad to get down on terra cotta again!"
"Aw, terra firma, you blamed ignor----"
"Listen to the perfessor! Say, can't you see a joke?"
"Say, fellers--everybody! Let's give a big hooraw for the noble land of
France. Now, then, are you ready? Hip, hip----"
The yell that followed might almost have made the French think that the
Boches had made a land attack from the sea, did they not know that now
such was impossible.
And now, even if the mess had not been called for many hours after the
landing, the khaki-clad boys would not have gone hungry, for as they
fell in line on command and filed down from the ship hundreds of
kindly-faced girls, lads, women and even old men, greeted them smilingly
and tendered each soldier a dainty, ample bit of delicious food: meaty
sandwiches, tasty little cakes, cups of milk and sour wine--looking
surprised, indeed, when the latter was refused by many, Herb and Roy
being among this number.
Lieutenant Loring, standing near and noticing this, said to the boys:
"You are right, fellows, of course, morally considering the matter, but
here it is a little different from our country. The water is generally
vile and often you will have to endanger your health or go thirsty;
besides, there is so little alcohol in this common wine,
'_vin-ordinaire_,' they call it, that it is really not intoxicating.
That may let you down occasionally for a drink of it when you can't get
milk."
Again, when thousands of long cigarettes came their way, Herb and Roy
were among a very few who refused them. The donors were taken aback,
indeed. But the boys' messmates, those of their company, had long since
acknowledged the sanity of the arguments against tobacco, even though
failing in the practise of abstinence.