November 10, 1917.
Evening.
You know November in France. I’ve been here almost two weeks now and
am still _à l’entrainement_, that is, I haven’t started in to do any
regular work yet. Only five times have I been able to fly in two weeks.
But I’ve got my own machine, and mechanic, everything is in order and
I’ve been assigned to a patrol the last two mornings when it rained.
Tomorrow again at 8:50 with four others--patrol for one hour and fifty
minutes at about 15,000 feet, back and forth over our sector, sometimes
over our own lines, sometimes in Bochie. I’m getting very impatient
to get started. In what few flights I’ve had, I’ve been working on
acrobacy a bit and am gradually learning a few simple things; twice I
stayed up a little too long and had to lie down a few hours afterward,
almost seasick.
I like Spa 84 very much indeed. The Frenchmen there are much more
regular fellahs than most of those I’ve been with in the schools.
Wertheimer, a sergeant, is a sort of informal and unadmitted chief
of the _sous-officiers_. It is he that speaks English and has helped
us a lot in getting settled, etc. Very much of a gentleman he is,
and understands a bit Anglo-Saxon customs and eccentricities, always
gay and an indefatigable worker. We have all been arranging the one
big room of our barracks--dining room, reading room, and probably
eventually American bar. The walls are covered with green cloth,
green paper (of two different shades and neither quite the same as
the cloth), red cloth (on top as a sort of frieze) and red paper. The
ceiling is done in white cloth to keep in heat and lighten the room.
A monumental task it has been, especially as materials are hard to
get and expensive. Wertem (as Wertheimer is called) and Deborte have
done most of the work. Deborte is also _chef de popote_, which means
housekeeper, and a very efficient man. For four francs per day we are
fed amazingly well, especially when one realizes that we are near the
front in a country which has had three years of war. Deborte hasn’t
the pleasantest manner in the world at times, but usually is very
agreeable, willing to tell me things about flying or the _escadrille_,
always ready to work, and a dependable man in the air. And Verber who
rooms with Wertem,--he speaks a little English, has a great deal of
trouble understanding it, but is picking up. Wears a monocle all the
time because he’s got a bum eye, carries a stick and has an extremely
eccentric appearance, but withal is very agreeable and a very valuable
man. He has the habit of taking long trips all alone far into Germany
just to see what is going on. Pinot is the name of the little roly-poly
chap everybody calls Bul-Bul, who used to be a mechanic and now is a
very good, merry pilot. He has a great _pension_ toward Pinard, is
violently but not at all objectionably non-aristocratic, is forever
laughing or kidding some one, walks on his hands to amuse people, and
is the delight of all the _mécanos_. Demeuldre is a very quiet sort of
school boy type who has been a pilot of biplanes and reconnaissance
machines for a long time. He came to the escadrille recently with a
record of two Boches as pilot of a biplane (that is, his machine gun
man did the shooting and they both get credit), and a few days ago
brought down a German in flames, his first as _pilote de chasse_. There
are two others away on permission, whom I don’t know yet.