Part 12

Presently he turned towards Nourrigat.

"How about your regiment? Stationary?"

"I fancy so. We were pretty well thinned out. We're waiting for reinforcements."

"What's become of Chenu, and Morlet and Panard?"

"Gone! all of them."

"Too bad! They were such good fellows!"

And our friends smiled, occupied but with the thought of the living present. Paris, their friends, their families, their professions, all seemed to be forgotten, or completely over-shadowed by the habitual daily routine of marches and halts, duties and drudgery. They were no longer a great painter and a brilliant barrister. They were two soldiers; two atoms of that formidable machine which shall conquer the German; they were as two monks in a monastery--absolutely oblivious to every worldly occupation.

We understand, we feel quite certain that they will be ours again--but later--when this shall all be over--if God spares them to return.

At that same instant two boys appeared at the entrance to the courtyard. They may have been respectively ten and twelve years of age. The perspiration trickled from their faces, and they were bending beneath the weight of a huge bundle each carried on his back.

"Hello, there, fellows," called one of them.

A soldier appeared on the threshold.

"Here Lefranc--here are your two boxes of sardines, and your snuff. There isn't any more plum jam to be had. Oh, yes, and here's your writing paper."

The child scribbled something in an old account book.

"That makes fifty-three sous," he finally announced.

Other soldiers now came up.

The boys were soon surrounded by a group of eager gesticulating poilus.

"Oh, shut up, can't you? How can a fellow think if you all scream at once? Here--Mimile"--and he turned to his aid. "Don't you give 'em a thing."

Then the tumult having subsided, he continued--

"Now then, your names, one at a time--and don't muddle me when I'm trying to count!"

Pistre quickly explained that this phenomenon was Popaul called "Business"--and Mimile, his clerk, both sons of a poor widow who washed for the soldiers. In spite of his tender years "Business" had developed a tendency for finance that bespoke a true captain of industry. He had commenced by selling the men newspapers, and then having saved enough to buy first one and then a second bicycle, the brothers went twice a day to Villers Cotterets, some fifteen miles distant, in quest of the orders given them by the soldiers. At first the dealers tried to have this commerce prohibited, but as the lads were scrupulously honest, and their percentage very modest, the Commandant not only tolerated, but protected them.

Mimile was something of a Jonah, having twice been caught by bits of shrapnel, which necessitated his being cared for at the dressing station.

"All his own fault too," exclaimed Business, shrugging his shoulders. "He's no good at diving. Doesn't flatten out quick enough. Why I used to come right over the road last Winter when the bombardment was on full tilt. I was then working for the Legion and the Chasseurs. No cinch let me tell you! It used to be--'Popaul here--Popaul there--where's my tobacco? How about my eau-de-Cologne?' There wasn't any choice with those fellows. It was furnish the goods or bust--and I never lost them a sou's worth of merchandise either!"

Business knew everything and everybody; all the tricks of the trade, all the tricks of the soldiers. He had seen all the Generals, and all the Armies from the British to the Portuguese.

He had an intimate acquaintance with all the different branches of warfare, as well as a keen memory for slang and patois. He nourished but one fond hope in his bosom--a hope which in moments of expansion he imparts, if he considers you worthy of his confidence.

"In four years I'll volunteer for the aviation corps."

"In four years? That's a long way off, my lad. That's going some, I should say," called a poilu who had overheard the confession.

"Look here, Business, did I hear you say it won't be over in four years?" asked another.

"Over? Why, it'll have only just begun. It was the Americans on the motor trucks who told me so, and I guess they ought to know!"