strictly attended to. It's some sight too, they tell me, when a good
mix-up is goin' on up front. I've got a camera here that I bought
special, thinking it would be fun later to show round my album in the
States an' point out this man being skewered on a bayonet an' that one
being disrupted by a bomb an' the next lot charging a trench. But will
you believe me, Loo-tenant, I haven't as much as set eye or foot on the
trenches. I did once take a run up on the captain's 'Douglas,' thinking
I'd just have a walk around an' see the sights and get some snaps. But
I might as well have tried to break into Heaven an' steal the choir's
harps. I was turned back about ten ways I tried, and wound up by being
arrested as a spy an' darn near gettin' shot. I got mad at last and I
told some fellows, stuck all over with red tabs and cap-bands and
armlets, that they could keep their old trenches, and I didn't believe
they were worth looking at anyway."

Courtenay was laughing again. "I fancy I see the faces of the staff,"
he choked.

"Oh, they ante-d up all right later on," admitted the sergeant, "when
they'd discovered this column and roped in my captain to identify me.
One old leather-face, 'specially--they told me after he was a
General--was as nice as pie, an' had me in an' fed me a fresh meat and
canned asparagus lunch and near chuckled himself into a choking fit
when I told him about dad, an' my being booked up as a Benevolent
Neutral. He was so mighty pleasant that I told him I'd like to have my
dad make him a present of as dandy an auto as rolls in France. I would
have, too, but he simply wouldn't listen to me; told me he'd send it
back freight if I did; and I had to believe him, though, it seemed
unnatural. But they wouldn't let me go look at their blame trenches. I
tried to get this General joker to pass me in, but he wouldn't fall for