Gordon Bates - The Khaki Boys at Camp Sterling; Or, Training for the Big Fight in France

Mess over that night, the tired quartette were glad of a chance to lounge in their new quarters, there to discuss among themselves the, to them, unusual events of that long day. Greatly to their satisfaction they had not been separated, but occupied four cots together in a row, with Roger and Jimmy in the middle and Ignace and Bob on either side of the two.

“To-morrow our real military life begins,” exulted Roger. “I wonder how long we’ll be taken out for drill, and whether we’ll be in the same squad or not?”

“Hope we don’t land in the awkward squad the very first shot,” commented Bob. “The drill sergeant’s supposed to go easy with rookies for the first day or two. An enlisted man I know, who’s been in the Army for the past three years, once told me that it depends a whole lot on the officer who does the drilling. If he’s an old-timer who’s seen service he’s more apt to be patient with a rookie than if he’s just won his chevrons. A newly made drill sergeant is more likely to get peppery and bawl a rookie out before the whole squad.”

“I used to know a little bit about this drill game. The last year I was in grammar school some of us kids got the soldier fever and organized a company of our own,” reminisced Jimmy. “The brother of one of the fellows belonged to the National Guards and he used to drill us. There were about twenty of us, and we drilled in our garret once a week for a whole winter. We’d planned to go camping together the next summer and sleep in tents and all that, like real soldiers. Then some of the fellows got to scrapping and our company broke up. We had uniforms something like those the Boy Scouts wear and wooden guns. Hope I haven’t forgotten what little I learned. Maybe it’ll help me now.”

“Shouldn’t be surprised if it would.” Bob regarded Jimmy with interest. “You’ll probably be quicker at catching the swing and rhythm of things than the rest of us. Being familiar with the commands ought to help some.”

“I am the dumb,” broke in Ignace, who had been gloomily listening to the conversation of the trio. “If this day I no brother help me what I do? Yet must I be the good solder. I have said an’ so am I, som’ day.”

“You’ve done the best you could, old man,” comforted Bob. “You’ll learn. So don’t cry about it!”

“Never I cry the tear,” was the somewhat reproachful retort to Bob’s kindly chaffing. “Only the littles an’ the ’ooman cry. I am the man. I no cry my father hit me, I no cry now. So is it.”

It had been anything but a red-letter day for the Pole. Bewildered by the rapidity with which things happened in Camp Sterling, Ignace had been hustled here and there like a sheep to slaughter. Only the kindly proddings and promptings of his three self-adopted Brothers had saved him from being set down as intolerably stupid in the minds of the efficient officers and men with whom he had already come in contact.

In reality Ignace was not as stupid as he appeared. Years of unremitting, slavish toil had undoubtedly made him slow and clumsy of movement. He had not the quick faculty of adapting himself to new conditions, which is one of the most striking characteristics of the American the world over. He was also likely to come to grief frequently through his imperfect knowledge of English. In spite of all these handicaps, his will to become a good soldier was so paramount that his three friends were of the opinion that somehow he would plod along to that end. Moreover, they had privately agreed among themselves to do all in their power to help him.

“That’s the talk,” commended Jimmy. “Never say die till you’re dead.”

“Then can I no say,” supplemented Ignace so positively as to create a general snicker. It dawned upon him that he had provoked it, and a slow grin overspread his usually immobile face. He was beginning to understand the vernacular of his “Brothers.”

“We’ve got a lot to learn,” sighed Roger. “All I can see to do is to get busy and learn it. I’ve been trying to look as much like a first-class private as I could since I drew my uniform. Jimmy has us all beaten when it comes to that, though. His uniform blouse looks as though it grew on him.”

Jimmy appeared radiantly pleased at Bob’s candid praise. Unconsciously he drew himself up with a proud little air that was vastly becoming to him. “Oh, I’m not so much,” he demurred.

“Don’t let it go to your head and swell it, Blazes,” teased Bob. “Look at me and think what you might have been. To-night you see before you a simple, hopeful rookie. To-morrow at drill you’ll see a sore and hopeless dub. I expect to get mine; but not forever. Live and learn. If you can’t learn you’ve got a right to live, anyhow. A few gentle reminders from a drill sergeant that you’re a dummy won’t put you in the family vault. A little mild abuse’ll seem like home to me. I’ll think I’m back on the Chronicle listening to the city editor. It takes a newspaper man to read the riot act to a cub reporter. Nothing left out and several clauses added.”

Bob’s untroubled attitude toward what lay in wait for him on the morrow had a cheering effect on Jimmy and Roger. Ignace, however, sat humped up on his cot a veritable statue of melancholy. Decidedly round-shouldered, his stocky figure showed at a glaring disadvantage in the trim olive-drab Army-blouse.

Jimmy’s glance coming to rest on the dejected one, he counseled warningly: “You’d better practice holding back your shoulders, Iggy. They need it.”

Ignace obediently straightened up. “Too much mill,” he explained. “All time so.” He illustrated by bending far forward. “Mebbe better soon. Huh?”

“You’ll have to keep on the job all the while, then,” was Jimmy’s blunt assertion.

“So will I.” Ignace sighed, then braced himself upon the edge of his cot to a position of ramrod stiffness that was laughable, yet somehow pathetic. Occupied with the ordeal, he took small part in the low-toned talk that continued among his Brothers, but sat blinking at them, now and then slumping briefly and recovering himself with a jerk. Shortly before the 9:45 call to quarters sounded, he dropped over on his cot and went fast asleep. Sound of the bugle brought him to his feet with a wild leap and a snort that nearly convulsed his comrades, and brought the eyes of a dozen or more of rookies to bear upon him. Among them was a tall, freckle-faced, pale-eyed youth with a sneering mouth, who bunked directly across the aisle from the four Khaki Boys.

Viewing Ignace with a grin of malicious amusement, he addressed a remark to his nearest neighbors that caused them to burst into jeering laughter. Quick to catch its scornful import, Jimmy shot an angry glance across the room. Beyond an occasional cursory survey of his rookie companions of the barrack, he had paid them small attention. Now in his usual impetuous fashion he conceived an instant dislike for the freckle-faced soldier, which he never had reason to change. For a second the two stared steadily at each other. Across the narrow space sped a silent declaration of war to the knife. Had Jimmy been gifted with the ability to read the future, he would have been considerably amazed to learn what the outcome of that mute declaration was destined to be.

During the first three days in camp the four Khaki Boys could not get over the awkward feeling of having been suddenly set down in the midst of a strange and confused world. Taken out for drill on the second morning after their arrival at Camp Sterling, their first encounter with a drill sergeant did not tend to make them feel strictly at home in the Army. It served, instead, to bring out sharply to them a deep conviction of their own imperfections.