Three Soldiers by John Dos Passos (best e book reader android .txt) đ
- Author: John Dos Passos
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âAll right, kid,â he said. âI told her youâld pay when Uncle Sam came across. Ever had any Kummel?â
âWhat the hellâs that?â
âYouâll see.â
They sat down before a dish of fried eggs at the table in the corner, the favoured table, where Marie herself often sat and chatted, when wizened Madame did not have her eye upon her.
Several men drew up their chairs. Wild Dan Cohan always had an audience.
âLooks like there was going to be another offensive at Verdun,â said Dan Cohan. Someone answered vaguely.
âFunny how little we know about whatâs going on out there,â said one man. âI knew more about the war when I was home in Minneapolis than I do here,â
âI guess weâre lightinâ into âem all right,â said Fuselli in a patriotic voice.
âHell! Nothinâ doinâ this time oâ year anyway,â said Cohan. A grin spread across his red face. âLast time I was at the front the Boche had just made a coup de main and captured a whole trenchful.â
âOf who?â
âOf Americansâof us!â
âThe hell you say!â
âThatâs a goddam lie,â shouted a black-haired man with an ill-shaven jaw, who had just come in. âThere ainât never been an American captured, anâ there never will be, by God!â
âHow long were you at the front, buddy,â asked Cohan coolly. âI guess you been to Berlin already, ainât yer?â
âI say that any man who says an Americanâld let himself be captured by a stinkinâ Hun, is a goddam liar,â said the man with the ill-shaven jaw, sitting down sullenly.
âWell, youâd better not say it to me,â said Cohan laughing, looking meditatively at one of his big red fists.
There had been a look of apprehension on Marieâs face. She looked at Cohanâs fist and shrugged her shoulders and laughed.
Another crowd had just slouched into the cafe.
âWell if that isnât wild Dan! Hello, old kid, how are you?â
âHello, Dook!â
A small man in a coat that looked almost like an officerâs coat, it was so well cut, was shaking hands effusively with Cohan. He wore a corporalâs stripes and a British aviatorâs fatigue cap. Cohan made room for him on the bench.
âWhat are you doing in this hole, Dook?â The man twisted his mouth so that his neat black mustache was a slant.
âG. O. 42,â he said.
âBattle of Paris?â said Cohan in a sympathetic voice. âBattle of Nice! Iâm going back to my section soon. Iâd never have got a court-martial if Iâd been with my outfit. I was in the Base Hospital 15 with pneumonia.â
âTough luck!â
âIt was a hell of a note.â
âSay, Dook, your outfit was working with ours at Chamfort that time, wasnât it?â
âYou mean when we evacuated the nut hospital?â
âYes, wasnât that hell?â Dan Cohan gulped down half a glass of red wine, smacked his thick lips, and began in his story-telling voice:
âOur section had just come out of Verdun where weâd been getting hell for three weeks on the Bras road. There was one little hill where weâd have to get out and shove every damn time, the mud was so deep, and God, it stank there with the shells turning up the ground all full of mackabbies as the poilus call themâŠ. Say, Dook, have you got any money?â
âIâve got some,â said Dook, without enthusiasm.
âWell, the champagneâs damn good here. Iâm part of the outfit in this gin mill; theyâll give it to you at a reduction.â
âAll right!â
Dan Cohan turned round and whispered something to Marie. She laughed and dived down behind the curtain.
âBut that Chamfort was worse yet. Everybody was sort oâ nervous because the Germans had dropped a message sayinâ theyâd give âem three days to clear the hospital out, and that then theyâd shell hell out of the place.â
âThe Germans done that! Quit yer kiddinâ,â said Fuselli.
âThey did it at Souilly, too,â said Dook. âHell, yesâŠ. A funny thing happened there. The hospital was in a big rambling house, looked like an Atlantic City hotelâŠ. We used to run our car in back and sleep in it. It was where we took the shell-shock cases, fellows who were roarinâ mad, and tremblinâ all over, and some of âem paralysed likeâŠ. There was a man in the wing opposite where we slept who kept laughinâ. Bill Rees was on the car with me, and we laid in our blankets in the bottom of the car and every now and then one of usâld turn over and whisper: âAinât this hell, kid?â âcause that feller kept laughinâ like a man who had just heard a joke that was so funny he couldnât stop laughinâ. It wasnât like a crazy manâs laugh usually is. When I first heard it I thought it was a man really laughinâ, and I guess I laughed too. But it didnât stopâŠ. Bill Rees anâ me laid in our car shiverinâ, listeninâ to the barrage in the distance with now and then the big noise of an aeroplane bomb, anâ that feller laughinâ, laughinâ, like heâd just heard a joke, like something had struck him funny.â Cohan took a gulp of champagne and jerked his head to one side. âAn that damn laughinâ kept up until about noon the next day when the orderlies strangled the fellerâŠ. Got their goat, I guess.â
Fuselli was looking towards the other side of the room, where a faint murmur of righteous indignation was rising from the dark man with the unshaven jaw and his companions. Fuselli was thinking that it wasnât good to be seen round too much with a fellow like Cohan, who talked about the Germans notifying hospitals before they bombarded them and who was waiting for a court-martial. Might get him in wrong. He slipped out of the cafe into the dark. A dank wind blew down the irregular street, ruffling the reflected light in the puddles, making a shutter bang interminably somewhere. Fuselli went to the main square again, casting an envious glance in the window of the Cheval Blanc, where he saw officers playing billiards in a well-lighted room painted white and gold, and a blond girl in a raspberry-colored shirtwaist enthroned haughtily behind the bar. He remembered the M. P. and automatically hastened his steps. In a narrow street the other side of the square he stopped before the window of a small grocery shop and peered inside, keeping carefully out of the oblong of light that showed faintly the grass-grown cobbles and the green and grey walls opposite. A girl sat knitting beside the small counter with her two little black feet placed demurely side by side on the edge of a box full of red beets. She was very small and slender. The lamplight gleamed on her black hair, done close to her head. Her face was in the shadow. Several soldiers lounged awkwardly against the counter and the jambs of the door, following her movements with their eyes as dogs watch a plate of meat being moved about in a kitchen.
After a little the girl rolled up her knitting and jumped to her feet, showing her face,âan oval white face with large dark lashes and an impertinent mouth. She stood looking at the soldiers who stood about her in a circle, then twisted up her mouth in a grimace and disappeared into the inner room.
Fuselli walked to the end of the street where there was a bridge over a small stream. He leaned on the cold stone rail and looked into the water that was barely visible gurgling beneath between rims of ice.
âO this is a hell of a life,â he muttered.
He shivered in the cold wind but remained leaning over the water. In the distance trains rumbled interminably, giving him a sense of vast desolate distances. The village clock struck eight. The bell had a soft note like the bass string of a guitar. In the darkness Fuselli could almost see the girlâs face grimacing with its broad impertinent lips. He thought of the sombre barracks and men sitting about on the end of their cots. Hell, he couldnât go back yet. His whole body was taut with desire for warmth and softness and quiet. He slouched back along the narrow street cursing in a dismal monotone. Before the grocery store he stopped. The men had gone. He went in jauntily pushing his cap a little to one side so that some of his thick curly hair came out over his forehead. The little bell in the door clanged.
The girl came out of the inner room. She gave him her hand indifferently.
âComment ca va! Yvonne? Bon?â
His pidgin-French made her show her little pearly teeth in a smile.
âGood,â she said in English.
They laughed childishly.
âSay, will you be my girl, Yvonne?â
She looked in his eyes and laughed.
âNon compris,â she said.
âWe, we; voulez vous etâ ma fille?â
She shrieked with laughter and slapped him hard on the cheek. âVenez,â she said, still laughing. He followed her. In the inner room was a large oak table with chairs round it. At the end Eisenstein and a French soldier were talking excitedly, so absorbed in what they were saying that they did not notice the other two. Yvonne took the Frenchman by the hair and pulled his head back and told him, still laughing, what Fuselli had said. He laughed.
âNo, you must not say that,â he said in English, turning to Fuselli.
Fuselli was angry and sat down sullenly at the end of the table, keeping his eyes on Yvonne. She drew the knitting out of the pocket of her apron and holding it up comically between two fingers, glanced towards the dark corner of the room where an old woman with a lace cap on her head sat asleep, and then let herself fall into a chair.
âBoom!â she said.
Fuselli laughed until the tears filled his eyes. She laughed too. They sat a long while looking at each other and giggling, while Eisenstein and the Frenchman talked. Suddenly Fuselli caught a phrase that startled him.
âWhat would you Americans do if revolution broke out in France?â
âWeâd do what we were ordered to,â said Eisenstein bitterly. âWeâre a bunch of slaves.â Fuselli noticed that Eisensteinâs puffy sallow face was flushed and that there was a flash in his eyes he had never seen before.
âHow do you mean, revolution?â asked Fuselli in a puzzled voice.
The Frenchman turned black eyes searchingly upon him.
âI mean, stop the butchery,âoverthrow the capitalist government. âThe social revolution.â
âBut youâre a republic already, ainât yer?â
âAs much as you are.â
âYou talk like a socialist,â said Fuselli. âThey tell me they shoot guys in America for talkinâ like that.â
âYou see!â said Eisenstein to the Frenchman.
âAre they all like that?â
âExcept a very few. Itâs hopeless,â said Eisenstein, burying his face in his hands. âI often think of shooting myself.â
âBetter shoot someone else,â said the Frenchman.
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