Tom Slade with the Boys Over There | Page 5

said he
didn't mind that because they were all going to fight together to get
Alsace back. Jollying means making fun of somebody--kind of," Tom
added.
"Oh, zat iss what he say?" Florette cried. "Zat iss my
brother--Armand--yess!"
She explained to her parents and then advanced upon Tom, who
retreated to his second line of defence behind a chair to save himself
from the awful peril of a grateful caress.
"He told me all about how your father fought in the Franco-Prussian
War," Tom went on, "and he gave me this button and he said it was
made from a cannon they used and----"
"Ah, yess, I know!" Florette exclaimed delightedly.
"He said if I should ever happen to be in Alsace all I'd have to do
would be to show it to any French people and they'd help me. He said it
was a kind of--a kind of a vow all the French people had--that the
Germans didn't know anything about. And 'specially families that had
men in the Franco-Prussian War. He told me how he escaped, too, and
got to America, and about how he hit the German soldier that came to
arrest you for singing the Marseillaise."
The girl's face colored with anger, and yet with pride.
"Mostly what we came here for," Tom added in his expressionless way,
"was to get some food and get rested before we start again. We're going
through Switzerland to join the Americans--and if you'll wait a little
while you can sing the Marseillaise all you want."
Something in his look and manner as he sat there, uncouth and forlorn,
sent a thrill through her.

"Zey are all like you?" she repeated. "Ze Americans?"
"Your brother and I got to be pretty good friends," said Tom simply;
"he talked just like you. When we got to a French port--I ain't allowed
to tell you the name of it--but when we got there he went away on the
train with all the other soldiers, and he waved his hand to me and said
he was going to win Alsace back. I liked him and I liked the way he
talked. He got excited, like----"
"Ah, yess--my bruzzer!"
"So now he's with General Pershing. It seemed funny not to see him
after that. I thought about him a lot. When he talked it made me feel
more patriotic and proud, like."
"Yess, yess," she urged, the tears standing in her eyes.
"Sometimes you sort of get to like a feller and you don't know why. He
would always get so excited, sort of, when he talked about France or
Uncle Sam that he'd throw his cigarette away. He wasted a lot of 'em.
He said everybody's got two countries, his own and France."
"Ah, yess," she exclaimed.
"Even if I didn't care anything about the war," Tom went on in his dull
way, "I'd want to see France get Alsace back just on account of him."
Florette sat gazing at him, her eyes brimming.
"And you come to Zhermany, how?"
"After we started back the ship I worked on got torpedoed and I was
picked up by a submarine. I never saw the inside of one before. So
that's how I got to Germany. They took me there and put me in the
prison camp at Slopsgotten--that ain't the way to say it, but----"
"You've got to sneeze it," interrupted Archer.
"Yes, I know," she urged eagerly, "and zen----"

"And then when I found out that it was just across the border from
Alsace I happened to think about having that button, and I thought if I
could escape maybe the French people would help me if I showed it to
'em like Frenchy said."
"Oh, yess, zey will! But we must be careful," said Florette.
"It was funny how I met Archer there," said Tom. "We used to know
each other in New York. He had even more adventures than I did
getting there."
"And you escaped?"
"Yop."
"We put one over on 'em," said Archer. "It was his idea (indicating
Tom). They let us have some chemical stuff to fix the pump engine
with and we melted the barbed wire with it and made a place to crawl
out through. I got a piece of the barbed wirre for a sooveneerr. Maybe
you'd like to have it," Archer added, fumbling in his pockets.
Florette, smiling and crying all at once, still sat looking wonderingly
from one to the other of this adventurous, ragged pair.
"Those Germans ain't so smart," said Archer.
The girl only shook her head and explained to her parents. Then she
turned to Tom.
"My father wants to know if zey are all like you in America. Yess?"
"He used to be a Boy Scout," said Archer. "Did you everr