d in his dirty uniform
and headed for certain punishment back at his camp, than Mr. Davis
proclaimed his intention to write the story.

"The best war story I ever knew!" he exclaimed.

Of course the young soldier did not see it as a drama in real
life, and he certainly did not comprehend that he might be playing
a part in what would be a tragedy in his own life. To him the
incident had no dramatic possibilities. He was merely a young man
who had been racked by exposure and suffering to a point where he
longed to escape a continuance of such hardship, and the easiest
way out of it seemed by way of deserting.

He was "fed up" on discomfort and dirt and cold, and harassed by
the effects of an ill-healed wound received in Flanders some
months before, and he wanted to go home.

The story, as Mr. Davis tells it in the following pages, is
complete as it stands. So far as he knew up to the time of his
death, there was no sequel. He died thinking of "Hamlin" as a
potential deserter who had been shamed out of his purpose to
desert and who had left, ungrateful and bitter with resentment at
his fellow Americans, who had persuaded him to go back to camp,
"take his medicine," and "see it through."

The Hotel "Hermes" is probably no more. Only a few days ago the
news came that all of the water-front of Salonika, a district
stretching in splendid array from the "White Tower" to the Customs
House, had been wiped out by a tremendous fire. It was in this
district that most of the finest buildings, including the Olympos
Palace Hotel--the Hotel Hermes of Mr. Davis's story--were located,
and there is little likelihood that any of this part of the city
escaped. The magnitude of the fire is indicated by the estimated
loss, which is $100,000,000, with about $26,000,000 insurance.

The government has authorized the construction of barracks outside
the burned zone, but has decided not to permit repairs or
temporary construction within that area until plans for rebuilding
the city are complete.

Thus the setting of the story of "The Deserter" is gone, the
author is gone, and who can tell at this moment whether "Hamlin,"
fighting in the trenches on the British front in Prance, is not
also gone.

I hope it may not affect the interest or the moral of the story if
I give the sequel. I know that Mr. Davis would have been glad to
hear what became of the young man who left our room with an angry
word of resentment against us. I hope, too, tha