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
it. 'No, no,' he gurgles and splutters. 'A Benevolent Neutral in the
trenches! Never do, never do. We'll have to put some new initials on
the Mechanical Transport,' he says, 'B.N.M.T. Benevolent Neutral! I
must tell Dallas of the Transport that.' And he shooed me off with
that."

The sergeant had worked busily as he talked, and now, as he commenced
to replace the repaired fork, he was thoughtfully silent a moment.

"I suppose there's some dandy sna-aps up in those trenches,
Loo-tenant?" he said at last.

"Oh, well, I dunno," said Courtenay. "Sort of thing you see in the
picture papers, of course."

"Them!" said the sergeant contemptuously. "I could make better sna-aps
posin' some of the transport crowd in these emergency trenches dug
twenty miles back from the fron