this is
a dirty business! I am a Gascon.... I like to live." He put a dirty
brown hand on Martin's arm.

"How old do you think I am?"

"Thirty-five."

"I am twenty-four. Look at the picture." From a tattered black note-book
held together by an elastic band he pulled a snapshot of a jolly-looking
young man with a fleshy face and his hands tucked into the top of a
wide, tightly-wound sash. He looked at the picture, smiling and tugging
at one of his long moustaches. "Then I was twenty. It's the war." He
shrugged his shoulders and put the picture carefully back into his
inside pocket. "Oh, it's idiotic!"

"You must have had a tough time."

"It's just that people aren't meant for this sort of thing," said the
artilleryman quietly. "You don't get accustomed. The more you see the
worse it is. Then you end by going crazy. Oh, it's idiotic!"

"How did you find things at home?"

"Oh, at home! Oh, what do I care about that now? They get on without
you.... But we used to know how to live, we Gascons. We worked so hard
on the vines and on the fruit-trees, and we kept a horse and carriage. I
had the best-looking rig in the department. Sunday it was fun; we'd play
bowls and I'd ride about with my wife. Oh, she was nice in those days!
She was young and fat and laughed all the time. She was something a man
could put his arms around, she was. We'd go out in my rig. It was
click-clack of the whip in the air and off we were in the broad road....
Sacred name of a pig, that one was close.... And the Marquis of
Montmarieul had a rig, too, but not so good as mine, and my horse would
always pass his in the road. Oh, it was funny, and he'd look so sour to
have common people like us pass him in the road.... Boom, there's
another.... And the Marquis now is nicely embusque in the automobile
service. He is stationed at Versailles.... And look at me.... But what
do I care about all that now?"

"But after the war ..."

"After the war?" He spat savagely on the first step of the dugout. "They
learn to get on without you."

"But we'll be free to do as we please."

"We'll never forget."

"I shall go to Spain ..." A piece of shrapnel ripped past Martin's ear,
cutting off the sentence.

"Name of God! It's getting hot.... Spain: I know Spain." The
artilleryman jumped up and began dancing, Spanish fashion, snapping his
fingers, his big moustaches swaying and trembling. Several shells burst
down the road in quick succession, filling the air