hospitals every time he got took back there for being shot up. He was
almost too scrappy even for that war. He was usually too busy to write,
but we got plenteous reports of his adventures from other men, these
adventures always going hard with whatever Germans got in his way.
And I bet his mother never dreamed that his being such a demon fighter
was all due to her keeping him in curls so long, where he got the habit
and come to love it for its own sake.

Anyway, he fought and fought and had everything happen to him that German
science had discovered was useful to exterminate the lesser races, and it
finally begun to tell on him, hardened as he was by fighting from the
cradle up, as you might say.

It was a glad day for Arline when she got word that he was a broken-down
invalid and had landed at an Atlantic Ocean port on his way home. She
got arrowroot gruel and jelly and medicinal delicacies and cushions, and
looked forward to a life of nursing. She hoped that in the years to come
she could coax the glow of health back to his wan cheeks. And I wouldn't
put it past her--mebbe she hoped she could get him to let the golden hair
grow again, just long enough to make him interesting as he lay coughing
on his couch.

And Shelley come home, but his idee of being an invalid wasn't anything
like his mother's. He looked stout as a horse, and merely wished to rest
up for a couple weeks before getting some other kind of action suited to
his peculiar talents. And worse, he wasn't Shelley Vane Plunkett--he was
Bugs Plunkett; and his mother's heart broke again. He was shaved like a
convict and thicker through than ever, and full of rich outdoor words
about what he would do to this so-and-so medical officer for not letting
him back into the scrap. Yes, sir; that man is going to suffer casualties
right up to the limit the minute he gets out of his uniform--and him
thinking the world is at peace once more! Sure, Shelley had been shot
through the lungs a couple of times, and one leg had been considerably
altered from the original plan, but he had claimed he was a better
scrapper than ever before and had offered to prove it to this medical
officer right then and there if it could be done quiet. But this fair
offer had been rejected.

So here he'd come back, not any kind of a first-class invalid that would
be nice to nurse, but as Bugs Plunkett! No sooner did he get to town than
letters and postal cards begun to come addressed to Mr. Bu