Biltmore Oswald — 10 - Part 10
So together Tim and I had a bachelor's dinner over the sandwiches, which were worthy of that auspicious occasion.
_Aug.
17th.
_ We were standing on a street corner of a neighboring town.
The party consisted of Tim the barkeep, the "Spider," an individual who modestly acknowledged credit for having brought relief to several over-crowded safes in the good old civilian days; Tony, who delivered ice in my district also in those aforementioned days, and myself.
These gentlemen for some time had been allowing me to exist in peace, and I had been showing my gratitude by buying them whatever little dainties they desired, but such a comfortable state of affairs could not long continue with that bunch.
Suddenly, without any previous consultation, as if drawn together as it were by some fiendish undercurrent, they decided to make me unhappy--me, the only guy that spoke unbroken English in the crowd.
This is the way they accomplished their low ends.
When the next civilian came along they all of them shouted at me in tones that could be heard by all passers-by: "Here comes a 'ciwilian,' buddy; he'll give you a quarter."
"Do you need some money, my boy?"
said the old gentleman to me in a kindly voice.
"No, sir," I stammered, getting red all over, "thank you very much, but I really don't need any money."
Ironical laughter from my friends in the background.
"Oh, no," cries Tim sarcastically, "he don't need no money.
Just watch him when he sees the color of it."
"Don't hesitate, my son," continued the kind old man, "if you need anything I would be glad to help you out."
"No, sir," I replied, turning away to hide my mortification, "everything is all right."
"Poor but proud," hisses the "Spider."
The old gentleman passed on, sorely perplexed.
For some time I was a victim of this crude plot.
When I tried to move away they followed me around the streets, crying after me: "Any 'ciwilian' will give you a quarter.
Go on an' ask them."
Several ladies stopped and asked if they could be of any service to me.
I assured them that they couldn't, but all the time these low sailors whom I had been feeding lavishly kept jeering and intimating that I was fooling and would take any amount of money offered me from a dime up.
This shower of conflicting statements always left the kindhearted people in a confused frame of mind and broke me up completely.
I had to chase one man all the way down the street and hand him back the quarter he had thrust into my hand.
My friends never forgave me for this.
At length, tiring of their sport, they desisted and stood gloomily on the curb as sailors do, looking idly at nothing.
"It don't look like we was ever going to get a hitch," said the "Spider," after we had abandonedly offered ourselves to several automobiles.
At that moment a huge machine rolled heavily by.
"There goes a piece of junk," said Tim.
The lady in the machine must have heard him, for the car came to and she motioned for us to get in.
"Going our way?"
she asked, smiling at us.
"Thanks, lady," replies Tim, elbowing me aside as he climbed aboard.
"Dust your feet," I whispered to Tony as he was about to climb in.
"Whatta you mean, dusta my feet?"
shouted Tony wrathfully, "you go head an' dusta your feet!
I look out for my feet all right."
"What did he want yer to do, Tony?"
asked Tim in a loud voice.
"Dusta my feet," answered Tony, greatly injured.
"What yer doin', Oswald?"
asks Tim sarcastically, "tryin' to drag us up?"
"I only spoke for the best," I answered, sick at heart.
"Ha!
ha!"
grated Tim, "guess you think we ain't never rode in one of these wealthy wagons before."
"Arn't you rather young?"
asked the lady soothingly of the "Spider," who by virtue of his mechanical experience in civil life had been given a first class rating, "Arn't you rather young to have so many things on your arm?"
"Yes," answered the "Spider" promptly, "but I kin do a lot of tricks."
The conversation languished from this point.
"We always take our boys to dinner, don't we, dear?"
said the lady to her husband a little later.
"Yes, dear," he answered meekly, just like that.
Expectant silence from the four of us.
"Have you boys had dinner?"
the lady asked.
"Certainly not," we cried, with an earnestness that gave the lie to our statement, "no dinner!"
"None at all," added Tim thoughtfully.
The automobile drew up at a 14k.
plate-glass house that fairly made the "Spider" itch.
"Gosh," he whispered to me, looking at the porch, "that wouldn't be hard for me."
During the dinner he kept sort of lifting and weighing the silver and then looking at me and winking in an obvious manner.
"Not many people here to-night," said Tony from behind his plate.
"Why, there is the usual number," said the husband in surprise, "my wife and myself live alone."
"Oh," said Tony, looking around at the tremendous dining hall, "I thought this was a restaurant."
[Illustration: "'OH,' SAID TONY, 'I THOUGHT THIS WAS A RESTAURANT'"] Tim started laughing then, and he hasn't stopped yet.
He's so proud he didn't make the mistake himself.
The "Spider" didn't open his mouth save for the purpose of eating.
He told me he was afraid his teeth would chatter.
_Aug.
20th.
_ Got a letter from Polly to-day.
She says that her finger is just itching for the ring.
I told the "Spider" about it and he said that he had several unset stones he'd let me have for next to nothing.
A good burglar is one of the most valuable friends a man can possess.
_Sept.
3d.
_ I had such a set-back to-day.
Never was I more confounded.
This morning I received a notice to report before the examining board for a first class rating.
Of course I had been expecting some slight recognition of my real worth for a long time, but when the blow fell I was hardly prepared for it.
Hurrying to "My Blue Jacket's Manual," I succeeded by the aid of a picture in getting firmly in my mind the port and starboard side of a ship and then I presented myself before the examiners--three doughty and unsmiling officers.
There were about twelve of us up for examination.
Seating ourselves before the three gentlemen, we gazed upon them with ill-concealed trepidation.
One of them called the roll in a languid manner, and then without further preliminaries the battle began, and I received the first shock of the assault.
I don't quite remember the question that man asked me, it was all too ghastly at the time, but I think it was something like this: "What would you do if you were at the wheel in a dense fog and you heard three whistles on your port beam, four whistles off the starboard bow, and a prolonged toot dead ahead?"
"I would still remain in a dense fog," I gasped in a low voice.
"Speak up!"
snapped the officer.
"Full speed ahead and jumps," whispered a guy next to me.
It sounded reasonable.
I seized upon it eagerly.
"I'd put full steam ahead and jump, sir," I replied.
"Are you mad?"
shouted the amazed officer.
"No, sir," I hastened to assure him, "only profoundly perplexed.
I
think, sir, that I would go into a conference, under the circumstances."
The officer seemed to be on the verge of a breakdown.
"What's your name?"
asked another officer suddenly.
I told him.
"Initials?"
I told him.
He looked at the paper for a moment.
"That explains it," he said with a sigh of relief, "you're not the man.
There has been some mistake.
Orderly, take this man away and bring back the right one.
Pronto!"
That Spanish stuff sounds awfully sea-going.
I was taken away, but the officer had not yet recovered.
He regarded me with an expression of profound disgust.
Anyway I created a sensation.
[Illustration: "'I WOULD STILL REMAIN IN A DENSE FOG,' I GASPED IN A LOW VOICE"]
_Sept.
4th.
_ Things have been happening with overwhelming rapidity.
On the strength of being properly engaged to Polly, my permanent sweetie, I went to my Regimental commander this morning and applied for a furlough.
He regarded me pityingly for a moment and then carefully scanned a list of names on the desk before him.
"I am sorry," he said finally, "but not only am I not able to grant your request, but I have the unpleasant duty to inform you that you are a little less than forty-eight hours from the vicinity of Ambrose light."
"Shipped!"
I gasped as the world swam around me.
"Your name is on this list," said the officer not unkindly.
"Shipped!"
I repeated in a dazed voice.
"It does seem ridiculous, I'll admit," said the officer, smiling, "but you never can tell what strange things are going to happen in the Navy.
If I were in your place I'd take advantage of this head start I have given you and get my clothes and sea-bag in some sort of condition.
If I remember rightly, you have never been able successfully to achieve this since you've been in the service."
"Thank you, sir," I gasped, and bolted.
In my excitement I ran violently into a flock of ensigns stalking across the parade ground.
"I'm going to be shipped," I cried by way of explanation to one of them as he arose wrathfully.
"You're going to be damned," said he, and I was.
Too frantic to write more.
_Sept.
5th.
_ All preparations have been made.
Tim, Tony and the Spider are going too.
I have just been listening to the most disturbing conversation.
It all arose from our speculating as to our probable destination and the nature of our services.
The Master-at-arms, who had been sleeping on the hammock rack as only a Master-at-arms can, permitted himself to remain awake long enough to join in.
"I wouldn't be at all surprised," said he, "if you were shipped to one of these new Submarine Provokers."
"What's that?"
I asked uneasily.
"Why, it's a sort of a dee-coy," said he, stretching his huge hulk, "a little, unarmed boat that goes messing around in the ocean until it finds a submarine and then it provokes it."
"How's that?"
asked Tim.
"Why, you see," continued the jimmy-legs, "it just sort of steams back and forth in front of the submarine, just steams slowly back and forth in front of the submarine until it provokes it."
"Ah!"
said I, taking a deep breath.
"Yes," he continues cheerfully, "and the more you provoked the submarine why the harder it shoots at you, so of course it doesn't notice the real Submarine Sinker coming up behind it.
See the tactics."
"Oh," says I, "we just provoke the submarine until it loses its temper and the other boat sinks it."
"That's it," says the jimmy-legs, "you just sort of steam back and forth in front of it slowly."
"How slowly?"
asks the Spider.
"Very," replied the jimmy-legs.
"No guns at all?"
asks Tim.
"None," says he.
"A regular little home," suggests Tony.
"Sure," says the jimmy-legs, "nothing to do at all but steam slowly back--" "For God's sake don't dwell on that point any more!"
I cried.
"We understand it perfectly."
"A regular lil' home," muttered Tim as he began to stow his bag.
(Later) I write these lines with horror.
Some one has told me that the Navy needs Powder tasters, something I'd never heard of before, and that perhaps--that's what we are going to be used for.
All you have to do, this guy says, is to taste the powder to see if it's damp or dry and if it's damp you take it away and bake it.
This sounds worse than the Submarine Provoker.
(Still later) Rumor is rife.
The latest report is that we are going to be Mine Openers.
"What's a Mine Opener?"
I asked my informant.
"Why, it's a guy," says he, "that picks up the mines floating around his boat, but only the German mines of course, and opens them to see if they are as dangerous as they look.
Some are not half as dangerous as they look," he continues easily, "some are not quite so dangerous and of course some are a great deal more so.
But they are all dangerous enough."
"My dear chap," I replied, turning away miserably, "a pinwheel is quite dangerous enough for me."
_Sept.
6th.
_ This is being written from the gate.
My bag and hammock are beside me.
Tim lashed them together for me so they wouldn't come undone.
We are waiting for the truck.
Tony in his excitable way wants to kiss the guard good-by.
The guard doesn't want him to.
My last moments at Pelham have been hectic.
The doctor said I looked one hundred per cent better than when I came in, but that wasn't enough.
If you didn't look at me very closely you wouldn't know that I was such an awful dub.
This is progress at any rate.
The telephone wires between mother's house and the camp were dripping wet with tears when I phoned her that I was being shipped.
However, she braced up and said she was proud of me and said she hoped I'd tell the captain good-by and thank him for all he has done.
I assured her I would do this, or at least leave a note.
Polly was a trump.
The Spider talked to her and said that he was going to save the best uncut stone for her that he had ever bitten out of a ring.
The Spider has been very valuable to us all.
He seems to have the uncanny faculty of being able to take the cloth straps off other people's clothes right before their eyes.
Consequently we are well supplied.
At present he's looking at the handle of the gate in a musing way.
I think he would like to have it as a souvenir.
Here comes the truck.
Pelham is about to lose its most useless recruit.
I must tuck these priceless pages in my money belt.
Wish I had a picture of Polly.
Well, here's to the High Adventure, but there's something about that Submarine Provoker I can't quite get used to.
It seems just a trifle one sided.
However, that is in the lap of the gods.
Instead of a camp I will soon have the vast expanses of the ocean in which to demonstrate my tremendous inability to emulate the example of one John Paul Jones.
"Bear a hand there, buddy," the P. O.
has just cried at me.
"Buddy" I came in and "buddy" I go out.
We're off!
I can dimly distinguish Mr. Fogerty, that unscrupulous dog that abandoned my bed and board for a couple of influential yeomen.
Farewell, Fogerty, may your evil ways never bring you to grief.
I do wish I had a picture of my Sweetie.
[Illustration: "'BUDDY' I CAME IN AND 'BUDDY' I GO OUT"] [Illustration: BILTMORE OSWALD and FOGARTY] THE END
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