ver there in the 50th?" he demanded. "How do I
know whose knifin' me with the boys? I don't mean your party. You're here
same as I am. I mean Mike the Kike, and the regular Reepublican
nomination, I do.... And, how do I know when _you_ are going back?"

I was silent.

"_Are_ you?"

"Perhaps."

"Doc, will you talk business, man to man?"

"Duck, to tell you the truth, the hell that is in full blast over
here--this gigantic, world-wide battle of nations--leaves me, for the
time, uninterested in ward politics."

"Stop your kiddin'."

"Can't you comprehend it?"

"Aw, what do you care about what Kink wins? If we was Kinks, you an' me,
all right. But we ain't Doc. We're little fellows. Our graft ain't big
like the Dutch Emperor's, but maybe it comes just as regular on pay day.
Ich ka bibble."

"Duck," I said, "you explain your presence here by telling me that you
enlisted while drunk. How do you explain my being here?"

"You're a Doc. I guess there must be big money into it," he returned with
a wink.

"I draw no pay."

"I believe you," he remarked, leering. "Say, don't you do that to me, Doc.
I may be unfortunit; I'm a poor damn fool an' I know it. But don't tell me
you're here for your health."

"I won't repeat it, Duck," I said, smiling.

"Much obliged. Now for God's sake let's talk business. You think you've
got me cinched. You think you can go home an' raise hell in the 50th while
I'm doin' time into these here trenches. You sez to yourself, 'O there
ain't nothin' to it!' An' then you tickles yourself under the ribs, Doc.
You better make a deal with me, do you hear? Gimme mine, and you can have
yours, too; and between us, if we work together, we can hand one to Mike
the Kike that'll start every ambulance in the city after him. Get me?"

"There's no use discussing such things----"

"All right. I won't ask you to make it fifty-fifty. Gimme half what I
oughter have. You can fix it with Curley Tim Brady----"

"Duck, this is no time----"

"Hell! It's all the time I've got! What do you expec' out here, a caffy
dansong? I don't see no corner gin-mills around neither. Listen, Doc, quit
up-stagin'! You an' me kick the block off'n this here Kike-Wop if we get
together. All I ask of you is to talk business----"

I moved aside, and backward a little way, disgusted with the ratty soul of
the man, and stood looking at the soldiers who were digging out bombproof
burrows all along the trench and shoring up the hol