sentry, gazing skyward through field glasses on "aeroplane watch"
against the Boches, can be none other than Gabby, the ex-right tackle.

Gabby is a little puzzled by Fat's moustache, but only for a second.

"Whatever became of Charley Rose," he asks, "and Bill Lyman, and all the
rest of them?"

"For the love of Mike--meeting you in this forsaken spot after all this
time! Where are you stationed? Can't we stage a reunion? Can't we, Fat?"

Well, Fat is a sergeant-chauffeur, Q.M.C. Gabby is a doughboy in an
infantry regiment. They can't get together. They're at the War.

For the next ten minutes a whole battlefield of Boche fliers might have
sneaked past the Chicago sentry and bombed the daylights out of Division
Headquarters without any hindrance from Gabby.

Charley Rose, says Fat, is an infantry lieutenant. Maury Dunne's in the
heavy artillery. Dan McCarthy, the hopeless but untiring "sub" of the
1911 squad, is in France in the Q.M.C.

"Well, doggone!" says Fat, in wonderment at the littleness of the world.
"Well, gee whiz!" says Gabby, thinking the same thing.

You'll meet 'em all over here--your old rivals, your staunchest pals.
You may find yourself top sergeant over the very kids you stole apples
or milk bottles with back in the "good old days." Perhaps you'll be
saluting the fellow who cut you out of your girl back in high school
when an exchange of class pins with pretty Frances Black meant that you
were engaged to her for that semester.

Somewhere in France, they're all here.

----
SO THIS IS FRANCE?
----

The first shift is coming out from the tables. White-haired plump Madame
scurries over to her place at the door to collect the dinner toll.
Silver clinks into her country cash register, a cigar box with the lid
knocked off.

The second shift edges toward the dining room where Suzanne and Angel
and Joan are rushing about, clearing away the traces of the first
service.

"How's the chewin'?" asks the Albany rifleman.

"Pretty good, pretty good," says the engineer boy from Los Angeles.
"Good place to fill up on tan bread for a change."

Close your eyes and shut out the khaki. The buzzing voices, the scraping
hob nails take you back to the Democratic convention of Pottewantamis
County last Spring when the delegates came in through a sleet storm and
dried their socks around the stove in the Chamber of Comme