h have liked to go, but the surgeon-major had taken him round
the waist to keep him by force in the depot with the auxiliary. 'Eh
bien,' he says, 'I resigned myself. After all, I shall be of greater
value in putting my intellect to the service of the country than in
carrying a knapsack.' And him that was alongside said, 'Oui,' with his
headpiece feathered on top. He'd jolly well consented to go to Bordeaux
at the time when the Boches were getting near Paris, and then Bordeaux
became the stylish place; but afterwards he returned firmly to the
front--to Paris--and said something like this, 'My ability is of value
to France; it is absolutely necessary that I guard it for France.'

"They talked about other people that weren't there--of the commandant
who was getting an impossible temper, and they explained that the more
imbecile he got the harsher he got; and the General that made
unexpected inspections with the idea of kicking all the soft-jobbers
out, but who'd been laid up for eight days, very ill--'he's certainly
going to die; his condition no longer gives rise to any uneasiness,'
they said, smoking the cigarettes that Society swells send to the
depots for the soldiers at the front. 'D'you know,' they said, 'little
Frazy, who is such a nice boy, the cherub, he's at last found an excuse
for staying behind. They wanted some cattle slaughterers for the
abattoir, and he's enlisted himself in there for protection, although
he's got a University degree and in spite of being an attorney's clerk.
As for Flandrin's son, he's succeeded in getting himself attached to
the roadmenders.--Roadmender, him? Do you think they'll let him stop
so?' 'Certain sure,' replies one of the cowardly milksops. 'A
road-mender's job is for a long time.'

"Talk about idiots," Marthereau growls.

"And they were all jealous, I don't know why, of a chap called Bourin.
Formerly he moved in the best Parisian circles. He lunched and dined in
the city. He made eighteen calls a day, and fluttered about the
drawing-rooms from afternoon tea till daybreak. He was indefatigable in
leading cotillons, organizing festivities, swallowing theatrical shows,
without counting the motoring parties, and all the lot running with
champagne. Then the war came. So he's no longer capable, the poor boy,
of staying on the look-out a bit late at an embrasure, or of cutting
wire. He must stay peacefully in the warm. And then, him, a Parisian,
to go into the provinces and bury him