Chapter 5

Stopping at a prison camp for gasoline, a lieutenant came up to me, and seeing the lightning streak on my shoulder he told me that he too belonged to the 78th and remembered meeting me last winter. He offered to take me and whoever else was interested through the wood of Ardennes where the 78th had fought in October. You can imagine I was glad to go. So I have seen the scarred and blasted woods and ravines through which my boys panted and bled and kept on. I seemed to almost live through it with them, and I felt the exhilaration of battle more than the horror, and wished fervently that I could have been a man fighting with them. We came to a place where the Germans had blown up two engines. Right there Lieut. S. said the 311th had its supply dump. And sure enough, on a tree I saw the good old Lightning Sign! I took it down, for I know the boy who made all the signs, and intend to give it to some one for a souvenir.

But to skip over more quickly, we spent that night at Romagne, where the great American-Argonne cemetery is being made. The next day we visited Grand Pré, the town which the 78th took; a terrible wreck, bearing the signs of hot street fighting, the standing walls being nicked and riddled with machine gun fire. Here again my spirit was back with my fighting boys reliving it all with them.

And then, following the long desolate front, we went to Verdun. But I can't give you any more descriptions. That Verdun battle field! That stronghold, which the Germans did not pass! I will never forget it. Even the Argonne is a green, fertile place in comparison. Blasted skeleton forests, dead fields, plowed and plowed again with shells. Death, and the silence of death.

I found myself repeating under my breath some verses of poetry that had caught my eye last winter, written by an officer.

"Nous avons cherché la Victoire. Ou se cache-t-elle, dis-moi? Et, repassant la Meuse noire, Elle me crie, 'Au fond de toi.'"

and

"Est-ce vrai que la mort est une vie immense? Est-ce vrai que la vie est l'amour de mourir?"

_Lieut. Joachim Gasquet, auteur des "Hymnes de la Grande Guerre."_

In such ways I tried to understand and to visualize all that had taken place there.

We returned to Gondrecourt Sunday evening. On Monday I had a new and comic experience. The Y.M.C.A. announced an auction of all its supplies and I was asked to conduct it, being the only American who spoke French. They tell me that I have missed my vocation, that I ought to have been a saleslady. Any way I made a lark out of it, and gave the shrewd old French ladies tit for tat, which delighted them.

Now I am back in Chaumont working in the library of the "Y." It is a temporary job. I have half an idea I shall be homeward bound soon.

Goodbye dear family. This pen will drive me distracted, and they cost ten dollars over here!

June 25th. Officers' Hut, Chaumont.

Another change of job. From buck privates to elderly majors and lieutenant colonels! About a week ago I was assigned to the Officers' Hut at Chaumont. This has been, naturally, the largest and pleasantest officers' "Y" in France, but owing to the daily diminishing of the personnel at G.H.Q. the business of the "Y" is rapidly falling off. I was sent here principally on account of my knowledge of French. Ahem! There is a large restaurant and a French force employed, and I am the medium of communication with them. I manage to keep the peace by translating the orders diplomatically, softening them and _politening_ them.

There are many pleasant aspects to this work. I enjoy very much being with cultivated people again, though my fondness for the expressive doughboy is as great as ever. After all, there is something comfortable about good grammar, and I confess that a conversation with a dash of high-browism contains a pleasure all its own.

The first day I was here I met Colonel MacC. of Chicago. He has been very kind to me. Sunday evening he took me to call on some French friends of his and we had a very delightful time.

The atmosphere of Chaumont is totally different from that of dear little Pouillenay. There are many American girls, Red Cross, Y.M.C.A. and Y.W.C.A., and giddy telephone girls. Every night there is a party at the château and much gaiety. The boys here certainly have a great deal of entertainment. The social pace is too much for me. I get out of things as much as I can without being too rude. It won't last much more than a week anyway, and then I shall be ready and glad to come home.

Peace has come! "Le jour de gloire est arrivé." Early yesterday morning, I was awakened by the strains of a band approaching nearer and nearer. It didn't sound like an American band, and I jumped out of bed to see what it was. There in the early grayness of morning French soldiers were marching to a band composed of bugles and drums. They marched seriously, with rifles over their shoulders and bayonets fixed. This was their triumphant march, yet there was no triumph in it. As I watched the little blue figures keeping step to their strange yet spirited march, the tears came to my eyes, and I felt the tragedy of France, and I loved her. In Paris they say there were all sorts of gay doings, in which the Americans took part, but I shall always remember this little column of men, marching solemnly through the town of Chaumont.

Paris, July 15.

"Plans have been seething these last ten days since I have been in Paris, but after a great deal of sifting and shifting I have accepted the offer of the French Red Cross. I am discharged from the Y.M.C.A. and am enrolled as a member of the "Union des Femmes de France!" This means that I finish the summer working in the devastated regions of France, and I go next Thursday to Noyon. They permitted me to keep my old uniform and my cape. It seemed so stupid to buy another expensive suit when my present one is practically as good as new. (I do believe these Y.M.C.A. uniforms are imperishable!) So I removed the triangle from my sleeve, and I now form part of an organization totally French, but--they allow me to retain the dear old red patch with its Lightning Streak, which means so much to me, on my left shoulder."

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