Wooden Crosses | Page 8

officers of malevolent nature, who preferably
sent good soldiers to sleep in the police station the night before leave.
Anger choked him.
"Barracks!... He fancies he's still in barracks, that lark-skull! He's just
come out of the depot and he would like to put it all over us again!...
Well then, get on with it, go to the distribution, see the rations; they'll
have a good laugh. The lads of the squad are always sure to be in a nice
fix and no mistake. I don't care for myself, I'll manage all right."
And to show quite clearly that he was no longer one with a squad being
led to the abyss by an incapable corporal, he sauntered off towards the
church, whistling a little tune to himself.
The squads were being mustered when Gilbert came into the courtyard
where the quartermaster had had unloaded, a few paces from the
manure tank, the quarters of frozen meat which a man was now cutting
up with an axe, potatoes, bully-beef, a burst sack from which trickled a
thin stream of rice, and biscuits, which the youngsters were carrying off
in their aprons to make pig's-meat with.
Stooping over the cask of wine, which they were tapping to make sure
that it was properly full, those who were waiting their turn were

arguing as to the number of bidons that would fall to each squad, and
some of them were already clamouring that that wasn't their proper
figure. Lentils were given out, sweet potatoes, coffee in the berry.
Taken by surprise, Demachy remarked:
"But we have no coffee-mill."
The others stared at him and laughed. Behind the group someone
bellowed:
"You can go on enjoying yourselves! That's the lad they send to get the
rations for a whole squad!"
It was Sulphart, who had come out of curiosity, just to look on. Heavily
embarrassed, his cap full of sugar, his pockets stuffed with coffee, his
bag weighed down full of lentils, Gilbert was at his wit's end, with no
notion where he could put his rice. As everybody was laughing round
him, and the quartermaster shouting, "Come along, here's your lot;
don't you want to have it to eat?" he lost his head and emptied it
anywhere he could --into his bag along with the lentils. Then Sulphart
burst out:
"Here, that's a bit too much!... You see the cookie's phiz if he'll like
sorting out his rice and his bugs!... Lord, what an army! And they talk.
about hoofing the Boches out. What a joke!..."
Thoroughly furious, the new chum turned round, red all over.
"Look here, you shut up. All you had to do was to come here yourself."
Sulphart, without turning a hair, waited for the remainder of the
distribution. He watched the corporal on duty throwing down great
chunks of meat, some of an appetizing fresh redness, others thickly
veined with tallow, on a muddied piece of tent canvas.
"We're going to draw lots for them," said the corporal.
"No!" protested several squads, "there will be some faking about it....

Share it out according to the number of men."
"There are fourteen of us in the second squad; I want that piece."
"And what about us, in the first... ."
All stooping over the stall, hands stretched out, they were disputing in
advance over the food, all shouting at once, under the impassive eye of
the quartermaster.
"That will do with your howling," he said at last. "I'll distribute it. Third
squad.... that piece. Fourth squad... Fifth squad."
He had not time to finish, nor to point out the piece intended with the
end of his stick. With a roar Sulphart hurled himself into the group.
"No!" he shouted, "I'm not having any.... You want us all in the squad
to die of hunger. They're taking advantage of its being a lad that isn't up
to snuff to do us in the eye."
The others hooted him, the quartermaster would fain have driven him
away, but clean beyond all restraint, wildly waving his arms, he
shouted louder than them all.
"I won't have that piece at all.... I'll tell the Captain, and I'll tell the
Colonel too, if I have to.... It's always the same lot that get the best.... I
want my proper share.... The fifth squad is the one with the most men
in it...."
"There are only eleven of you."
"That's a lie!... We'll make a complaint.... That's nothing but bone!"
He was uttering cry upon cry, now shrill, now hoarse, now terrifying
and now plaintive, thrusting one back and jostling others over. Those
who had already been served were hugging their share to their hearts,
as the mothers of Bethlehem must have held their babes on the night of
Herod's slaughter. By good luck the quartermaster