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Page 26
"In the name of a sacred pig, what was it?" demanded my Frenchman.
"That was what I asked. It was a bear. The men who had been logging in
the camp two months back had left a keg of maple-syrup and a half barrel
of flour, and the bear broke into both--successively--and alternately.
He probably thought he was in bear-heaven for a while, but it must have
gotten irksome. For his head was eighteen inches wide when they found
him, white, with black touches. They soaked him in the river two days,
and sold his skin for twenty dollars. 'Pretty good for devil skin,'
Rafael said."
The Frenchman stared at me a moment and then leaned back in his chair
and shouted laughter. The greedy bear's finish had hit his funny-bone.
And the three others stopped talking and demanded the story told over,
which I did, condensing.
"I like zat Hurong for my soldier," Colonel Raffr� stated heartily. "Ze
man what are not afraid of man _or_ of devil--zat is ze man to fight ze
Boches." He was talking English now because Colonel Chichely was
listening. He went on. "Zere is human devils--oh, but plentee--what we
fight in France. I haf not heard of ozzers. But I believe well ze man
who pull me out in sheet would be as your guide Rafael--he also would
crip up wiz his rifle on real devil out of hell. But yes. I haf not told
you how my Indian soldier bring in prisoners--no?"
We all agreed no, and put in a request.
"He brings zem in not one by one always--not always." The colonel
grinned. He went on to tell this tale, which I shift into the vernacular
from his laborious English.
It appears that he had discerned the aptitude of his Hurons for
reconnaissance work. If he needed information out of the dangerous
country lying in front, if he needed a prisoner to question, these men
were eager to go and get either, get anything. The more hazardous the
job the better, and for a long time they came out of it
untouched. In the group one man--nicknamed by the poilus, his
comrades--Hirondelle--the Swallow--supposedly because of his lightness
and swiftness, was easily chief. He had a fault, however, his dislike to
bring in prisoners alive. Four times he had haled a German corpse before
the colonel, seeming not rightly to understand that a dead enemy was
useless for information.
"The Boches are good killing," he had elucidated to his officer. And
finally: "It is well, m'sieur, the colonel. One failed to understand
that the colonel prefers a live Boche to a dead one. Me, I am otherwise.
It appears a pity to let live such vermin. Has the colonel, by chance,
heard the things these savages did in Belgium? Yes? But then--Yet I will
bring to m'sieur, the colonel, all there is to be desired of German
prisoners alive--_en vie_; fat ones; _en masse_."
That night Hirondelle was sent out with four of his fellow Hurons to
get, if possible, a prisoner. Pretty soon he was separated from the
others; all but himself returning empty-handed in a couple of hours. No
Germans seemed to be abroad. But Hirondelle did not return.
"He risks too far," grumbled his captain. "He has been captured at last.
I always knew they would get him, one night."
But that was not the night. At one o'clock there was suddenly a sound of
lamentation in the front trench of the French on that sector. The
soldiers who were sleeping crawled out of their holes in the sides of
the trench walls, and crowded around the zigzag, narrow way and rubbed
their eyes and listened to the laughter of officers and soldiers on
duty. There was Hirondelle, solemn as a church, yet with a dancing light
in his eyes. There, around him, crowded as sheep to a shepherd, twenty
figures in German uniform stood with hands up and wet tears running down
pasty cheeks. And they were fat, it was noticeable that all of them were
bulging of figure beyond even the German average. They wailed "Kamerad!
Gut Kamerad!" in a chorus that was sickening to the plucky poilu
make-up. Hirondelle, interrogated of many, kept his lips shut till the
first excitement quieted. Then: "I report to my colonel," he stated, and
finally he and his twenty were led back to the winding trench and the
colonel was waked to receive them. This was what had happened:
Hirondelle had wandered about, mostly on his stomach, through the
darkness and peril of No Man's Land, enjoying himself heartily; when
suddenly he missed his companions and realized that he had had no sign
of them for some time. That did not trouble him. He explained to the
colonel that he felt "more free." Also that if he pulled off a success
he would have "more glory." After two hours of this midnight amusement,
in deadly danger every second, Hirondelle heard steps. He froze to the
earth, as he had learned from wild things in North American forests. The
steps came nearer. A star-shell away down the line lighted the scene so
that Hirondelle, motionless on the ground, all keen eyes, saw two
Germans coming toward him. Instantly he had a scheme. In a subdued
growl, yet distinctly, he threw over his shoulder an order that eight
men should go to the right and eight to the left. Then, on his feet, he
sent into the darkness a stern "Halt!" Instantly there was a sputter,
arms thrown up, the inevitable "Kamerad!" and Hirondelle ordered the
first German to pass him, then a second. Out of the darkness emerged a
third. Hirondelle waved him on, and with that there was a fourth. And a
fifth. Behold a sixth. About then Hirondelle judged it wise to give more
orders to his imaginary squad of sixteen. But such a panic had seized
this German mob; that little acting was necessary. Dark figure followed
dark figure out of the darker night--arms up. They whimpered as they
came, and on and on they came out of shadows. Hirondelle stated that he
began to think the Crown Prince's army was surrendering to him. At last,
when the procession stopped, he--and his mythical sixteen--marched the
entire covey, without any objection from them, only abject obedience, to
the French trenches.
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