A good many thousands of people in France and England and America learned from the newspapers the story of the nondescript in the blue overalls, who had behaved so gallantly at the crucial moment of a crucial fight. But McDermott never did. He seldom read newspapers. No one had been able to learn his name, so the reporters had given him a name. They called him “Dennis.” And it was “Dennis” who got the fame and glory. McDermott would not have identified himself with Dennis had he seen the newspapers. When he awakened from his long, broken stupor, with its intervals of dazed halfconsciousness, the first thing he did was to steal away from that hospital; he left without having heard of Dennis or of the decoration of Dennis. There was one thing that he had experienced that did live hazily and confusedly in his memory, however, although he could not fix it in its relationship to any other thing. And that was the fact that he had met Gustave Schmidt. Three or four months after he slipped away from the hospital--a period of unchronicled wanderings, during which he had tried unsuccessfully to enlist several times--he limped into a saloon on the Brooklyn water front and asked Tim O'Toole, the proprietor, for his usual. He had just got back to Brooklyn, and he carried his earthly possessions in a bundle wrapped in brown paper. “I hear Yordy Crowley isn't givin' his racket this year,” said McDermott, laying his bundle on the bar and pouring out his drink. “He is not,” said Tim. “He is in France helpin' out thim English.” “Yordy will make a good sojer,” said McDermott. “He is a good man of his fists.” “The Irish is all good sojers,” said Mr. O'Toole, sententiously. “There was that man Dinnis, now, that was in all av the papers.” “I did not hear av him,” said McDermott. “An' phwat did he do?” “He licked th' entire German army wan morn-in',” said O'Toole, “an' saved England, an' the Quane of France kissed him for it. 'Twas in all the papers. Or, maybe,” said Mr. O'Toole, “it was the King av Belg'um kissed him for ut. Anny-way wan of thim foreign powers kissed him wid the whole world lookin' on.” “An' phwat did this Dinnis do thin?” asked McDermott. “He attimpted to assault the person that kissed him,” said O'Toole. “Maybe 'twas the King av Italy. 'Twas in all the papers at th' time. Some wan told me ye were in France y'rsilf, Paddy.” “I was that,” said McDermott. “I wint wid mules.” “Did ye see annything av the war?” “I did not,” said McDermott. “Divil a bit of ut, barrin' a lot o' racket an' a big roarin' divil av a stame-boiler thing that come bustin' through th' air an' took away the mules that was me passport. But I come near seein' some av ut, wan time.” “An' how was it that ye come near it, an' missed it?” inquired Tim.