Several days followed each other. We remained imprisoned in the barracks, in ignorance. The only events were those related by the newspapers which were handed to us through the gates in the morning. The war got on very slowly; it immobilized itself, and we--we did nothing, between the roll-calls, the parades, and from time to time some cleaning fatigues. We could not go into the town, and we waited for the evening--standing, sitting, strolling in the mess room (which never seemed empty, so strong was the smell that filled it), wandering about the dark stairs and the corridors dark as iron, or in the yard, or as far as the gates, or the kitchens, which last were at the rear of the buildings, and smelt in turns throughout the day of coffee-grounds and grease. We said that perhaps, undoubtedly indeed, we should stay there till the end of the war. We moped. When we went to bed we were tired with standing still, or with walking too slowly. We should have liked to go to the front. Marcassin, housed in the company office, was never far away, and kept an eye on us in silence. One day I was sharply rebuked by him for having turned the water on in the lavatory at a time other than placarded. Detected, I had to stand before him at attention. He asked me in coarse language if I knew how to read, talked of punishment, and added, "Don't do it again!" This tirade, perhaps justified on the whole, but tactlessly uttered by the quondam Pétrolus, humiliated me deeply and left me gloomy all the day. Some other incidents showed me that I no longer belonged to myself. * * * * * * One day, after morning parade, when the company was breaking off, a Parisian of our section went up to Marcassin and asked him, "Adjutant, we should like to know if we are going away." The officer took it in bad part. "To know? Always wanting to know!" he cried; "it's a disease in France, this wanting to know. Get it well into your heads that you _won't_ know! We shall do the knowing for you! Words are done with. There's something else beginning, and that's discipline and silence." The zeal we had felt for going to the front cooled off in a few days. One or two well-defined cases of shirking were infectious, and you heard this refrain again and again: "As long as the others are dodging, I should be an ass not to do it, too." But there was quite a multitude who never said anything. At last a reinforcement draft was posted; old and young promiscuously--a list worked out in the office amidst a seesaw of intrigue. Protests were raised, and fell back again into the tranquillity of the depot.