Farm life -- Fiction; Nebraska -- Fiction; Soldiers -- Fiction; War stories; World War, 1914-1918 -- Fiction
The old man wished him a pleasant visit home, and the best of
luck in days to come. Every one in the car smiled at him as he
stepped down to the platform with his suitcase in one hand and
his canvas bag in the other. His old friend, Mrs. Voigt, the
German woman, stood out in front of her restaurant, ringing her
bell to announce that dinner was ready for travellers. A crowd of
young boys stood about her on the sidewalk, laughing and shouting
in disagreeable, jeering tones. As Claude approached, one of them
snatched the bell from her hand, ran off across the tracks with
it, and plunged into a cornfield. The other boys followed, and
one of them shouted, "Don't go in there to eat, soldier. She's a
German spy, and she'll put ground glass in your dinner!"
Claude swept into the lunch room and threw his bags on the floor.
"What's the matter, Mrs. Voigt? Can I do anything for you?"
She was sitting on one of her own stools, crying piteously, her
false frizzes awry. Looking up, she gave a little screech of
recognition. "Oh, I tank Gott it was you, and no more trouble
coming! You know I ain't no spy nor nodding, like what dem boys
say. Dem young fellers is dreadful rough mit me. I sell dem candy
since dey was babies, an' now dey turn on me like dis.
Hindenburg, dey calls me, and Kaiser Bill!" She began to cry
again, twisting her stumpy little fingers as if she would tear
them off.
"Give me some dinner, ma'am, and then I'll go and settle with
that gang. I've been away for a long time, and it seemed like
getting home when I got off the train and saw your squaw vines
running over the porch like they used to."
"Ya? You remember dat?" she wiped her eyes. "I got a pot-pie
today, and green peas, chust a few, out of my own garden."
"Bring them along, please. We don't get anything but canned stuff
in camp."
Some railroad men came in for lunch. Mrs. Voigt beckoned Claude
off to the end of the counter, where, after she had served her
customers, she sat down and talked to him, in whispers.
"My, you look good in dem clothes," she said patting his sleeve.
"I can remember some wars, too; when we got back dem provinces
what Napoleon took away from us, Alsace and Lorraine. Dem boys is
passed de word to come and put tar on me some night, and I am
skeered to go in my bet. I chust wrap in a quilt and sit in my
old chair."
"Don't pay any attention to them. You don't have trouble with the
business people here, do you?"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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