“And a little before at times also,” asserted the lieutenant. “There is the morale to keep up--the general good fellowship and well-being. If the boys know they’re going to be treated right if they get winged, then they’re heartened up a whole lot; you know that.” “I do,” Don eagerly admitted. “Don’t think I’m throwing any rocks at the splendid efficiency of the Red Cross; if anyone knows about them I ought to, from every angle of the service. But I have also seen the kind of work that threw a scare into the Huns, and believe me that was not a humane, not a nursing proposition, as you know.” “Yes, I know that, too. And it may be funny, but I’ve had a sort of homesick feeling to get back and see more of it, and the nearer I get the more impatient I am.” “Same here. But this boat is doing her darndest for a long run and we can hardly improve the time even if you get out and walk.” “From watching your speedometer register something over thirty miles in less than sixty minutes I am convinced that only a motorcycle or an airplane would help us better to get on.” The ambulance did get on in a very satisfactory manner. Here and there along the road and at all turns and forks splotches of white paint on stones, posts, buildings, bridges or stakes and by which the transport and freight camions were guided, made the way across the three hundred miles quite plain. The lads paid no attention to the French sign posts, here and there, which announced the distance in kilometers to some larger town or city and then to Paris farther inland, for the route avoided these places wherever possible and ran into no narrow and congested streets or masses of people. At the next stop, for a bite to eat in a small village, the middle-aged nurse expressed some disappointment at not going into Paris. “I have been there many times in former years when my dear husband was living; we stopped there once for several months. But they say now that the city is not like it used to be--I mean the people, of course, in manners and gayety; the mourning for the dead and the fear of invasion or bombardment----” “There is no longer fear of invasion,” Herbert declared. “That time has gone past. The business in hand now is whipping the Huns clear across the Rhine and into Berlin, if necessary, and we are going to do that in short order!” “It’s terrible. So much death and suffering,” said the young girl. “And the Germans, too; who cares for them when wounded?” “They have a Red Cross and very excellent ambulance and hospital service,” Don explained. “We pick up a good many of their wounded and treat them just as well as our own.” “You have seen this yourself?” asked the gray-haired woman. “My friend was in the thick of it, around Château-Thierry,” Herbert announced eagerly. “He was wounded, invalided, but he is going back for more work.” The women all gazed at blushing Donald, who hastened to get even.