The Khaki Boys Fighting to Win; or, Smashing the German LinesChase, Josephine
General
The Khaki Boys Fighting to Win; or, Smashing the German Lines
Chase, Josephine
World War, 1914-1918 -- Juvenile fiction
"You mean she'll dance for joy!" laughed Jimmy. "That's all right,
Iggy. No offense meant," he went on as he saw his Polish friend look
at him rather sharply. "You want to learn English, you know, even if
it is a queer language, and you told us to correct you when you made
mistakes."
"Sure. So I did. I am of a thanks to you. But my mothar, she will of
joy have a lot when she gets this money. It--it is more as she haf ever
seen of a once," and there was something in Iggy's tone that put a stop
to further joking on this line.
The Polish lad went on with his letter-writing. As he had said, he was
enclosing a money order for two hundred dollars. This was his share of
a reward of five thousand francs which Sergeant Jimmy Blaise won for
putting out of the way a certain "Charles Black," who, it turned out,
was an Austrian spy named Adolph von Kreitzen. Jimmy, who in private
life was wealthy, had insisted on sharing his reward with the other of
the "Five Brothers," as the Khaki Boys were often called.
"Need any help, Iggy?" asked Bob, as he saw the Polish lad shake his
head as if in despair over some knotty point in the letter.
"Well, I maybe do," was the answer. "I should tell my mothar about how
I was out on night-work, and I of help capture that Russian spy of
the name Alexandraiovitch Tarbotchanitzitschi. That is a hard name to
spell."
"Spell! You can't spell that name!" and Jimmy Blaise exploded in a
laugh. "You can get your tongue around it a whole lot better than any
of us, but it can't be spelled. Just put in a wheeze, a couple of
sneezes and a hiccough. Then you'll have the name, Iggy."
"Well, I guess maybe you got it right," assented the Polish lad.
"I just tell my mothar I of capture a Russian spy what the Germans
have--what you call made bad. I tell her the name when I get home."
"That's the idea!" agreed Bob. "Home!" he exclaimed. "Say, fellows,
where have I heard that word before?"
"That's what I was wondering," chimed in Roger Barlow. "It sort of
rhymes with bath-tub, pie, broiled steaks----"
He was interrupted by a dog-eared magazine which Jimmy tossed at him,
narrowly missing hitting the electric lamp by which Iggy was writing
his letter.
"Here! Cheese it! Do you want to douse the glim?" expostulated
Schnitzel. "We won this dugout from the Germans after too much hard
work to let you put it on the blink now. It's the best place we've had
to rest in for some time. Don't go putting it on the kazook!"
"I apologize," said Sergeant Jimmy, humbly enough. "It's great to have
electric light, isn't it? Those Huns certainly went to a lot of work to
make this place like home for their officers. Electric lights, decent
berths, and places where you can take it easy and write letters."
"They never thought we'd get this far, I guess," remarked Bob.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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