A gas-mask, two bulging _musettes_, the bottom of a mess-kit, and a French canteen were thrown to the ground. McGee’s great height began to assert itself. He stretched his long arms and shook a case of field-glasses and a German luger aloose from their insecure attachments to his left shoulder straps. “Yes, I see now. No, can’t say that I’ve minded them so much as I haven’t been in the Army long,” replied Jimmy’s roadside find. “So,” muttered Jimmy reflectively. “Say, when in hell did you enlist anyway?” “I didn’t—I was drafted,” answered O. D., as McGee had already mentally nicknamed the man in front of him. “_Oui_—_Oui_—I _compree_,” said the product of eight months in the mud and rain of the Western Front, nodding his head affirmatively. Silence for a moment and then Jimmy said what was on his mind. “Say, how does it feel to be that way buddy? It don’t bother you at nights does it?” “Don’t quite understand you,” stammered the product of General Crowder’s machine. “_Pas compree_, eh? Just like a Frenchman when he don’t want to give you what you want,” answered Jimmy. “Well I’ll try to shoot away the camouflage this time. Don’t you ever wish that you’d enlisted?” “Sure—I wanted to enlist when the war first started but my Dad had just died and he didn’t leave much; not enough to pay his funeral expenses. My mother has always been sickly and Mary hadn’t finished her business-schooling yet. I had to work like the deuce to keep things going— Then I was drafted.” “That’s just the way with this damn army,” interrupted Jimmy sympathetically. “They do everything like the French, backwards. Why the devil couldn’t they have let you stay home and take care of your mother and Mary? There’s enough of us big hams without any cares to fight this war. Who is Mary, your sister?” asked Jimmy bluntly; but he meant to be gentle. “Yes, she is my sister; only nineteen. Two years younger than me,” explained the drafted man. “How’s Mary and your ma makin’ it now?” was Jimmy’s next question. “Mary’s finished business school and has a good job. I make a twenty-dollar allotment, and my mother gets twenty-five dollars from the Government along with that. They’re doing pretty good now, so their letters tell me,” was the frank response. Jimmy sat down next to the recruit and started to hack off a couple of slices of bread according to the French way of doing it. He gave him a slice. “Slap some of this _confiture_ on it,” pointing to a tin of jam. “You won’t mind if I call you O. D., will you?” “No; but what makes you want to call me that? My right name’s William G. Preston.” “Damn glad to know you, Bill,” said Jimmy, shooting out his right hand; “but about this O. D. stuff?” “What’s that gold stripe on your sleeve for?” gasped Bill. “Have you been over here six months?” was the amazing question. “_Oui_, but that’s a wound stripe on the right sleeve—this is the sleeve for service chevrons,” and McGee exhibited two greasy and rumpled service chevrons.