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Show II 1" fJfi&Qr SOLDIER Jf'A ' WHO WENT ' W MACHINE GUMML"R,JERY1NGIS FRANCE" SVA I 19(7 BY I ejH ARTHUR tUY rrHTY EMPEY HAS NARROW ESCAPE WHILE ON PATROL DUTY IN NO MAN'S LAND. Synopsis. Fired by the sinking of the Lusitania, with the loss of American lives, Arthur Guy Kmpey, an American living in Jersey City, goes to England and eniists as a private in the British army. After a short experience as a recruiting officer in London, he is sent to training train-ing quarters in France, where he first hears the sound of big guns and makes the acquaintance of "cooties." After a brief period of training Empey's company is sent into the front-line trenches, where he takes his first turn on the fire step while the bullets whiz overhead. Empey learns, as comrade falls, that death lurks always in the trenches. Chaplain distinguishes himself by rescuing wounded men under hot fire. With pick and shovel Empey has experience as a trench digger in No Man's Land. Exciting experience on listening post detail. Exciting Ex-citing work on observation post duty. CHAPTER XVI Continued. 13 Qu'te a contrast to Wilson was another an-other character in our brigade named Scott; we called him "Old Scotty" on account of his age. He was fifty-seven, although looking forty. "Old Scotty" had been born in the Northwest and had served in the Northwest Mounted nolice. He was a typical cowpuncher md Indian fighter and was a dead shot with the rifle, end took no pains to disguise this fact from us. He used to take care of his rifle as if it were a baby. In his spare moments you could always see him cleaning it or -polishing the stock. Woe betide the man who by mistake happened to g-et hold of this rifle; he soon found out his error. Scott was as deaf as a mule, and it was amusing at parade to watch him in the manual of arms, slyly "lancing out of the corner of his eye at the man next to him to see what the order was. How he passed the doctor was a mystery to us; he must have bluffed his way through, because he certainly was independent. Beside him the Fourth of July looked like Good Friday. He wore at the time a huge sombrero, had a Mexican stock saddle over his shoulder, a lariat on his arm, and a "forty-five" hanging from his hip. Dumping this paraphernalia parapher-nalia on the floor he went up to the recruiting officer and shouted : "I'm from America, west of the Rockies, and want to join your d d army. I've got no use for a German and can shoot some. At Scotland Yard they turned me down; said I was deaf and so I am. I don't hanker to ship in with a d d mud-crunching outfit, but the cavalry's full, so I guess this regiment's regi-ment's better than none, so trot out your papers and I'll sign 'em." He told them he was forty and slipped by. I was on recruiting service at the time he applied for enlistment. It was Old Scotty's great ambition to be a sniper or "body snateher," as Mr. Atkins calls it. The day that be was detailed as brigade sniper he cele-, cele-, brated his appointment by blowing the whole platoon to fags. Being a Yank, Old Scotty took 1 liking lik-ing to me and used to spin some great yarns about, the plains, and the whole platoon would drink these in and ask for more. Ananias was a rookie compared com-pared with him. The ex-pluinsmna and discipline could not agree, but the officers all liked him, even if be was hard to manage, man-age, so when he was detailed as a sniper a sigh of relief went up from the officers' ni"ss. Old Scotty had the freedom of the brigade, lie used to draw two or three days' rations and disappear with his glass, range finder and rifle, and we would see or hear no more of him until suddenly he would reappear with a couple of notches added to those already n the butt of bis rifle. Every time be got a German it meant another notch. He was proud of these notches. But after a few months Father Khouma Usui got him and he was sent 1o Blighty; the air in the wake of his stretcher was hi no with curses. Old Scotty surely could swear; some of his outbursts actually burned you. No doubt, at this writing, he Is 'somewhere in Blighty" pussy footing it no !i bridge or along the wall of initio munition plant with the "G. It." fir Home Defense corps. CHAPTER XVII. Out in Front. After toil Lieutenant Stores of our section came into the dugout and in formed me that I was "for" n reconnol-tering reconnol-tering patrol and would carry six Mills bombs. At 11 :30 that night twelve men, our lieutenant and myself went out in front on a patrol in No Man's Land. We cruised around in the dark for about two hours, just knocking about looking for trouble, on the lookout for Boche working parties to see what they were doing. Around two in the morning we were carefully picking our way about thirty yards in front of the German barbed wire, when we walked into a Boche covering party nearly thirty strong. Then the music started, the fiddler rendered ren-dered his bill, and we paid. Fighting in the dark with a bayonet is not very pleasant. The Germnns took it on the run, but our officer was no novice at the game and didn't follow fol-low them. He gave the order "down on the ground, hug it close." Just in time, too, because a volley skimmed over our heads. Then in low tones we were told to separate and i crawl back to our trenches, each man ' on his own. I We could see the flashes of their rifles in the darkness, but the bullets , were going over our heads. We lost three men killed and one j wounded in the arm. If it hadn't been I for our officer's quick thinking the i whole patrol would have probably j been wiped out. After about twenty minutes' wait we : went out again and discovered that i the Germans had a wiring party work- 1 ing on their barbed wire. We returned j to our trenches unobserved with the 1 information and our machine guns im- j mediately got busy. ' The next night four men were sent ' out to go over and examine the German Ger-man barbed wire and see If they had cut lanes through it; if so, this presaged pres-aged an early morning attack on our trenches. Of course I had to be one of the four j selected for the job. It was just like Rending a fellow to the undertaker's I to order his own coffin. i At ten o'clock we started out, armed with three bombs, a bayonet and revolver. re-volver. After getting Into No Man's I Land we separated. Crawling four or five feet at a time, ducking star shells, with strays cracking overhead, I reached their wire?. I scouted along this inch by inch, scarcely breathing. I could hear them talking in their trench, my heart was pounding against my ribs. One false move or the least noise from me meant discovery and almost certain death. After covering my sector I quietly crawled hack. I had gotten about half way when I noticed that my revolver was missing. It was pitch dark. 1 turned about to see if I could find it; it couldn't be far away, because about three or four minutes previously I had felt the butt in the holster. I craw led around in circles and at hist found it, then started on my way back to our trenches, as I thought. 1'relty soon I reached barbed wire, and was just going to give the password pass-word when something told me not to. I put out my band and touched one of the barbed wire stakes. It was iron. The British are of wood, while the German are iron. My heart stopped beating; by mistake I had crawled back to the German lines. I turned slowly about and my tunic caught on the wire and made a loud ripping noise. A sharp challenge rang out. I sprang to my feet, ducking low, and ran madly (jack toward our lines. 'X'he Germnns started firing. The bullets were biting all around me, when bang! I ran smash into our wire, and a sharp challenge, "'Alt, who comes there?" rang out. I gasped out the password, and, groping my way through the lane in the wire, tearing my hands and uniform, I tumbled into our trench and was safe, but I was a nervous wreck for an hour, until a drink of rum brought me round. CHAPTER XVIII. Staged Under Fire. Three days after the incident just related re-lated our company was relieved from the front line and carried. We stayed in reserve billets for about two weeks when we received the welcome news that our division would go back of the line "to rest billets." We would remain re-main in these billets for at least two months, this in order to be restored to our full strength by drafts of recruits from Blighty. Everyone was happy and contented at these tidings; all you could hear around the billets was whistling and singing. The day after the receipt of the order we hiked for five days, making mak-ing an average of about twelve kilos per day until we arrived at the small town of O' . It took us about three days to get settled, and from then on our cushy time started. We would parade from 8:45 in the morning until 12 noon. Then except for an occasional billet or Drigade guard we were on our own. For the first four or five afternoons 1 spent my time in bringing up to date my neglected correspondence. Tommy loves to be amused, and being be-ing a Yank, they turned to me for something new iu this line. I taught them how to pitch horseshoes, and this game made a great hit for about ten days. Then Tommy turned to America Amer-ica for a new diversion. I was up in the air until a happy thought came to me. Why not write a sketch and break Tommy in as an actor? One evening after "lights out," when you are not supposed to talk, I imparted impart-ed my scheme in whispers to the section. sec-tion. They eagerly accepted the idea of forming a stock company and could hardly wait until the morning for further details. After parade, the next afternoon I was almost mobbed. Everyone In the section wanted a part in the proposed sketch. When I informed them that it would take at least ten days of hard work to write the plot, they were bit- f, - t. , - ' i v - ;" ' : . . ' : , s - - ..-:.. 1? , - s-- . ' I - - ' 1 " :-?..':.".'C Sti A Hidden Gun. terly disappointed. I immediately got busy, made a desk out of biscuit tins in the corner of the billet, and put up a sign 'Empey & Wallace Theatrical Co." About twenty of the section, upon reading this sign, immediately applied for the position of office boy. 1 accepted the twenty applicants, and sent them on scouting parties throughout through-out the deserted French village. These parties were to search all the attics for discarded civilian clothes, and anything any-thing that we could use iu the props of our proposed company. About five that night they returned covered with grime and dust, but loaded load-ed down with a miscellaneous assortment assort-ment of everything under the sun. They must have thought that I was going to start a department store, judging from the different things they brought back from their pillage. After eight clays' constant writing I completed a two-act farce comedy which I called "The Diamond Palace Saloon." Upon (he suggestion of one of the boys in the section I sent a proof of the program to a printing bouse in London. Then I assigned the different parts and started rehearsing. David I'.elasco would have thrown up bis hands in despair at the material which I had to use. Just imagine trying to tench a Tommy, with a strong cockney accent, to impersonate a Bowery tough or a Southern negro. Adjacent to our billet was an open field. We got busy at one end of It and constructed a stage. We secured the lumber for the stage by demolishing an old wooden shack in the rear of our billet. The first scene was supposedto represent rep-resent a street on the Bowery in New York, while the scene of the second act was the Interior of the Diamond Palace saloon, also on the Bowery. In the play I took the part of Abe Switch, a farmer, who had come from Pumpklnville Center, Tenn., to make his first visit to New York. In the first scene Abe Switch meets the proprietor of the Diamond Palace saloon, a ramshackle affair which to the owner was a financial loss. The proprietor's name was Tom Twistem, his bartender being named Fill era Up. After meeting Abe, Tom nnd Fillem Up persuaded htm to buy the place, pruising It to the skies and telling wondrous tales of the money taken over the bar. Empey 6tages his play under difficulties but with great success. suc-cess. The next installment tells about it. ' (TO BE CONTlNUliD.l |