Part 4 (1/2)

She shrieked again. ”Ma Gud, she's a dyin' woman!” said Scotty.

She was not. She had found her pa.s.sport. The business of waiting was resumed by the rest of us.

The little cafes along the water-front were closing; loads of soldiers and sailors began to flow out on to the jetty. One began to sing, and another; others to whirl along in grotesque dance steps. Two began to talk loudly. They came to blows. A third one stepped in to stop it, whereupon one of the first two turned on him to inquire what he was interfering for.

”But he's a friend o' mine,” explained the third man.

”Is he a better friend o' yours than o' me? Answer me that. Is he? Do you know him longer than I know him? No? Then mind your own and do not be interferin'.” The third man felt properly rebuked. He withdrew his objections and the other two resumed their fight.

We were inside the shed at last; and by and by I came before a man in a little office inside the shed. He was a Frenchman, but spoke good English.

”Your pa.s.sport, please.”

I produced it. He took a look and pa.s.sed it back.

”Any gold on your person?”

”Thirty dollars--American.”

”Hand it over, please. Wait. Are you American?”

”I am.”

”In that case keep it. That is all. Pa.s.s out. Next.”

Next came a little house with a row of men sitting at a long, narrow pine-board table. The first had a quick look at my pa.s.sport and handed it on to a man who sat on his left before a card index in boxes. That one dug into his boxes, found what he was looking for, and slid the pa.s.sport along to the next on his left, who slid it along to the man on his left, and he to the man on his left, and he to the last one.

You chased that pa.s.sport down the line, answering the questions which each one put in turn, as to where you last came from, where before that, and before that, and the date, your business, where you were going in England, why, for how long, and where you would stay. They were all pleasantly put, but you had the feeling that let you stumble and it would be G.o.d help you. Each asked a question or two that n.o.body else had thought of. The last one had the least of all to say. He probably thought that if, after all, you were a German spy, you had earned your exemption. He only made a note of your name, handed out a red card, said to give it to the soldier at the out-going door, claim your baggage, have the customs inspector pa.s.s it, and go aboard the steamer when you liked. All I saw liked to go aboard at once.

There was a man of many b.u.t.tons behind a s.h.i.+ning bra.s.s grill on the steamer--French, apparently, but also speaking plain English. I handed in my ticket and asked for a berth. He was snappy. ”Have you one reserved?”

”Why, no. When I bought my steamer ticket I was told that there would be no need to reserve a berth--there would be plenty.”

”He told you wrong. There are no berths.”

”But is he not your agent--the man who sold me the ticket?”

”No.”

”But you accept his ticket?”

”There is no berth.”

”You mean that I pay for a first-cla.s.s ticket on your steamer and then have to walk the deck?”

”There is no berth, I say.” He talked like a machine-gun, and the marble Roman G.o.ds were not more impa.s.sive as he turned to the next. I saluted him. You just have to honor a man who knows exactly what he wants to say and says it, which did not prevent me from saying over the next one's shoulder what I thought of his manners, the ethics of his company, and the cheek of the well-known tourist agency which had sold me the ticket in Paris.

But it did not get me anything. He went right on about his business of turning more people away.

I had a look around. The smoking-room air was all blue, and all khaki as to chairs and tables. Also all khaki as to sleeping-quarters. They had been campaigning for a year or more on the western line, and had not lost any time here. And every blessed one of them had a whiskey and soda before him. They were talking, but not of the war. They were going home for a ten days' leave after a year at the front and were trying to forget the war. There was also a lounge-room and a dining-saloon, but bunks there were also already commandeered by the strategic military.