' And he
wasn't long about it, either."
"He went a bit too far, even. The first time I saw him in his
kitchen, you'd never guess what he'd got the stew going with! With a
violin that he'd found in the house!"
"Rotten, all the same," says Mesnil Andre. "One knows well
enough that a violin isn't worth much when it comes to utility, but
all the same--"
"Other times, he used billiard cues. Zizi just succeeded in pinching
one for a cane, but the rest--into the fire! Then the arm-chairs in
the drawing-room went by degrees--mahogany, they were. He did 'em in
and cut them up by night, case some N.C.O. had something to say
about it."
"He knew his way about," said Pepin. "As for us, we got busy
with an old suite of furniture that lasted us a fortnight."
"And what for should we be without? You've got to make dinner, and
there's no wood or coal. After the grub's served out, there you are
with your jaws empty, with a pile of meat in front of you, and in
the middle of a lot of pals that chaff and bullyrag you!"
"It's the War Office's doing, it isn't ours."
"Hadn't the officers a lot to say about the pinching?"
"They damn well did it themselves, I give you my word! Desmaisons,
do you remember Lieutenant Virvin's trick, breaking down a cellar
door with an ax? And when a poilu saw him at it, he gave him the
door for firewood, so that he wouldn't spread it about."
"And poor old Saladin, the transport officer. He was found coming
out of a basement in the dusk with two bottles of white wine in each
arm, the sport, like a nurse with two pairs of twins.
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