I'll
think about it when I have time. And then, my pack of cards, and a
set of draughts, with a paper board and the pieces made of
sealing-wax."
Barque comes up, regards the scene, and says, "I've a lot more
things than that in my pockets." He addresses himself to Volpatte.
"Have you got a Boche pay-book, louse-head, some phials of iodine,
and a Browning? I've all that, and two knives."
"I've no revolver," says Volpatte, "nor a Boche pay-book, but I
could have had two knives or even ten knives; but I only need one."
"That depends," says Barque. "And have you any mechanical buttons,
fathead?"
"I haven't any," cries Becuwe.
"The private can't do without 'em," Lamuse asserts. "Without them,
to make your braces stick to your breeches, the game's up."
"And I've always got in my pocket," says Blaire, "so's they're
within reach, my case of rings." He brings it cut, wrapped up in a
gas-mask bag, and shakes it. The files ring inside, and we hear the
jingle of aluminium rings in the rough.
"I've always got string," says Biquet, "that's the useful stuff!"
"Not so useful as nails," says Pepin, and he shows three in
his hand, big, little, and average.
One by one the others come to join in the conversation. to chaffer
and cadge. We are getting used to the half-darkness. But Corporal
Salavert, who has a well-earned reputation for dexterity, makes a
banging lamp with a candle and a tray, the latter contrived from a
Camembert box and some wire.
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