We light up, and around its
illumination each man tells what he has in his pockets, with
parental preferences and bias.
"To begin with, how many have we?"
"How many pockets? Eighteen," says some one--Cocon, of course, the
man of figures.
"Eighteen pockets! You're codding, rat-nose," says big Lamuse.
"Exactly eighteen," replies Cocon. "Count them, if you're as clever
as all that."
Lamuse is willing to be guided by reason in the matter, and putting
his two hands near the light so as to count accurately, he tells off
his great brick-red fingers: Two pockets in the back of the
greatcoat; one for the first-aid packet, which is used for tobacco;
two inside the greatcoat in front; two outside it on each side, with
flaps; three in the trousers, and even three and a half, counting
the little one in front.
"I'll bet a compass on it," says Farfadet.
'And I, my bits of tinder."
"I," says Tirloir, "I'll bet a teeny whistle that my wife sent me
when she said, 'If you're wounded in the battle you must whistle, so
that your comrades will come and save your life.'"
We laugh at the artless words. Tulacque intervenes, and says
indulgently to Tiloir, "They don't know what war is back there; and
if you started talking about the rear, it'd be you that'd talk rot."
"We won't count that pocket," says Salavert, "it's too small. That
makes ten."
"In the jacket, four. That only makes fourteen after all."
"There are the two cartridge pockets, the two new ones that fasten
with straps.
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