The Bluffton news. [volume] (Bluffton, Ohio) 1875-current, 1944-09-21


looked as If they might be old enough
for him, but he couldn't be sure.
One of them passed by his cot, and
Mr.. Winkle, catching his glance,
and for lack of anything else to say
on the spur of the moment observed:
"Well, here We are"
"Hah?" the man asked, staring
blankly.
Mr.. Winkle didn't pursue it, and
the man passed on.
He realized just what an outsider
he was going to be. He wrote a let
ter to Amy. He informed her that
his bag would arrive home by ex-
press collect; it contained his rub
bers, which she had better give TO
the scrap rubber drive. He instruct
ed her to tell the Pettigrews that
Jack was getting along fine-right
now he was having roughhouse
with another boy. He assured Amy
that he was all right. He just felt a
little funny in his new life.
Sitting there alone on his cot, Mr..
Winkle reflected that he felt more
than. little funny.
There was an additional thing con-
nected with what was going on,
which he couldn't exactly analyze or
express. 1t was connected in some
way with the broad. general struc-
ture of the state of human affairs.
1t went beyond the possibility that
man was warning animal in spite
of all his civilized refnements. Nei-
ther was it to be found in the con-
current theory that at certain inter.
walls man needed to make war in or
der to pull himself down to his nat
ural level, which he had made the
mistake of exceeding.
Perhaps, thought Mr.. Wrinkle, what
he felt was contained in the fact that
man had will to die as well as a
will to live, and that the present
war was merely a grand expression
of this. The world was bent on a
mass suicide-pact, whose impulses
would be spent only when millions
had done away with themselves by
the oblique methods employed.
Yet not even in that did he dis
cover an explanation of the thing he
felt. 1t was to be found in some
thing much more simple than any
such objective ideas, which were
perhaps little crazy, anyway, or
at least too dangerous to entertain.
But he was sure there was some
thing to express the situation in
which he found himself, and that he
would ultimately run across 1t. He
decided to be on the lookout for it.
Private Tindall came in shortly
after FIVE, looking hot and not cut
ting a very attractive figure in his
soiled dungarees. His thin line of
mustache did not seem to fit this
garment at all. Several of the men
wanted to know what he had had
to do.
Freddie glared at them disgusted-
ly. II washed fioors," he snarled.
"Me!"
Jack led the laugh that followed.
Freddie strobe over to him and
without word, drew back his fist
and hit him.
Jack sat down on a cot, not hurt
but angry.
Mr.. Wrinkle had time to think that
it was good thing he had finished
his letter mentioning Jack before
the boy rose, again to battle Fred
die.
From the doorway the voice of
Alphabet was heard: For fighting
you'd be surprised what there is,
Private Tindall. But this time We'll
make it just the garbage detail for
tomorrow"
After the Alphabet had written in
his notebook and gone away, Fred
die promised, I'm going to kill
him. From A to z"
IF I don't get you first" Jack
muttered.
"You," Freddie demanded, "and
what other part of the Army? You
and Pop, maybe?"
Mr.. Wrinkle reflected that this was
not the right outlook at all. 1t was
hardly the true spirit of the reason
they were here.
Mr.. Wrinkle did not find friend of
his own age until he was shipped on
a train to his Replacement Training
Center. Camp Squibb was a thou
sand miles away from home. Mr.
Wrinkle understood that this great
distance was for the purpose of get
ting him away from family ties.
He was no happier at this than
was Freddie Tindall when it was
learned that Sergeant Czeideskrow-
ski was to accompany and stay with
them. 1t seemed that the Alphabet
had been champing at the bit for
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