Several times during the interesting
transaction the American shrugged his shoulders and walked away as if
to say: "Oh, I don't want your old watch. It isn't worth anything."
Then they would get together again, and the gesticulating would begin
all over; the machine-gun staccato of "Oui Oui's" would rattle again,
and the argument would continue, without either one of the contracting
parties knowing a word of the other's language.
At last I saw the American soldier unstrap his Ingersoll and hand it
over to the Frenchman, who, in turn, pulled out the good Swiss-movement
watch, and both parties to the transaction went off happy, for each had
gotten what he wanted.
One of the funniest things that happened in France while I was there
was told me by a wounded boy one Sunday afternoon back of the Notre
Dame cathedral. He was invalided from the Chateau-Thierry scrap in
which the American marines had played such a heroic part. He was a
member of the marines, and was slightly wounded. He saw that I was a
secretary, and thought to play a good joke on me. He pulled out of his
breast-pocket a small black thing that looked and was bound just like a
Bible. Its corner was dented, and it was plain to be seen that a
bullet had hit it, and that that book had stopped its death-dealing
course.
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