CHAPTER IX

HARTLEY AND THE G. O. G.'S

"Oh, I say, Torchy," calls out Mr. Robert, as I'm reachin' for my hat here the other noon, "you don't happen to be going up near the club on your way to luncheon, do you?"

"Not today," says I. "I'm lunchin' with the general staff."

"Oh!" says he, grinnin'. "In that case never mind."

And for fear you shouldn't be wise to this little office joke of ours maybe I'd better explain that who I meant was Hartley Grue, a.s.sistant chief of our bond room force.

Just goes to show how hard up we are for comic stuff in the Corrugated Trust these days when we can squeeze a laugh out of such a serious-minded party as Hartley. But you know how it is. I expect some of them green-eyed clerks on the tall stools started callin' him that when the War Department first turned him loose and he reports back to tackle the old job wearin' the custom tailored uniform with the gold bar on his shoulders. And I admit the rest of us might have found something better to do than listen to them Cla.s.s B-4 patriots who would have helped save the world for democracy if the war had lasted a couple years more.

Still, that general staff tag for Mr. Grue tickled us a bit. As a matter of fact he did come back--from the Hoboken piers--about as military as they made 'em. And to hear him talk about the Aisne drive and the St.

Mihiel campaign and so on you'd think he must have been right at Pershing's elbow durin' the whole muss, instead of at Camp Mills and later on at the docks on a transport detail. But he gets away with it, even among us who have watched all the details of his martial career.

For the big war gave Hartley his chance, and he grabbed it as eager as a park squirrel nabbin' a peanut. He'd been hangin' on here in the bond room for five or six years, edgin' up step by step until he got to be a.s.sistant chief, but at that he wasn't much more'n an office drudge.

Everybody ordered him around, from Old Hickory down to Mr. Piddie. He was one of the kind that you naturally would, being sort of meek and spineless. He'd been brought up that way, I understand, for his old man was a chronic grouch--thirty years at a railroad ticket office window--and I expect he lugged his ticket sellin' disposition home with him.

Anyway, Hartley had that cheap, hang-dog look, like he was always listenin' for somebody to hand him something rough and would be disappointed if they didn't. And yet he was quick enough to resent anything if he thought it was safe. You'd see him scowlin' over his books and he carried a constant flush under his eyes, as if he'd been slapped recent across the face, or expected to be. Not what you'd call a happy disposition, Hartley; nor was he just the type you'd pick out to handle a bunch of men.

All he had to start with was a couple of years' trainin' as a private in one of the National Guard regiments. I suppose he knew "guide right"

from "left oblique" and how to ground arms without mashin' somebody's pet corn. But I don't think anybody suspected he had any wild military ambitions concealed under that 2x4 dome of his. Yet while most of us was still pattin' Wilson on the back for keepin' us out of war Hartley had already severed diplomatic relations and was wearin' a flag in his b.u.t.tonhole.

When the first Plattsburg camp was organized Hartley was among the first to get a month's leave of absence and report. He didn't make it, being a little shy on the book stuff, besides lacking ten pounds or more for his height. But that didn't discourage him. He begun taking correspondence courses, eating corn meal mush twice a day, and cutting out the smokes.

And after a four weeks' whirl at the second officers' training camp he squeezed through, coming out as a near lieutenant. Old Hickory Ellins gasped some when Hartley showed up with the bar on his shoulders, but he gave him the husky grip and notified him that his leave was extended for the duration of the war with half pay.

And the next we heard from Hartley he was located at Camp Mills drillin'

recruit companies. Two or three times he dropped in to say he expected to be sent over, but each time something or other happened to keep him within a trolley ride of Broadway. Once he was caught in a mumps quarantine just as his division got sailing orders, and again he developed some trouble with one of his knees. Finally Hartley threw out that someone at headquarters was blockin' him from gettin' to the front, and at last he got stuck with this dock detail, which he never got loose from until he was turned out for good. Way up to the end, though, Hartley still talked about getting over to help smash the Huns. I guess he was in earnest about it, too.

Maybe they thought when they had mustered Hartley out that they'd returned another citizen to civilian life. But they hadn't more'n half finished the job. Hartley wouldn't have it that way. He'd stored up a lot of military enthusiasm that he hadn't been able to work off on draftees and departin' heroes. In fact, he was just bustin' with it. You could see that by the way he walked, even when he wasn't sportin' the old O. D. once more on some excuse or other. He'd come swingin' into the general offices snappy, like he had important messages for the colonel; chin up, his narrow shoulders well back, and eyes front. He'd trained Vincent, the office boy, to give him the zippy salute, and if any of the rest of us had humored him he'd had us pullin' the same stuff. But those of us that had been in the service was glad enough to give the right arm motion a long vacation.

"Nothing doing, Hartley," I'd say to him. "We've canned the Kaiser, ain't we? Let's forget that shut-eye business."

And how he did hate to part with that uniform. Simply couldn't seem to do it all at once, but had to taper off gradual. First off he was only going to sport it two days a week, but whenever he could invent a special occasion, out it came. He even got him a Sam Browne belt, which was contrary to orders, and once I caught him gazin' longin' in a show window at some overseas service chevrons and wound stripes. Course, he wore the allied colors ribbon, which pa.s.ses with a lot of folks for foreign decorations; but then, a whole heap of limited service guys have put that over.

When it came to provin' that it was us Yanks who really cleaned up the Huns and finished the war, Hartley was right there. That was his strong suit. He carried maps around, all marked up with the positions of our different divisions, and if he could get you to listen to him long enough he'd make you believe that after we got on the job the French and English merely hung around the back areas with their mouths open and watched us wind things up.

"You see," he'd explain, "it was our superior discipline and our wonderful morale that did it. Look at our marines. Just average material to start with. But what training! Same way with a lot of our infantry regiments. They'd been taught that orders were orders. It had been hammered into 'em. They knew that when they were told to do a thing it just had to be done, and that was all there was to it. We didn't wait until we got over there to win the war. We won it here, on our cantonment drill grounds. And I rather think, if you'll pardon my saying so, that I did my share."

"I'm glad you admit it, Hartley," says I. "I was afraid you wouldn't."

His latest bug though was this Veteran Reserve Army scheme of his. His idea was that instead of sc.r.a.ppin' this big army organization that it had cost so much to build up we ought to save it so it would be ready in case another country--j.a.pan maybe--started anything. He thought every man should keep his uniform and equipment and be put on call. They ought to keep up their training, too. Might need some revisin' of regiments and so on, but by having the privates report, say once a week, at the nearest place where officers could meet them, it could be done. Course, some of the officers might be too busy to bother with it. Well, they could resign. That would give a chance for promotions. And the gaps in the enlisted ranks could be kept filled from the new cla.s.ses which universal service would account for.

See Hartley's little plan? He could go on wearin' his shoulder straps and shiny leggins and maybe in time he'd have a gold or silver poison ivy leaf instead of the bar.

It was the details of this scheme that he'd been tryin' to work off on me for weeks, but I'd kept duckin', until finally I'd agreed to let him spill it across the luncheon table.

"It's got to be a swell feed, though, Hartley," I insists as I joins him out at the express elevator.

"Will the Cafe l'Europe do?" he asks.

"Gee!" says I. "So that's why you 're dolled up in the Sunday uniform, eh? Got the belt on too. All right. But I mean to wade right through from hors-d'oeuvres to parfait. Hope you've cashed in your delayed pay vouchers."

I notice, too, that Hartley don't hunt out any secluded nook down in the grill, but leads the way to a table right in the middle of the big room on the main floor, where most of the ladies are. And believe me, paradin' through a mob like that is something he don't shrink from at all. Did I mention that Hartley used to be kind of meek actin'? Well, that was before I heard him talk severe to a Greek waiter.

Also I got a new line on the way Hartley looks at the enlisted man. I'd suggested that a lot of these returned buddies might have had about all the drill stuff they cared for and that this idea of reportin' once a week at some armory possibly wouldn't appeal to 'em.

"They'll have to, that's all," says Hartley. "The new service act will provide for that. Besides, it will do 'em good, keep 'em in line.

Anyway, that's what they're for."

"Oh," says I. "Are they? Say, with sentiments like that you must have been about as popular with your company, Hartley, as an ex-grand duke at a Bolshevik picnic."

"What I was after," says he, "was discipline, no popularity. It's what the average young fellow needs most. As for me, I had it clubbed into me from the start. If I didn't mind what I was told at home I got a bat on the ear. Same way here in the Corrugated, you might say. I've always had to take orders or get kicked. That's what I pa.s.sed on to my men. At least I tried to."

And as Hartley stiffens up and glares across the table at an imaginary line of doughboys I could guess that he succeeded.

It was while I was followin' his gaze that I noticed this bunch of five young heroes at a corner table. Their overseas caps was stacked on a hat tree nearby and one of 'em was wearin' some sort of medal. And from the reckless way they were tacklin' big platters of expensive food, such as broiled live lobster and planked steaks, I judged they'd been mustered out more or less recent.

Just now, though, they seemed a good deal interested in something over our way. First off I didn't know but some of 'em might be old friends of mine, but pretty soon I decides that it's Hartley they're lookin' at. I saw 'em nudgin' each other and stretchin' their necks, and they seems to indulge in a lively debate, which ends in a general haw-haw. I calls Hartley's attention to the bunch.

"There's a squad of buddies that I'll bet ain't yearnin' to hear someone yell 'Shun!' at 'em again," I suggests. "Know any of 'em?"

"It is quite possible," says Hartley, glancin' at 'em casual. "They all look so much alike, you know."

With that he gets back to his Reserve Army scheme and he sure does give me an earful. We'd got as far as the cheese and demi ta.s.se when I noticed one of the soldiers--a big, two-fisted husk--wander past us slow and then drift out. A minute or two later Hartley is being paged and the boy says there's a 'phone call for him.

"For me?" says Hartley, lookin' puzzled. "Oh, very well."

He hadn't more'n left when the other four strolls over, and one of the lot remarks: "I beg your pardon, but does your friend happen to be Second Lieutenant Grue?"

"That's his name," says I, "only it was no accident he got to be second lieutenant. That just had to be."

They grins friendly at that. "You've described it," says one.

"He was some swell officer, too, I understand," says I.

"Oh, all of that," says another. "He--he's out of the service now, is he?"

"Accordin' to the War Department he is," says I, "but if a little plan of his goes through he'll be back in the game soon." And I sketches out hasty Hartley's idea of keepin' the returned vets on tap.

"Wouldn't that be perfectly lovely now!" says the buddy with the medal, diggin' his elbow enthusiastic into the ribs of the one nearest him.

"Wonder if we couldn't persuade him to make it two drill nights a week instead of one. Eh, old Cootie Tamer?"

Course, it develops that these n.o.ble young gents, before being sent over to buck the Hindenburg line, had all been in one of the companies Hartley had trained so successful. I wouldn't care to state that they was hep to the fact that if it hadn't been for him they wouldn't have turned out to be such fine soldiers. But they sure did take a lot of interest in discoverin' one of their old officers. That was natural and did them credit.