"There's just one thing more I wad like ta say to ye." The sergeant
major's tendency to Doric was more noticeable in his moments of deeper
feeling, "but it's something for you lads to give heed ta. When ye were
scrammlin' up yonder, like a lot o' mavericks at a brandin', and yowlin'
like a bunch o' coyotes, there was one man in the regiment who could
laugh. There's lots o' animals that the Almighty made can yowl, but
there's only one can laugh, and that's a mon. For God's sake, men, when
ye're in a tight place, try a laugh."
For some weeks after this event the chaplain was known throughout the
battalion as "the man that can laugh," and certain it is that from
that day there existed between the M. O. and the chaplain a new bond of
friendship.
As the ship advanced deeper into the submarine zone, the sole topic of
thought and of conversation came to be the convoy. Where was that convoy
anyway? While the daylight lasted, a thousand pairs of eyes swept the
horizon, and the intervening spaces of tossing, blue-grey water, for the
sight of a sinister periscope, or for the smudge of a friendly cruiser,
and when night fell, a thousand pairs of ears listened with strained
intentness for the impact of the deadly torpedo or for the signal of the
protecting convoy.
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