"He was a pig of an officer, a
dirty Boche. Very chic, too, and young like a schoolboy."
One of the women patted him on the shoulder. Her eyes glistened.
"Did you slit his throat, the dirty dog? Eh, I'd like to get my
fingers round the neck of a dirty Boche!"
"I finished him with a grenade," said the poilu. "It was good enough.
It knocked a hole in him as large as a cemetery. See then, my cabbage.
It will make you smile. It is a funny kind of mascot, eh?"
He put on the table a small leather pouch stained with a blotch of
reddish brown. His big, clumsy fingers could hardly undo the little
clasp.
"He wore this next his heart," said the man. "Perhaps he thought it
would bring him luck. But I killed him all the same! 'Cre nom de
Dieu!"
He undid the clasp, and his big fingers poked inside the flap of the
pouch.
"It was from his woman, his German grue. Perhaps even now she doesn't
know he's dead. She thinks of him wearing this next to his heart. 'Cre
nom de Dieu! It was I that killed him a week ago!"
He held up something in his hand, and the light through the estaminet
window gleamed on it.
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