Fuselli was thinking of the other men lining up outside the dark mess shack and the sound the food made when it flopped into the mess kits. An idea came to him. He'd have to bring Sarge to see Yvonne. They could set him up to a feed. “It would help me to stay in good with him,” He had a minute's worry about his corporalship. He was acting corporal right enough, but he wanted them to send in his appointment.
“Damn bon,” he said to Yvonne with his mouth full.
“You.... Dan, bon,” she said and laughed. The cousin was looking from one to the other enviously, her upper lip lifted away from her teeth in a smile.
The old woman munched her bread in a silent preoccupied fashion.
“There's somebody in the store,” said Fuselli after a long pause. “Je irey.” He put his napkin down and went out wiping his mouth on the back of his hand. Eisenstein and a chalky-faced boy were in the shop.
“Hullo! are you keepin' house here?” asked Eisenstein.
“Have you got any chawclit?” asked the chalky-faced boy in a thin bloodless voice.
Fuselli looked round the shelves and threw a cake of chocolate down on the counter.
“Nothing, thank you, corporal. How much is it?”
Whistling “There's a long, long trail a-winding,” Fuselli strode back into the inner room.
When he had received the money, he sat down at his place at table again, smiling importantly. He must write Al about all this, he was thinking, and he was wondering vaguely whether Al had been drafted yet.
After dinner the women sat a long time chatting over their coffee, while Fuselli squirmed uneasily on his chair, looking now and then at his watch. His pass was till twelve only; it was already getting on to ten. He tried to catch Yvonne's eye, but she was moving about the kitchen putting things in order for the night, and hardly seemed to notice him. At last the old woman shuffled into the shop and there was the sound of a key clicking hard in the outside door. When she came back, Fuselli said good-night to everyone and left by the back door into the court. There he leaned sulkily against the wall and waited in the dark, listening to the sounds that came from the house. He could see shadows passing across the orange square of light the window threw on the cobbles of the court. A light went on in an upper window, sending a faint glow over the disorderly tiles of the roof of the shed opposite. The door opened and Yvonne and her cousin stood on the broad stone doorstep chattering. Fuselli had pushed himself in behind a big hogshead that had a pleasant tang of old wood damp with sour wine. At last the heads of the shadows on the cobbles came together for a moment and the cousin clattered across the court and out into the empty streets. Her rapid footsteps died away. Yvonne's shadow was still in the door: