Page:Frank Owen - Rare Earth, 1931.djvu/157

 It is hard anyway to hate an enemy that you cannot see, that you simply blaze away at haphazardly from a trench or shell-hole.

It would be impossible to describe the loneliness into which Enoch at times was plunged. How he longed for his home again. Even the genial companions which anchored to him did not alleviate his homesickness.

There was Dirk Dock, a big-boned negro from Chicago. For years he had been a laborer in the yards of 'The Illinois Central Railroad.'

"Don' know 'ow dat dere road's a-gonna run 'thout me," he drawled. "Dem cars'll miss me at dere mornin's bath. I knowed 'xactly how warm dey liked de water. Pretty bad jolt for de road when dey had to invite me to run dis yere war. Yassah, I made such a fin' job o' dat railroad, de President hear 'bout it an' he says to Mister Marshall, 'Marsh, Dirk's de fella whut we needs.' An' blame ef he don' sit down an' write me pussonal like, kinda urging me to join."

"Yeh!" snorted Joe Tooks of Alabama.