Page:Ruth of the U.S.A. (IA ruthofusa00balm).pdf/375

 all—Sam Hilton. He was seated before a cottage and was very popular with and intent upon the villagers gathered about; so Ruth had a good look at him before he observed her. In his trim uniform and new chevrons—he was sergeant now—he never looked "classier" in his life.

He appeared to have appointed himself a committee of one to investigate the experiences of the inhabitants of that village during the four years of German occupation, and he had found an interpreter—a French boy, of thirteen or fourteen—who was putting into rather precarious English the excited recitals of the peasants.

Ruth approached when one series of translation was coming to an end, and Sergeant Sam Hilton looked up and recognized her. "Why, hello; you here, too, Miss Alden?"

He had been long enough in France so that he was not really much amazed to encounter anyone. "Come here and listen to what the Huns been doing to these people, Miss Alden," he invited her, after she had replied to his greeting. "Say, do you know that's the way they been acting for four years? We're a fine bunch, I should say, letting that sort of stuff go on for three years and over before we stepped in. What was the matter with our government, anyway—not letting us know. I tell you"

It took him many minutes to express properly his indignation at the tardiness of the American declaration of war. Yet certain features of the situation enormously perplexed him.