Thirty-six hours later Lieutenant Pinkham dropped off a truck near the drome of the Ninth and limped, sore of foot and weary, past a sentry on the edge of the tarmac. The Boonetown exponent of skulduggery had bundled up his flying coat and was carrying it via stick, hobo fashion. \u201cHuh,\u201d grunted the human watch dog, \u201cso it\u2019s you, sir? We was hopin\u2019\u2014er\u2014I mean we figured you must of \u2018went west.\u2019 They was about ready to bury your trunk an\u2019 things, the officers was. They said it would do \u2018stead of a stiff.\u201d
\n\u201cYou\u2019re a liar,\u201d Phineas grinned and kept on walking. He trudged to his hut and tossed his flying coat on his cot. Then he flopped down beside it, wishing that he could get fifty cents worth of good old U.S. ice on which to set his burning dogs.
\nBump Gillis nosed in a few minutes later and eyed the prodigal crookedly.
\n\u201cHello, Rothschild,\u201d the sturdy Scot began. \u201cWhere\u2019d you hide the dough, huh?\u201d
\n\u201cWhat dough, huh?\u201d Phineas countered. \u201cWhat\u2019s the idea anyway? I s\u2019pose a bank in Paree has been held up an\u2019 they blame me. I don\u2019t know what it is you are talkin\u2019 about.\u201d
\n\u201cThe Old Man will enlighten you,
\nCarbuncle,\u201d Bump said with a superior air. \u201cHe has been waiting for you to show up. Did you by any chance take a detour around the Alps?\u201d Then Bump ducked as Phineas gathered strength to swing his fist.
\nFive minutes later an orderly knocked and asked Phineas Pinkham to step over to see Major Garrity for a couple of minutes. The Iowa wonder went to the Operations office and reported that he had come back.
\n\u201cDon\u2019t remind me of it,\u201d the Old Man
\nexploded. \u201cHow is the big financial wizard, huh?\u201d
\n\u201cThe wha-a-a-a-a?\u201d Phineas gulped. \u201cWhat\u2019s all the\u2014Why hello, Colonel. You get around, don\u2019t you, haw-w-w-w? You still think I stole them marks when you hit the cow with the jilopi, huh? By the way, the Frog is goin\u2019 to sue you, as after you left me he come along an\u2019 said the vache had a pedigree longer than\u2014er\u2014\u201d
\n\u201cSearch his hut!\u201d Colonel McWhinney of the U.S. Intelligence stormed. \u201cI know he stole those marks, Major. That cow was tied up to a fence when we hit it. It was eatin\u2019 grass in the middle of the road. Whoever saw grass growing in the middle of a road over here the way those trucks have been pounding them the last two years? Lieutenant Pinkham, I demand that you give up the marks.\u201d
\n\u201cDon\u2019t make me laugh, as when I cracked up I split my lip,\u201d Phineas pleaded. \u201cI never heard nothin\u2019 so silly. Humph!\u201d
\nBut Colonel McWhinney persisted, so the Pinkham hut was searched minutely. An M.P. unwrapped the Pinkham flying coat, then barged out yelling bloody murder and begging some one to unhinge a snapping turtle from his thumb.
\n\u201cThat gives me another idea,\u201d Phineas mumbled as he watched the M.P. dive into the medico\u2019s shack.
\nColonel McWhinney finally headed out of the drome. Nevertheless, he still insisted that Lieutenant Pinkham was a crook and that he would catch up with him if it took forty years after the war.
\n\u201cStubborn bum, ain\u2019t he?\u201d Phineas remarked to the Old Man as he followed his C.O. into the Operations office. \u201cHaw-w-w-w!\u201d
\n\u201cPinkham,\u201d Garrity thundered, \u201cdon\u2019t try to kid me. Once there was a guy named Rothschild and he got close to the Battle of Waterloo to see how it would come out. He planned either to buy French Louies or English pounds. Then when he saw that Wellington was going to knock Bonaparte into a cocked hat, he beat it to the Channel, hopped a boat to England, and bought up all the British money he could find. That mean anything to you, you buck-toothed simian?\u201d
\n\u201cThat is a swell story, daddikins,\u201d the irrepressible Yank baby-talked. \u201cNow tell me \u2018bout the barber who cut the throats of forty thieves, will ya papa? Haw-w-w-w! You believe anything, too, don\u2019t you, Major? I am gettin\u2019 so I don\u2019t think it is a joke any more. A Pinkham accused of stealin\u2019! Why I\u2019m as honest as they come. I never heard
\nof\u2014\u201d
\n\u201cListen, halfwit!\u201d Garrity bayed. \u201cTen minutes before McWhinney got here, a couple of war correspondents dropped in and said they stumbled over an old chateau where an old guy was hived up. He asked \u2018em did they have any marks to sell\u2014especially the new ones that had the numbers \u201c1\u00bd\u201d printed on \u2018em. What did you sell that Frog, Pinkham? Cigar coupons or marks, huh?\u201d
\n\u201cH-huh?\u201d Phineas tossed out, eyes wary.
\n\u201cWhat does that prove? I never heard of the old\u2014\u201d
\n\u201cOh no?\u201d Garrity snorted. \u201cWell he mentioned your name. The correspondents reported it to Lieutenant Sprinklem. And the old Frog said to tell you not to forget what you said about getting him some more marks. Look here, Pinkham, come clean. Did you tie that cow in the road? Did you sell cigar cou\u2014?\u201d
\n\u201cI am surprised at you,\u201d Phineas countered. \u201cYou\u2014believin\u2019 such things of me, a Pinkham. I guess you need a rest, as your dome\u2014say, why don\u2019t you ask for three weeks off? If you don\u2019t, you will be tellin\u2019 me I am Bismarck next week. Well, I have things to attend to. Adoo, sir.\u201d
\nThe Major ground his teeth and grew apoplectic, but that did no good so he flung a book at the wall. His eyes started out of his head and he groaned when the pages disgorged dozens of important memorandum slips that he had filed carefully inside the book for safe-keeping.
\nOVER in Alsace a perturbed Heinie Herr
\nOberst was conversing with the leading squarehead of Staffel 7, the Kaiser\u2019s top aerial circus. \u201cAch, der Marks here vill coom in zwei maybe drei Tags, ja, Herr Hauptmann. Alreadty yedt der gross agent K-4 he ist by der lines ofer where ist das Haus mit der Marks. Yoost haff idt der patienze und der chentlemen of der circus vill gedt idt der pay. Ho! Ho! Das ist sehr gut! Den dey vill fly vunce again.\u201d
\n\u201cJa? Ve safe der laughs yedt undtil der Marks ve haff by den Handen, Herr Oberst,\u201d growled the Jerry Hauptmann. \u201cNo more ve risk der necks for noddings, mein Freund. Der Leutnants dey haff idt der pockets embdy und dey read off der Cherman profit makers vot eat der sauerbraten und drinken vunce der Rhine vine und bouncing yedt der Frauleins by der knees in der beer gartens, bah!\u201d
\n\u201cBut you vill see,\u201d the Herr Oberst insisted. \u201cDer Marks ve vill gedt!\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Thirty-six hours later Lieutenant Pinkham dropped off a truck near the drome of the Ninth and limped, sore of foot and weary, past a sentry on the edge of the tarmac. The Boonetown exponent of skulduggery had bundled up his flying coat and was carrying it via stick, hobo fashion. \u201cHuh,\u201d grunted the human watch…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_kad_post_transparent":"","_kad_post_title":"","_kad_post_layout":"","_kad_post_sidebar_id":"","_kad_post_content_style":"","_kad_post_vertical_padding":"","_kad_post_feature":"","_kad_post_feature_position":"","_kad_post_header":false,"_kad_post_footer":false,"_kad_post_classname":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[51],"class_list":["post-678","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-pulp-classics","tag-joe-archibald"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/astoundingoutpost.com\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/678","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/astoundingoutpost.com\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/astoundingoutpost.com\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/astoundingoutpost.com\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/astoundingoutpost.com\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=678"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/astoundingoutpost.com\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/678\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1323,"href":"https:\/\/astoundingoutpost.com\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/678\/revisions\/1323"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/astoundingoutpost.com\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=678"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/astoundingoutpost.com\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=678"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/astoundingoutpost.com\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=678"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}