Get there early, feller citizens!  They won’t last long.’  Think o’ that, Gilbert?  Clams!” He smacked his lips, and even forgot how warm it was.  “Clams!  An’ I ain’t even seen one in five long years!  Not even a clam!” He turned his chair suddenly, and looked out of the open door, where the country meandered away.  “This is a hell of a hole!  Why did we ever come down here?” he whined.  He swung about again, and faced his nephew.  “Say, Gil, do they have clams in France?”

“No; only mussels.  Good ones, too.”

Uncle Henry looked amazed.  “They eat mussels?” he cried.

Gilbert looked up, smiled, and nodded.

“An’ I hear they eat frogs, an’ hosses, an’ cheese with worms in it, too.  Say,” the old man wanted to know, “what don’t they eat over there?...  An’ speakin’ of eatin’, ain’t we never goin’ to have no dinner?”

“I think it’ll be ready soon, Uncle.  Do be patient.  I want to write.”

Uncle Henry settled back in his chair, and for a brief interval became absorbed in his newspaper.  But not for long could he remain silent.  “Where’s that Mr. Pell?” he asked.

“Inside, I think, lying down,” Gilbert replied, nodding toward the alcove, his pen rushing across the page.

Uncle Henry made a grimace.  “He makes me sick, that feller.”

“Oh, cut that out, Uncle,” Gilbert implored; but there was a little note of irritation in his voice.  “That’s no way to talk of a guest under our roof.”

“I won’t neither cut nothin’ out!  An’ you make me sick too, you gol darn fool!”

“For the love of Mike, quit your babbling!  Sssh!”

“Don’t you shush me, gol darn it!” cried Uncle Henry, crumpling the newspaper in his hand and throwing it on the floor.  The heat was affecting him.  “I’ve kep’ still long enough, an’—­”

“Oh, have you?” Gilbert smiled.

“—­an’ I’m goin’ to find out what’s what!” Uncle Henry went on, as though he had not been interrupted.

“You act as though I were to blame for what’s happened,” his nephew said.  He saw it would do no good to lose his temper.

“Well, ain’t you?  Why did you want to go to war in the first place?  Why, why?” He pounded the arm of his chair.  “That’s what started it.”

“Well, somebody had to go,” Gilbert answered, smiling.  “If some of us hadn’t taken things in our hands, I don’t know what would have become of Democracy!”

Uncle Henry pondered a moment.  “Mebbe so.  But you didn’t have to go.”  Gilbert had risen to get a match, and his uncle’s eye followed him to the mantel-piece.  He spoke to the back of his head.  “You could have claimed exemption if you’d wanted to, an’ you know it.”

“Exemption?” Gilbert repeated the word, a little angry at its utterance.  This wasn’t like Uncle Henry who, with all his peculiarities, had always been a patriot.

“Absolutely!  You were the sole support of an invalid uncle.”  He waited for the truth of this remark to sink in; but Gilbert said nothing.  “And on top of that,” Uncle Henry went on, rapidly, when his nephew did not speak, “you were engaged in an essential industry—­if you can call these rotten steaks you feed us on essential.  The bones is softer than the meat.”  He gave a curious little laugh, thin and high.