On March first I entered the dreaded precinct shielded
behind "the boss" with his contagious smile, and the musical
quartermaster of Empire was overthrown and defeated, and I marched
forth clutching in one hand a new "assignment to quarters."
That night I moved. The new, or more properly the older, room was
in House 35, a one-story building of the old French type, many of
which the Americans revamped upon taking possession of the
Isthmian junk-heap, across and a bit down the graveled street. It
was a single room, with no roommate to question, which I might
decorate and otherwise embellish according to my own personal
idiosyncrasies. At the back, with a door between, dwelt the
superintendent of the Zone telephone system, with a convenient
instrument on his table. In short, fortune seemed at last to be
grinning broadly upon me.
But--the sequel. I hate to mention it. I won't. It's absurdly
commonplace. Commonplace? Not a bit of it. He was a champion, an
artist in his specialty. How can I have used that word in
connection with his incomparable performance? Or attempt to give a
hint of life on the Canal Zone without mentioning the most
conspicuous factor in it?
He lived in the next room south, a half-inch wooden partition
reaching half-way to the ceiling between his pillow and mine.
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