The day before leaving he
was standing at the door of the Hotel Edouard VII when one of his
schoolmates at the College Stanislas, Lieutenant Jacquemin, appeared.
"He took me to his room," this officer relates, "and we talked for more
than an hour about schooldays. I asked him whether he had some special
dodge to be so successful." "None whatever," he said, "but you remember
I took a prize for shooting at Stanislas. I shoot straight, and have
absolute confidence in my machine." He showed me his numberless
decorations, and was just as simple and full of good fellowship as he
was at Stanislas. It was evident that his head had not been in the least
turned by his success; he only talked more and enjoyed describing his
fights. He told me, too, that in spite of opposition from airplane
builders he had secured a long-contemplated improvement; and that he had
had a special camera made for him with which he could photograph a
machine as it fell. His parting words were: "I hope to fly to-morrow,
but don't expect to see my name any more in the _communiques_. That's
all over: I have bagged my fifty Boches.
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