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Updated: May 1, 2025
Spugg was standing among a little group of listening members of the club and when he said that he had decided to send his chauffeur, he spoke with a kind of simple earnestness, a determination that marks the character of the man. "Yes," he said, "we need all the man power we can command. This thing has come to a showdown and we've got to recognise it.
The situation gave him a new importance in our eyes, something tense. "This seems to be a terrific business," I said to him one day at lunch, "this new German drive." "My chauffeur," said Mr. Spugg, "was right in the middle of it." "He was, eh?" "Yes," he continued, "one shell burst in the air so near him it almost broke his wings." Mr.
Spugg, dressed as best he could manage it, and taking turns with his son in driving his own motor, was a pathetic but uncomplaining object. Meadows meantime was reported as with the heavy artillery, doing well. "I hope nothing happens to Meadows," Spugg kept saying. "If it does, we're stuck. We can't go ourselves. We're too busy.
The Germans have caught them both. I suppose I shan't have either of them back now till the war is all over." He gave a slight sigh, the only sign of complaint that ever I had heard come from him. But the next day we learned what was Spugg's answer to the German's capture of William and Henry. "Have you heard what Spugg is doing?" the members of the club asked one another. "What?"
"Spugg," said a quiet looking, neatly dressed man whom I knew to be the president of an insurance company and who reached out and shook the speaker by the hand, "this is a fine thing you're doing, a big thing. But we mustn't let you do it alone. Let our company take a hand in it.
Spugg by sight until one afternoon when I heard him saying that he intended to send his chauffeur to the war. It was said quite quietly, no bombast or boasting about it. Mr.
"And you're sending your gardener?" "I am," said Spugg. "He's gone already. I called him in from the garden yesterday. I said, 'William, Henry's been gassed. Our first duty is to keep up our man power at the front. You must leave to-night." "What are you putting William into?" I asked "Infantry. He'll do best in the trenches, digs well and is a very fair shot.
Or, say Henry comes back mutilated, say he loses a leg, say he loses two legs, " Here Mr. Spugg looked about him at his listeners, with a look that meant that even three legs wouldn't be too much for him. "Whatever Henry loses I pay for. The loss shall fall on me, every cent of it."
Spugg told this with no false boasting or bravado, eating his celery as he spoke of it. Here was a man who had nearly had his chauffeur's wings blown off and yet he never moved a muscle. I began to realize the kind of resolute stuff that the man was made of. A few days later bad news came to the club. "Have you heard the bad news about Spugg?" someone asked. "No, what?"
Then he added, as an afterthought, "They may never come back." From that day on, Mr. Spugg, with his French medal on his watch chain, was the most conspicuous figure in the club. He was pointed out as having done more than any other one man in the institution to keep the flag flying. But presently the limit of Mr. Spugg's efforts and sacrifices was reached.
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