He never concerned himself with the contents of his papers.
So he sped along, thinking how he would get a new headlight for _Uncle Sam_ and a new mud-guard.

He thought the people back at Cantigny would wonder what had happened to his machine.

He had no thought of telling them.

There was nothing to tell.
Swiftly and silently along the road he sped, the dispatch-rider who had come from the blue hills of Alsace, all the way across poor, devastated France.

The rays of the dying sun fell upon the handle-bar of _Uncle Sam_, which the rider held in the steady, fraternal handshake that they knew so well.