Wherever there were Americans, Europe had a new medium of exchange, subject to all the lamentable fluctuations that affect legal tender. The medium: cigarets.
In Italy the departure of U.S. troops had cut the supply of cigarets to the point where a cigaret currency crisis had set in. The value of a carton was as erratic as that of a lira. Enterprising Italians were doing their best to restabilize by "importing" cigarets by mass smuggling.
In France, where smuggling was somewhat less effective, cigarets (worth $15 U.S. a carton) were an international language....
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