"I'll show you the cablegram."
She went to her desk, and drew out the message, clipped, abbreviated in the puzzling fashion of cablegrams:
"Regret inform you, Bickett killed, action French front. Details
later."
(Signed) "CAILLARD."
"Caillard? Caillard?" Where had I heard that name? Then I suddenly remembered. Paul Caillard was the friend with whom Jack had gone across the ocean to the Great War. I examined the paper carefully.
"I thought Dicky said you received the usual official notification," I remarked.
"That's what I told him," she replied. "That's it."
"But this isn't an official message," I persisted.
"Why isn't it?"
I explained the difference haltingly, and spoke of the wonderful system of identification in the French army, with every man tagged with a metal identification check.