She followed Michelle into the house, which was a bare, homely little place, oddly furnished with a few splendid pieces brought from the old home, eked out with simple stools and tables got from near at hand. But it was neat and homelike, and that meant much to Lucy, after her days spent in the midst of the hospital’s terrible activity.
Madame de la Tour had already gone to the French hospital, and Michelle was putting the house in order while the old servant was busy in the kitchen.
“Sit down upon this chair,” she said to Lucy, bringing an old, carved armchair close to the open window. The windows had been open ever since the glass was shattered by the shell-fire, but now that summer had come, the boards which helped keep out the winter cold were put aside.
Michelle pulled up a second chair for herself, and taking some knitting on her lap, exclaimed with a look of pleasant anticipation, “Now we are comfortable, no? It is so long since I have company. I feel almost strange to see a friend.”
“There is so much I want to talk about, I can’t think where to begin,” said Lucy frankly. But as she spoke she remembered her need of making another visit to the old prison, and realized also that such chance of speaking in safe privacy with Michelle might not come soon again. She did not have very long, either, for Elizabeth walked fast.
“Michelle, I want first to tell you about my brother’s coming here the other night,” she began quickly.
“Your brother—he come here?” gasped Michelle, her English failing her in her amazement.
“Yes,” Lucy nodded. She plunged into her story and repeated the whole incident of Bob’s coming and of her own visit to Captain Beattie’s prison. By the time she finished Michelle’s eyes were shining, her cheeks were flushed with pink, and the knitting lay unheeded in her hands. When Lucy stopped for breath she burst into such enthusiastic praise and comment that Lucy was almost overcome.
“Goodness, I didn’t do anything,” she said hastily, for she had not told the story with any idea of winning applause for herself. “The reasons I want you to know about it are, first, because I hope you will let me bring things for Captain Beattie here, and stop for them on my way to the prison. Secondly, because we are friends, and I wanted to tell you about Bob.”
Michelle’s face was a study; the strangest mixture of warm sympathy and a kind of puzzled doubt. Lucy looked at her wonderingly, for she answered with evident sincerity, “Very gladly will I help you to take things to the poor Englishman. I will go with you if I may—I long so to help a little bit! Oh, Lucy, only to make pass that news of Argenton across the German lines!”