“It—it has been wonderful to see you,” he said. “I don’t think I shall ever forget this.” He waved his hand around the room. “It isn’t possible.” He smiled whimsically. “I know I’m dreaming the whole thing. You’re really back in Ohio somewhere, probably playing bridge.”
“Not bridge—I don’t like bridge. Tennis, maybe.”
“And I’m going to wake up in a little while and tell folks what a queer dream I’ve had.”
She pinched herself. “See, I’m awake—and you don’t know how glad I am that I am awake—that I am here, seeing this, being a part of this....”
“But it isn’t done, you know. There’s nothing in the rules to cover it.... No, Miss Knox, I’m dreaming it—and I’m glad I am dreaming it. If it were real—” His face grew serious.
“Perhaps,” she said, “this is the first time you’ve ever seen anything real ... since you came to France. That is it.... France is real, the war is real, Andree is real, I am real.... The only things that aren’t real are the habits and thoughts we were busy with sixty days ago.... Sixty days!...”
“Good-by—and don’t forget me.”
“I sha’n’t do that. I like you.... Good-by.”
Kendall leaned far back in his car and smoked and found his thoughts disturbing company. He was not used to facing questions of big importance, but he saw now that for weeks he had been drifting toward a day when he would have to meet and reply to the first soul-modifying question that had ever been propounded to him.... The thing was inevitable. He was moving toward facts that could not be brushed aside.... Strangely enough, though he was heavy with apprehension, nevertheless there was a certain exultation.... This was living—living not in a circumscribed area, but in the unbounded world. This was life—this was experience—something big, worthy of the consideration of a man. There were happiness and misery in it.... He was beginning to see that he could not win through with happiness intact; it was his hope to win through with happiness preponderant.... The day he landed in France he had been a boy; less than two months had passed—and he had become a man.... France had done that for him.