"Do! What fun!" she cried, as the car started.
"The field-marshal was Partow, their chief of staff?" Westerling asked.
"Yes," said Mrs. Galland. "I remember when he was a young infantry officer before the last war, before he had won the iron cross and become so great. He was not of an army family—a doctor's son, but very clever and skilful."
"Getting a little old for his work!" remarked Westerling. "But apparently he is keen enough to take a personal interest in anything new."
"Wasn't it thrilling and—and terrible!" Marta exclaimed.
"Yes, like war at our own door again," replied Mrs. Galland, who knew war. She had seen war raging on the pass road. "Lanstron, the young man said his name was," she resumed after a pause. "No doubt the Lanstrons of Thorbourg. An old family and many of them in the army."
"The way he refused to give in—that was fine!" said Marta.
Westerling, who had been engrossed in his own thoughts, looked up.
"Courage is the cheapest thing an army has! You can get hundreds of young officers who are glad to take a risk of that kind. The thing is," and his fingers pressed in on the palm of his hand in a pounding gesture of the forearm, "to direct and command—head work—organization!"
"If war should come again—" Marta began. Mrs. Galland nudged her. A Brown never mentioned war to an officer of the Grays; it was not at all in the accepted proprieties. But Marta rushed on: "So many would be engaged that it would be more horrible than ever."