"Someone there to see your wounded, madame—" said the man who did not know——
Paralyzed, fixed to the floor, she could not move. She saw coming toward her, shrouded in an impressive silence, a woman—one of those women of France, good mother, good wife, good patriot, accustomed from youth to go through a harsh and bitter life as the wife of a laboring man, with serenity——
She went straight to him. The nurse followed her with her glance. She could no longer see her face, but saw the woman bend a great while over her dead. Of what was she thinking? Of the Calvary of her man, of his wound, of his agony, or rather of her own sadness, or the children for whom she would have to struggle——
She turned and, coming toward her:
"Is it you, madame, who have cared for him? Permit me to kiss you."
It was the nurse who wept——
THE IRREVERENT POILU.
March, 1917.
An élite Division was au repos[29] in a pretty little village on the Meuse where the houses are gray and from where one can hear the cannon at Verdun, like a spring thunderstorm.
General Pétain has gone to spend a few hours with these heroes, accompanied by my worthy comrade de Buisseret.