From the victory of the Marne—there had been a victory, a great victory! What a thing to hear, after their almost hopeless days! Hopelessness had been so black and close about them. And now it was lifted, dispersed, in a moment, by a word. Here come their own people crying victory. In their own tongue, their own men, dressed in blue, told them of victory.
Those things the Germans had said were not true. They had never believed, but now they knew. To think of looking into the faces of friends, of talking with friends! The humblest little soldier was a friend, the most wonderful of all things.
Rémy, who had all his life been distant and cold, was inexpressibly happy to wring a friend's hand, and sit with him, or pace the floor with him, and smoke with him.
What a pleasure to give all one had to friends!
How happy Claire was to help scrub and cook for friends!
It was a madness of relief and joy.
There was little time for thinking about it though. The new possession of the château was a desperately risky thing.
But these were friends, to suffer with and die with, if need be. Nothing could be as terrible as in those past days of isolation among enemies. Among friends they met what came.
In a few hours death and destruction were upon everything. And then, day after day, day after day, the battle raged along the river and under the edge of the hills; the sound of the cannon grew to be a familiar part of the nights and days; the screech of a shell was no longer strange.