So we order coffee and sit at a little table, chattering away. But I confess that all I want is to watch that young girl's pale, dark face.
Rays of light keep illuminating it, making it almost divinely beautiful, and it seems to me I have never come so close before to another human being's joy.
And then a soldier walks in.
He comes towards her. She springs to her feet.
He utters a word.
He is telling her her husband is out in the passage.
Very wonderful is the way that girl gets across the big, smoky, Flemish café.
I declare she scarcely touches the ground. It is as near flying as anyone human could come. Then she is through the door, and we see no more.
Ah, but we can imagine it, we two, the old mother and I!
And we look at each other, and her eyes are wet, and so are mine, and we smile, but very mistily, very shakily, at the thought of those two in the little narrow passage outside, clasped in each others' arms.