Jeannine changes the subject.
The conversation, having wavered, naturally returns to the War. When will it end? In the spring? Yes, after the Big Push! We return to the first weeks. They ply me with questions. What have I seen? At first, I decline to be drawn out. They insist—I let myself go. They listen, and ask for details. Here is the perfect audience, interested and impassioned. Even technical details do not repel them, this sister and this daughter of soldiers, who have been staking out the maps with little flags; they, too.
I question them in my turn. It pleased me to hear them describing Paris' proud bearing at the time of our reverses. They have a right to speak of it, as they live there. When I mention our meeting with the two young Red Cross members at Rosny——
"It might have been me," says Jeannine. "I was at St. Denis that morning."
Heavens! I do not know what I had feared or desired. I become expansive. My mind is set at ease. What, is that Jeannine, who is listening to me, leaning her chin in her hand? Is it her pure, pensive gaze which mine meets without embarrassment?
And the grandmother is standing up. In the most natural tone in the world, she asks her grand-daughter to show me round the garden.
Jeannine hesitates, and looks at her. I wonder, at this moment, if Madame Landry has ever heard of our letters, if she sees the tragic undercurrents to this frivolous scene which is being enacted.
Jeannine is still considering. Is she afraid that the walk may tire me? I get up, and reassure her in advance. She blushes. The grandmother apologises for not accompanying us—the doctor forbids it.
So I call little André—I only forestall Jeannine—that there may be a third in the party.