Like most of the men who came out of the trenches he had very little to say about them. It amused him to hear that my new fur coat purchased in America is of so fleeting a dye that I must dart into the subway whenever the sun shines. He was laughing quietly as he wished me a cloudy winter upon my descending the broad stone steps into the empty, echoing courtyard. The unexpected appreciation of my doubtful humor set me musing over the possibility of a duty new to Americans. It is the French who have stood for gaiety. We have warmed ourselves in their quick wit. Perhaps it is time for us to do our little clownish best to set them laughing.
Having made the resolve I failed meanly to put it into execution. I knew I was going to fail as the motor stopped before the great house in the rue Daru—the lordly house of exquisitely tinted walls although the colors are not seen by those who dwell within. There is a paved COUR beyond the high wall with great steps leading up to the hotel. At the right are the stables, where delicate fabrics are woven—the workmen with heads erect; where are special looms for those who, by the sad demands of this war, are denied hands as well as their two eyes. At the left is another building and here the men play in a gymnasium, even fence with confidence. In an anteroom is a curious lay figure that the most sensitive of the students may learn massage—it is the blind in Japan who give their understanding fingers to this work—and in the rooms above is a printing press, silent for lack of funds, but ready to give a paper of his own to the sightless. Only, at "The Light House" they will not accept that a single one of their guests is without vision. "Ah GUARDIENNE," cried one of the students to the American woman who has established our Light House methods over there, "you do not see the unevenness of this fabric for your eyes are in your way."
I was standing in the room where the plan of the house is set upon a table. It is the soldier's first lesson that he may know the turns and steps, and run about without the pitiful outstretching of arms. There were other callers upon the GUARDIENNE. A blind graduate who had learned to live (which means to work) had returned with his little old father, and both were telling her that he had enough orders for his sweaters from the "Trois Quartiers" to keep him occupied for two years. The family felt that he was established—so there was nothing more to fear. And then because we were all happy over it the old man and the woman and myself began to cry noiselessly. Only the blind boy remained smiling through the choking silence.
I went to the window and glared down into the gardens where other soldiers were studying at little tables with a professor for each, and I asked myself why, in this great exigency, I was not being funny and paying my debt to France. But there was nothing to be funny about. The thing that dried my tears was the recollection of the blind asylum of my youth, where the "inmates" never learned to walk without groping, where we were shown hideous bead furniture, too small for dolls, which was the result of their eager but misspent lives.
There was a gown to be ordered before noon and as I drove back through the Faubourg St. Honoré I found myself looking fondly, thirstily into the shop windows, lifting my free eyes to the charming vagaries of old buildings, and again I made a vow although it had nothing to do with humor. On my dressing table rests a cushion of brocade and I shall carry it about as one who may yield to temptation carries a pledge, for the card which is attached chants out to me whenever my eyes rest upon it: "Soldat Pierre. Aveugle de la guerre. Blessé à Verdun." And as long as Soldier Pierre. Blind from the war. Wounded at Verdun can go on weaving his fabrics I pray that I may carry whatever burden may be mine with the unrebellious spirit.
Ah well! The robe took its place in the curriculum of my new Parisian day. It was to be a replica in color of that worn by the head of the house—her one of mourning was so bravely smart—for the business must go on and only the black badge of glory in fashionable form show itself in the gay salon. "Yes, we must go on," she said, "though every wife may give her mate. It is of an enormity to realize before one dies that he can be done without—that there are enough little ones to keep France alive and we women in the meantime can care for the country. Our men may die glad in that thought, but I think there must be a little of grief, too. It is sad not to be needed. Yes, Madame, blue for you where mine is black, and in place of the crêpe something very brilliant. It is only Americans that we can make gay now, and it keeps the women in the sewing room of good cheer to work in colors. Too dear you think? Ah, no, Madame, observe the model!"
Conscious that she had taken the basest advantage of my sympathy, and glad that she had done so I went to déjeuner with a feeling that I had deserved it which I might not otherwise have enjoyed. We were lunching at the restaurant on the Seine which felt for a short time the upheaval of war. Among the first called to the front had been the proprietor, and the august deputies whose custom it was to take their midday meal at this famous eating place had suffered from an unevenness of the cuisine. He is back at his establishment now, an ammunition maker on the night shift and the excellent and watchful patron at noon.
Our guests came promptly, for France still eats, although, if I can say anything so anomalous, does not stop to do so. The war talk continues albeit one carries it more lightly through a meal. A French officer arrived in the only automobile of his garage which the government had not commandeered. We looked down upon it stealthily that we might not give offense to his chauffeur, for the car is a Panhard in the last of its teens—which holds no terrors to a woman but is a gloomy age for a motor. An American architect from our Clearing House bowed over my hand a little more Gallic in these days than the Gaul himself. He has a right to the manners of the country. He had come over at the beginning of the war for a month and is determined to stick it out if he never builds another railway station. "To see the troops march through the Arc de Triomphe!" is the cry of the Americans, but the French do not express themselves so dramatically.
There is drama enough, though, even in the filing of papers at every American relief society. That and the new sensation of work serves to hold the dilettante of our country to his long task. "This is the president's office," you will be told in a hushed voice outside some stately door. Then one discovers in Mr. President a playmate of Mayfair or Monte Carlo or Taormina who may never previously have used a desk except as a support for the signing of checks.
Our friend had been engaged that morning upon the re-ticketing of the Lafayette Kits which had come back from the front because there was no longer a Gaspard to receive them. I put this down that any young girl of our country who does not hear from "her soldier" may understand the silence. And sometimes the poilu is a little confused, writing a charming letter of thanks to "Monsieur Lafayette" himself.