"I don't know. But I think so, for from the hour of the mobilization until now, I have not heard from them."
"Since the hour of the mobilization," said Paul Guitry, "much water has flowed under the bridges. I had just been married. My wife is in Paris. I have a little son now. I saw them when I had my eight days' leave. And it seems that again I am to be a father. It is very wonderful."
"I was going to be married," said the Idiot simply.
There was a short silence.
"If I had known," said Paul Guitry, "I would not have boasted of my own happiness."
"I am not the only French soldier who has not heard from his sweetheart since the mobilization," said the Idiot. "It has been hard," he said, "but by thinking of all the others, I have been able to endure."
"She remained there at Champ-de-Fer?"
"She must have, or else she would have written to me."
Paul Guitry could not find anything to say.
"Soon," said the Idiot, "we shall be in Champ-de-Fer, and they will tell me what has become of her."