I went to my billet at Madame Chéri’s house, from which I had been absent some days. I had the key of the front door now and let myself into the hall. The diningroom door was open, and I heard the voices of the little French family, laughing, crying, hysterical. Surely hysterical!
“O mon Dieu! O mon petit Toto! Comme tu es grandi! Comme tu es maigre!”
I stood outside the door, understanding the thing that had happened.
In the centre of the room stood a tall, gaunt boy in ragged clothes, in the embrace of Madame Chéri, and with one hand clutched by Hélène and the other by the little Madeleine, her sister. It was Edouard who had come back.
He had unloosed a pack from his shoulder, and it lay on the carpet beside him, with a little flag on a broken stick. He was haggard, with high cheek-bones prominent through his white, tightly-drawn skin, and his eyes were sunk in deep sockets. His hair was in a wild mop of black, disordered locks. He stood there, with tears streaming from his eyes, and the only words he said were:
“Maman! O maman! maman!”
I went quietly upstairs and changed my clothes, which were all muddy. Presently there was a tap at my door and Hélène stood there, transfigured with joy. She spoke in French.
“Edouard has come back—my brother! He travelled on an English lorry.”
“Thank God for that,” I said. “What gladness for you all!”
“He has grown tall,” said Hélène. She mopped her eyes and laughed and cried at the same time. “Tall as a giant, but oh! so thin! They starved him all the time. He fed only on cabbages. They put him to work digging trenches behind the line—under fire. The brutes! The devils!”