"Well," said the A.C.G., "I've sent in your name already, Graham, and they want you to go to Abbeville for a few weeks. A gathering is to be made there of the more promising material, and you are to get down to the work of making a syllabus, and so on. You will meet other officers from all branches of the Service, and it should be interesting and useful. I presume you will be willing to go? Of course it is entirely optional, but I may say that the men who volunteer will not be forgotten."
"Quite so," said the Professor. "They will render extremely valuable service. I shall hope to be there part of the time myself."
Peter thought quickly of a number of things, as one does at such a moment. Some of them were serious things, and some quite frivolous—like Julie. But he could hardly do otherwise than consent. He asked when he should have to go.
"In a few days. You'll have plenty of time to get ready. I should advise you to write for some books, and begin to read up a little, for I expect you are a bit rusty, like the rest of us. And I shall hope to have you back lecturing in this Army area before long."
So to speak, bowed out, Peter made his way home. In the Rue de Paris Julie passed him, sitting with a couple of other nurses in an ambulance motor-lorry, and she waved her hand to him. The incident served to depress him still more, and he was a bit petulant as he entered the mess. He flung his cap on the table, and threw himself into a chair.
"Well," said Pennell, who was there, "on the peg all right?"
"Don't be a fool!" said Peter sarcastically. "I'm wanted on the Staff.
Haig can't manage without me. I've got to leave this perishing suburb and
skip up to H.Q., and don't you forget it, old dear. I shall probably be a
Major-General before you get your third pip. Got that?"
Pennell took his pipe from his mouth. "What's in the wind now?" he demanded.
"Well, you might not have noticed it, but I'm a political and economic expert, and Haig's fed up that you boys don't tumble to the wisdom of the centuries as you ought. Consequently I've got to instruct you. I'm going to waltz around in a motor-car, probably with tabs up, and lecture. And there aren't to be any questions asked, for that's subversive of discipline."
"Good Lord, man, do talk sense! What in the world do you mean?"