"Yes, I think so.... How are your mules today?"
"The same," he said, "—ready to bite or kick or eat their heads off. The Remount took two hundred this morning."
"I saw them pass," said the girl. "I thought perhaps you also might be departing."
"Without coming to say good-bye—to you!" he stammered.
"Oh, conventions must be disregarded in time of war," she returned carelessly, continuing to shell peas. "I really thought I saw you riding away with the mules."
"That man," said Burley, much hurt, "was a bow-legged driver of the Train-des-Equipages. I don't think he resembles me."
As she made no comment and expressed no[pg 187] contrition for her mistake, he gazed about him at the sunny garden with a depressed expression. However, this changed presently to a bright and hopeful one.
"Vooz ate tray, tray belle, mademoiselle!" he asserted cheerfully.
"Monsieur!" Vexed perhaps as much at her own quick blush as his abrupt eulogy, she bit her lip and looked at him with an ominously level gaze. Then, suddenly, she smiled.
"Monsieur Burley, one does not so express one's self without reason, without apropos, without—without encouragement——"