"An airman?"
"Yes. My machine was shot down in Nivelle woods an hour ago."
After a silence, as they jogged along between the hazel thickets in the warm afternoon sunshine:
"Were you acquainted with my friend?" she asked wistfully.
"With Jack Burley? A little. I knew him in Calais."
The tears welled up into her eyes:
"Could you tell me about him?... He was my first friend.... I did not understand him in the beginning, monsieur. Among children[pg 215] it is different; I had known boys—as one knows them at school. But a man, never—and, indeed, I had not thought I had grown up until—he came—Djack—to live at our inn.... The White Doe at Sainte Lesse, monsieur. My father keeps it."
"I see," nodded the airman gravely.
"Yes—that is the way. He came—my first friend, Djack—with mules from America, monsieur—one thousand mules. And God knows Sainte Lesse had never seen the like! As for me—I thought I was a child still—until—do you understand, monsieur?"
"Yes, Maryette."