"The Germans want a decisive battle on French soil in the vicinity of Rheims. If they beat us there, they pivot on Verdun, half-circle on the Oise, and Paris lies before them. They have today a million men within striking distance of the French frontier."
"Are we fully mobilized?"
"Our concentration is slower; we are massing between Bar-le-Duc and Epinal. We have, so far, only seven corps d'armée concentrated, and twenty-one more on the march. But do you know what we have done already?
"Listen; this isn't generally known yet, but we have taken the passes of Bonhomme and Sainte Marie; we have taken Mülhausen——"
"What!"
"Yes, it's ours. More than that, we have entered Dinant. At Mangiennes, Moncel, Lagarde, we drove the Germans. Our line of battle stretches two hundred miles from a point opposite Tongres to Nancy. We smashed the Germans at Altkirch and left them minus thirty thousand men!
"And this great counter-offensive which our General is planning is already exercising such a pressure on their advance toward Brussels that they have begun to detach entire army corps and send them post haste into Alsace. What do you think of that, Warner?"
"Fine!" exclaimed the American. "It's simply splendid, Halkett. You see, we here in the valley couldn't know anything about it. All we had to go by was that the German guns were booming nearer and nearer, that Ausone is in ruins, that Uhlans were riding the country as impudently as though they were patrolling their own fatherland. I tell you, old chap, it's a wonderful relief to me to hear from you what is really going on."
He turned to his mirror, lighted a cigarette, and began to fuss with his tie.
Halkett said, grimly amused: