“I like the fresh air, and I don’t like secrecy.”
She leaned against the edge of the table and Doggie, emboldened, seated himself on the corner by her side, and they looked out into the little flagged courtyard in which the men, some in grey shirt-sleeves, some in tunics, were lounging about among the little piles of accoutrements and packs. Here and there a man was shaving by the aid of a bit of mirror supported on a handcart. Jests and laughter were flung in the quiet afternoon air. A little group were feeding pigeons which, at the sight of crumbs, had swarmed iridescent from the tall colombier in the far corner near the gabled barn. As Jeanne did not speak, at last Doggie bent forward and, looking into her eyes, found them moist with tears.
“What is the matter, Jeanne?” he asked in a low voice.
“The war, mon ami,” she replied, turning her face towards him, “the haunting tragedy of the war. I don’t know how to express what I mean. If all those brave fellows there went about with serious faces, I should not be affected. Mais, voyez-vous, leur gaieté fait peur.”
Their laughter frightened her. Doggie, with his quick responsiveness, understood. She had put into a phrase the haunting tragedy of the war. The eternal laughter of youth quenched in a gurgle of the throat.
He said admiringly: “You are a wonderful woman, Jeanne.”
Her delicate shoulders moved, ever so little. “A woman? I suppose I am. The day before we fled from Cambrai it was my jour de fête. I was eighteen.”
Doggie drew in his breath with a little gasp. He had thought she was older than he.
“I am twenty-seven,” he said.
She looked at him calmly and critically. “Yes. Now I see. Until now I should have given you more. But the war ages people. Isn’t it true?”