“You see, it makes company for me,” explained Mary. “Or keeping out of it altogether,” added Joan.!

They walked a little way in silence. Mary slipped her hand into Joan’s. “You wouldn’t care to come home and have a bit of supper with me, would you, dearie?” she asked. “Oh, just a Christian gentleman,” she answered. “You will love him when you know him.”

“Are they yours?” she asked. She had never connected them with the works, some half a mile away. Though had she been curious, she might have learnt that they were known as “Allway’s Folly.” “Abner is your second?” suggested Miss Tolley. Space did not allow of any separation; broken Frenchmen and broken Germans would often lie side by side. Joan would wonder, with a grim smile to herself, what the patriotic Press of the different countries would have thought had they been there to have overheard the conversations. Neither France nor Germany appeared to be the enemy, but a thing called “They,” a mysterious power that worked its will upon them both from a place they always spoke of as “Back there.” One day the talk fell on courage. A young French soldier was holding forth when Joan entered the hut.