Joan considered. “Yes,” she answered. “I should say he’s just the man to manage her.” “A section of the Paris Press is doing all it can to help him, of course,” explained Mrs. Denton. “It doesn’t seem to matter to them that Germany is only waiting her opportunity, and that, if Russia comes in, it is bound to bring Austria. Europe will pay dearly one day for the luxury of a free Press.”!

“Not much to look at, if that’s what you mean,” answered Madge. “Began life as a miner, I believe. Looks like ending as Prime Minister.” Mary’s work was finished. She sat upright in her straight-backed chair before the table, her eyes half closed. It seemed so odd to see those little work-worn hands idle upon her lap.

How long Joan remained there she was never quite sure. There was little difference between day and night. After it had been quiet for an hour or so, Madame Lelanne would go out, to return a little later with a wounded man upon her back; and when one died, she would throw him across her shoulder and disappear again up the steps. Sometimes it was a Frenchman and sometimes a German she brought in. One gathered that the fight for the village still continued. There was but little they could do for them beyond dressing their wounds and easing their pain. Joan and the little chemist took it in turns to relieve one another. If Madame Lelanne ever slept, it was when she would sit in the shadow behind the stove, her hands upon her knees. Dubos had been in the house when it had fallen. Madame Lelanne had discovered him pinned against a wall underneath a great oak beam that had withstood the falling débris. His beard had been burnt off, but otherwise he had been unharmed. Joan sighed. It looked as if the word had been passed round to treat the whole thing as a joke. Mrs. Denton took a different view. “Protection?” he flashed out scornfully. “Yes, I’ve heard of that. I’ve listened, as a boy, while the old men told of it to one another, in thin, piping voices, round the fireside; how the labourers were flung eight-and-sixpence a week to die on, and the men starved in the towns; while the farmers kept their hunters, and got drunk each night on fine old crusted port. Do you know what their toast was in the big hotels on market day, with the windows open to the street: ‘To a long war and a bloody one.’ It would be their toast to-morrow, if they had their way. Does he think I am going to be a party to the putting of the people’s neck again under their pitiless yoke?”