'It _is_ my duty. My first duty, that is, must be to my future husband. When he returns from America' (she had long ago learned the futility of distinguishing, for Marie, between 'l'Amerique du nord' and 'l'Amerique du sud'; and was patient with her belief that New York was a suburb of Cayenne) 'he will wish me there. He was to have sailed last month. A letter--a telegram--must have gone astray in the confusion. When I hear, he will doubtless be in England. And when he reached England, I was to go to my friends and be married to him. My heart bleeds for France; but I am not French, and my duty is not here. I am American, you see, dear Marie, and my _fiance_ is English.' 'Ah!' Marie shook her head. 'My old head is turned with all they tell me, and the buzzing in my bad ear is like cannon. But I had thought that the English, for some reason I do not understand, were fighting with us. They have been telling us for ten years that we do not hate the English--that we love them. And Theophile thought that an English army was against the Germans. But perhaps I am wrong. _Monsieur votre fiance_ will not have to fight, then? I congratulate you, mademoiselle.' 'The English are fighting with the French, Marie. But all Englishmen are not soldiers. Monsieur Laye is not a soldier. He is an engineer.' 'He is perhaps past the age.' 'There is no conscription in England, Marie. No man is a soldier unless he chooses.' 'No service to make?' 'None.' '_C'est beau, ca!_ All Frenchmen must fight. So England may go to war, and still have men to till the fields. But where do their armies come from?' 'Any man who wishes may go. But none are compelled--except the soldiers by profession. There will be enough, never fear. England will not desert France.' The old woman nodded. 'I am not afraid of that. And you are not afraid that _monsieur le fiance_ will fight? I do not understand these things. As Theophile says, what I comprehend I do not hear, and what I hear I do not comprehend. I go to fetch mademoiselle's soup. They are lucky, all the same, to get the crops in, in time of war.' She clattered from the room. Miss Stanley felt her heart grow heavy, she did not know precisely why. If only word would come! Perhaps she was a fool to stay. There must be trains through to Paris now. Anything to get nearer Edmund, away from this historic, war-bound plain! She crouched by the window to eat her _soupe aux choux_ and stale bread. If only some boy would come riding into the courtyard with a letter for her! She had bribed half the urchins who loitered by the mairie in Sezanne to rush to her hot-foot with anything that came.