"Pauline," he said gravely, laying his hand upon her arm, "you must not stay here. Listen! The regiment on our left extends to the head of the ravine. The orders I received this morning left me to choose on which side of the ravine I should place my trenches. We advance no further. We are only a screen, but the screen must be maintained, must not be risked. I am obliged to choose the other side of the ravine. We shall almost certainly be attacked. I do not know when--nothing is known. But you would be in danger. You must leave this afternoon, go right back--to Amiens, Paris." She checked an impulse to quick speech, smiled at him. "Mon ami, I was almost unjust to you----" "You will go?" She shook her head. "No, cher ami, I remain with you." "But if we are attacked and have to retire to the other side of the ravine? You cannot remain in the trenches." "No. I should remain in my house until you advance again." She turned an appealing, coquettish glance upon him. "Should I be something to fight for?" She checked his protestations. "No, cher ami, I know all your arguments. They are useless. What did you say last night?--What if we have only to-day to live?" Her voice sank, her eyes dropped. "Cher ami, I want not a moment that your duty claims,--but those others, those precious little instants, can you not accept me in them? So little time is ours, _cher_!" The horses had drawn close together. He put his right arm round her waist. She leaned back, face upturned. Their eyes met in a long deep look. Their mouths approached, were one. The flame of life burned high in them. Their horses' ears quivered to a louder roar of the distant guns. Slowly they rode home together, by an easier, more roundabout path she showed him. All that day those of the regiment not required for outposts laboured hard at the new entrenchments on the high, western edge of the ravine--a long, long line of delving men. Ranges were marked out; reserves of ammunition, food and water carried up. The energising source of all this activity, the colonel, laboured also, without haste and without rest. His brain worked quickly, coolly, definite in its decisions. She, his companion, unobtrusively at hand when required for information or material of defence, vanished unnoticed when her presence might become importunate. She quenched her personality, transfused, she felt, her life-force into him as he worked, an emotionless intellect. With his chefs-de-bataillon he elaborated plans of defence; nothing was left to chance; nothing could be misunderstood. Personally he supervised, corrected, the siting of the trenches, the emplacements of the mitrailleuses. In the afternoon he rode over to the colonel of the adjoining regiment, concerted arrangements. From the général de brigade he obtained the promise of a battery in support on the morrow.