you." "It is quite true," said Eugene to me, "I hate seeing animals killed." "Nonsense," said Master Silvain. "Animals are made to feed us just as wood is made to warm us." Eugene turned away a little, as though he were ashamed of his weakness. His shoulders were thin, and his neck was as round as Martine's. Master Silvain used to say that he was the living portrait of their mother. I had never seen Eugene angry. He hummed songs all day long. In the evening he used to come back from the fields sitting sideways on one of the oxen, and he nearly always sang the same song. It was the story of a soldier, who went back to the war after he had learned that the girl he had been engaged to marry had married another man. He used to dwell on the refrain, which finished like this-- And when a bullet comes and takes Away my precious life, You'll know I died because you were Another fellow's wife.[1] Pauline always used to treat Eugene with much respect. She could never understand my freedom with him. The first evening that she saw me sitting next to him on the bench outside the door she made signs to me to come in. But Eugene called me back, saying, "Come and listen to the wood owl." We often used to be sitting on the bench, still, when everybody had gone to bed. The wood owl came quite near to an old elm tree which was by the door, and we used to think that it was saying "good night" to us. Then it would fly away, its great wings passing over us in silence. Sometimes a voice would sing on the hillside. I used to tremble when I heard it. The full voice coming out of the night reminded me of Colette. Eugene would get up to go in when the voice stopped singing, but I always used to stop, hoping to hear it again. Then he would say, "Come along in: it is all over." [1] Quand par un tour de maladresse Un boulet m'emportera Allons adieu chere maitresse Je m'en vais dans les combats. And now that the winter was with us again, and we could no longer sit on the bench by the door, there seemed to be a sort of secret understanding between us. Whenever he was making fun of anybody, his queer little eyes used to look for mine, and whenever he gave an opinion he used to turn to me as though he expected me to approve or disapprove. It seemed to me that I had always known him, and deep down in my thoughts I used to call him my big brother. He was always asking Pauline if she was pleased with me. Pauline said that there was no need to tell him the same thing, over and over again. The only thing she reproached me with was that I had no system in my work. She used to say that I was just as likely to begin at the end of it as at the beginning. I had not forgotten Sister Marie-Aimee, but I was no longer as sick with longing for her as I used to be. And I was happy on the farm.