"I don't know if you two are aware that you are positively indecent," said Tommy. "Let's change the subject. What's your news, Captain Graham?" Peter smiled in the dark to himself. "Well," he said, "not much, but I'm hoping for leave soon. I've pushed in for it, and our Adjutant told me this morning he thought it would go through." "Lucky man! I've got to wait three months. But yours ought to be about now, Julie." "I think it ought," said Julie shortly. Then: "What about the menu-cards, Peter? Would you like me to help you choose them?" "Would you?" said he eagerly. "To-morrow?" "I'm on duty at five o'clock, but I can get off for an hour in the afternoon. Could you come, Tommy?" "No. Sorry; but I must write letters. I haven't written one for ages." "Nor have I," said Julie, "but I don't mean to. I hate letters. Well, what about it, Peter?" "I should think we had better try that stationer's in the Rue Thiers," he said. "If that won't do, the Nouvelles Galeries might. What do you think?" "Let's try the Galeries first. We could meet there. Say at three, eh? I want to get some baby-ribbon, too." Tommy sighed audibly. "She's off again," she said. "Thank God, here's the hospital! Good-night, Captain Graham. You mustn't cross the Rubicon to-night." "You oughtn't to swear before him," said Julie in mock severity. "And what in the world is the Rubicon?" "Materially, to-night, it's the railway-line between his camp and the hospital," said Tommy Raynard. "What else it is I'll leave him to decide." She held out her hand, and Peter saw a quizzical look on her face. He turned rather hopelessly to Julie. "I say," he said, "didn't you _know_ it was my afternoon at the hospital?" "Yes," said Julie, "and I knew you didn't come. At least, I couldn't see you in any of the wards." "Oh," he exclaimed, "I thought you'd been out all the afternoon. I'm sorry. I am a damned fool, Julie!" She laughed in the darkness. "I've known worse, Peter," she said, and was gone. * * * * * Next day Julie was in her most provocative of moods. Peter, eminently respectable in his best tunic, waited ten minutes for her outside the Nouvelles Galeries, and, like most men in his condition, considered that she was never coming, and that he was the cynosure of neighbouring eyes. When she did come, she was not apparently aware that she was late. She ran her eyes over him, and gave a pretended gasp of surprise. "You're looking wonderful, Padre Graham," she said. "Really, you're hard to live up to. I never know what to expect or how to behave. Those black buttons terrorise me. Come on." She insisted on getting her ribbon first, and turned over everything there was to be seen at that counter. The French girl who served them was highly amused. "Isn't that chic?" Julie demanded of Peter, holding up a lacy camisole and deliberately putting it to her shoulders. "Wouldn't you love to see me in it?" "I would," he said, without the ghost of a smile.