"It is because," the mother continued more quickly, "I have no one to advise me; no help to hope for--under the circumstances. Understand clearly. To whom shall I go? To my husband? He would be furious? He would start to work and we should find that by his influence Jean would be incorporated in a German regiment in a week's time--away in the north or the east. My brother? He would rather insist on my son leaving Alsace. You see, monsieur, you are the only one who can do anything." "What exactly?" "But much. Jean has promised me that he will join the regiment. You can arrange that he shall be received and welcomed, and not discouraged. You can assure him protection, society, comrades--you have known him a long time. You can prevent his giving way to melancholy ideas, and stop him if he were again tempted to carry out such a plan." The lieutenant, much disturbed, frowned, and the expression of his face changed at the last words. Then he said: "Up to the first of October you have your son's promise--after that I will look after him." Then speaking to himself, and again occupied with an idea, which he did not express entirely: "Yes," he said, "very bad--it must not be." Lucienne heard it. "So much the worse," said she. "I betray my brother's secret, but he will forgive me when he knows that I betrayed him to calm mamma. You can be easy, mamma, Jean will not leave Alsace." "Because?" "He loves." "Where then?" "At Alsheim!" "Whom?" "Odile Bastian." Madame Oberlé asked absolutely amazed: "Is it true?" "As true as we are here. He told me everything." The mother closed her eyes, and, choking with halting breath: "God be praised. A little hope rises in my heart. Let me cry--indeed I must!" She pointed to the room, which was also open on the other side of the landing and was lighted by a large bay window, through which a tree could be seen. Farnow bowed, showing Lucienne that he was following her. And the girl moved on ahead, passing through the room where her ancestors had loved Alsace so much. Madame Oberlé turned away; sitting near the window she leaned her head against the panes where as a child she had seen the sleet and the ice form into ferns, and the sun, and the rain, and the vibrating airs of summer-time, and all the land of Alsace. "Odile Bastian! Odile!" repeated the poor woman. The bright face, the smile, the dresses of the young girl, the corner of Alsheim where she lived--a whole poem of beauty and moral health rose in the mother's mind; and with an effort she held to it jealously, in order to forget the other love-affair on account of which she had come here. "Why did not Jean confide in me?" she thought. "This is a kind of compensation for the other. It reassures me. Jean will not leave us, since the strongest of ties binds him to the country. Perhaps we shall succeed in overcoming my husband's obstinacy. I will make him see that the sacrifice we are making, Jean and I, in accepting this German----"