She was by no means sore that it was he. The light of a briquet was not precisely searching, and for the most part he had looked like more than one war-worn British officer she had seen during her long residence in Paris.... It was something in the eyes ... she could have vowed they were hazel ... their expression had altered; it was that of a somewhat ironic man of the world, which had changed as she watched them to the piercing alertness of a man of action ... but after ... was it perhaps an emanation of the personality that had so impressed her angry young soul and refused to be obliterated? But what of it? He might be married. Love another woman. All officers and soldiers during the war had looked about eagerly for love, when not already supplied, and given themselves up to it, indifferent as they may have been before.... Life seemed shorter every time they went back to the front. And if not why should he be attracted to her again! He had loved her for a moment when she had been in the first flush of her exquisite youth. That was twelve years ago. She was now thirty. True, thirty, to-day, was but the beginning of a woman's third youth, and a few weeks in the California sunshine and nourished by the California abundance would restore her looks, no doubt of that. But she would look no better as long as she remained in Paris.... Nor did she wish to return to California ... and beyond all question he must have forgotten, lost all interest in her long since. Still--there had been an eager upspringing light in his eyes ... was it recognition? ... merely the passing impulse of flirtation over a match and a briquet? ... No doubt she would never see him again. CHAPTER III I Did she want to? She had gone through many and extraordinary phases during these years of close personal contact with the martial history of Europe, as precisely different from the first twenty-six years of her life as peace from war.