“But you will not refuse it?” queried the priest gently. “It is not good to refuse the request of one old enough to be your father. Look, I have here some excellent tobacco and cigarette-papers. Let us sit down and smoke together. I will tell you who I am and the purpose that brought me here.” The soldier yielded grudgingly, not knowing what else to do. They sat down on a mossy bank beside the spring, and while the blue smoke of their cigarettes went drifting under the little trees the priest began: “My name is Antoine Courcy. I am the cure of Darney, a village among the Reaping Hook Hills, a few leagues south from here. For twenty-five years I have reaped the harvest of heaven in that blessed little field. I am sorry to leave it. But now this war, this great battle for freedom and the life of France, calls me. It is a divine vocation. France has need of all her sons to-day, even the old ones. I cannot keep the love of God in my heart unless I follow the love of country in my life. My younger brother, who used to be the priest of the next parish to mine, was in the army. He has fallen. I am going to replace him. I am on my way to join the troops--as a chaplain, if they will; if not, then as a private. I must get into the army of France or be left out of the host of heaven.” The soldier had turned his face away and was plucking the lobes from a frond of fern. “A brave resolve, Father,” he said, with an ironic note. “But you have not yet told me what brings you off your road, to this place.” “I will tell you,” replied the priest eagerly; “it is the love of Jeanne d'Arc, the Maid who saved France long ago. You know about her?” “A little,” nodded the soldier. “I have learned in the school. She was a famous saint.” “Not yet a saint,” said the priest earnestly; “the Pope has not yet pronounced her a saint. But it will be done soon. Already he has declared her among the Blessed Ones. To me she is the most blessed of all. She never thought of herself or of a saint's crown. She gave her life entire for France. And this is the place that she came from! Think of that--right here!” “I did not know that,” said the soldier.