Walters had vanished. Andrews was alone again, staring at the grey ashes. Suddenly he jumped to his feet and hurried off towards headquarters. In the anteroom to the colonel's office he waited a long while, looking at his boots that were thickly coated with mud. “Those boots will make a bad impression; those boots will make a bad impression,” a voice was saying over and over again inside of him. A lieutenant was also waiting to see the colonel, a young man with pink cheeks and a milky-white forehead, who held his hat in one hand with a pair of khaki-colored kid gloves, and kept passing a hand over his light well-brushed hair. Andrews felt dirty and ill-smelling in his badly-fitting uniform. The sight of this perfect young man in his whipcord breeches, with his manicured nails and immaculately polished puttees exasperated him. He would have liked to fight him, to prove that he was the better man, to outwit him, to make him forget his rank and his important air.... The lieutenant had gone in to see the colonel. Andrews found himself reading a chart of some sort tacked up on the wall. There were names and dates and figures, but he could not make out what it was about. “All right! Go ahead,” whispered the orderly to him; and he was standing with his cap in his hand before the colonel who was looking at him severely, fingering the papers he had on the desk with a heavily veined hand. Andrews saluted. The colonel made an impatient gesture. “May I speak to you, Colonel, about the school scheme?” “I suppose you've got permission from somebody to come to me.” “No, sir.” Andrews's mind was struggling to find something to say. “Well, you'd better go and get it.” “But, Colonel, there isn't time; the travel orders are being made out at this minute. I've heard that there's been a name crossed out on the list.” “Too late.” “But, Colonel, you don't know how important it is. I am a musician by trade; if I can't get into practice again before being demobilized, I shan't be able to get a job.... I have a mother and an old aunt dependent on me. My family has seen better days, you see, sir. It's only by being high up in my profession that I can earn enough to give them what they are accustomed to. And a man in your position in the world, Colonel, must know what even a few months of study in Paris mean to a pianist.” The colonel smiled. “Let's see your application,” he said. Andrews handed it to him with a trembling hand. The colonel made a few marks on one corner with a pencil. “Now if you can get that to the sergeant-major in time to have your name included in the orders, well and good.” Andrews saluted, and hurried out. A sudden feeling of nausea had come over him. He was hardly able to control a mad desire to tear the paper up. “The sons of bitches... the sons of bitches,” he muttered to himself. Still he ran all the way to the square, isolated building where the regimental office was.