He mopped his neck. “Want to tell you--what’s your name again? André Gunion? Can’t get these foreign names. Rotten at languages, but I can judge people. Where’s that old fellow--friend of yours--Vilmer, was it?--who shot the tires off the Nazis?” André had tried to speak several times. Now, he said loudly, “Victor--Lescot.” “Lescot? Lescot? That means green vegetable, doesn’t it?” barked the general. “No? Well, never mind. Congratulate him for me. Found out a lot from those Nazi colonels, we did. Tell you what. We expect the biggest generals we got, here on this bridgehead in a couple of days--Eisenhower, Marshall, Arnold. They’ll be glad to know how you French kids have helped.” He paused for breath. “Well, got to get going. Lieutenant!” Carson emerged from inspecting the bullet holes in the plane, again chattering rapidly. “How are we going to get this boy home, sir? He can’t walk. It’s too far.” The general snorted. “Send him in a jeep, of course--with some new orders for Captain Dobie.” An iron-faced sergeant appeared and saluted. “Oh, there you are, Streukoff,” shouted the general. “Take this boy to Captain Dobie. Boy knows where his command post is, over there somewhere.” He jerked a large thumb toward inland Normandy. At the plane, he called back, “And mind you get a receipt for him.” Carson called to André, “We had fun, eh? Be seeing you,” and opened the throttle. Half an hour later, a jeep bearing André in the front seat, rocketed around a line of trucks and soldiers into André’s own village. He had been busy for some minutes thinking how he was to explain his trip to Captain Dobie. As the jeep rolled down the village street André saw that something unusual had happened. The neighbors were running toward a little gathering of people. His eyes raced over them and stopped. In front of the parish house, worn, gray with fatigue, his clothes dusty and torn, loomed a tall old man. André’s heart stood still. “Father Duprey!” he shouted. CHAPTER FOURTEEN _Father Duprey’s Story_ “My dear boy!” Father Duprey held out his arms. André cleared the space to the parsonage steps as though shot from the jeep. “Did my mother come--my father--Marie?” he cried. He looked up at the priest’s long, bony face, lined with weariness, and halted. The old man’s embrace was kind, but André knew at once that the news he brought was not good. His expression held too much sadness. “The father needs rest,” someone in the crowd of neighbors called out. And Anna, the parsonage housekeeper, bustled from the door. “Come in, come in, André,” she called anxiously. “And bring in the father. I will give you tea. And _then_ you may talk.” [Illustration: _“My dear boy!” Father Duprey held out his arms_] “I must tell you, André,” Father Duprey said, “my news of your family is not too bad. So do not be anxious. However, I do not know where all of them are now. But come into the house.”