To Marie this was not impertinence, but gallantry.

This was a language she understood, and this was the type of man,
because he was the least difficult to manage, she held most in contempt.

"But about you, Paul did not deceive me," she retorted. In apparent
confusion her eyes refused to meet his. "He told me 'Pierrot' was a most
dangerous man!"

She continued hurriedly. With wifely solicitude she asked concerning
Paul. She explained that for a week she had been a prisoner in the
château, and, since the mobilization, of her husband save that he was
with his regiment in Paris she had heard nothing. Captain Thierry was
able to give her later news. Only the day previous, on the boulevards,
he had met Count d'Aurillac. He was at the Grand Hôtel, and as Thierry
was at once motoring back to Paris he would give Paul news of their
meeting. He hoped he might tell him that soon his wife also would be in
Paris. Marie explained that only the illness of her aunt prevented her
from that same day joining her husband. Her manner became serious.

"And what other news have you?" she asked. "Here on the firing-line we
know less of what is going forward than you in Paris."

So Pierre Thierry told her all he knew. They were preparing despatches
he was at once to carry back to the General Staff, and, for the moment,
his time was his own. How could he better employ it than in talking of
the war with a patriotic and charming French woman?

In consequence Marie acquired a mass of facts, gossip, and guesses. From
these she mentally selected such information as, to her employers across