of English manufacture. Only French eyes like wee Pierre's could have
seen it pinned there hidden over his heart. I think he wore it to give
him a large courage for his mission that meant bread or starvation to
so many of his people.

"Ah, Monsieur le Capitaine," I said to him with a softness of tears in
my throat, "I would that there was some little thing that I might do
to serve France. I do so long to go into those awful trenches with
that red cross on my arm, as it is not permitted to me to carry a gun,
which I can use much better than many men now handling them with
bullets against the enemy; but it is necessary that I obey the
commands of my soldier father and take to a safety the small Pierre."
And as we spoke he walked beside me to the prow of the large ship so
that to us was a view of the heavens of blue beyond which lay our
America.

"My child, there is a great service which you can render France," he
answered me as we stopped to watch the great white waves flung aside
from the ship. "France needs friends in America, great powerful
friends who will help her in contracting for food and all other
munitions. A beautiful woman can do much in winning those friends. You
go to your uncle, who is one of those in power in a State in that
fruitful valley of the Mississippi from which I hope that my
lieutenant, Count de Bourdon, whom I sent on that mission, will get
many mules to carry food to the hungry boys in the trenches when mud
is too deep for gasoline. Make of him and everyone your friend and
through you the friend of our struggling country. Tell them of France,
laugh with them for the joy to come when France, all France, with
Alsace and beautiful Lorraine, is free; and make them weep with you
for her struggles. Who knows but that through you may come some