along all the time, and they'd pay still more, if I wanted. A
dozen!--"

Lamuse hastens to add, "I said 'It's dear,' but still, it'll do, eh,
you others?" On this downright question we record our votes.

"We could do well with a drop to drink," says Lamuse. "Do you sell
wine?"

"No," said the woman, but added, shaking with anger, "You see, the
military authority forces them that's got wine to sell it at fifteen
sous! Fifteen sous! The misery of this cursed war! One loses at it,
at fifteen sous, monsieur. So I don't sell any wine. I've got plenty
for ourselves. I don't say but sometimes, and just to oblige, I
don't allow some to people that one knows, people that knows what
things are, but of course, messieurs, not at fifteen sous."

Lamuse is one of those people "that knows what things are." He grabs
at his water-bottle, which is hanging as usual on his hip. "Give me
a liter of it. That'll be what?"

"That'll be twenty-two sous, same as it cost me. But you know it's
just to oblige you, because you're soldiers."

Barque, losing patience, mutters an aside. The woman throws him a
surly glance, and makes as if to hand Lamuse's bottle back to him.
But Lamuse, launched upon the hope of drinking wine at last, so that
his cheeks redden as if the draught already pervaded them with its
grateful hue, hastens to intervene--