“But forgiveness? Can you give that to me--a coward?”
“You are no coward. Your only fault was to doubt a brave man.”
“And my wife? May I go back and tell her?”
“No, surely. Would you make her hear slander of the man she loves? Be what she believes you and she will be satisfied.”
“And the absolution, the word of peace? Will you speak that to me?”
Her eyes shone more clearly; the voice sounded sweeter and steadier than ever. “After the penance comes the absolution. You will find peace only at the lance's point. Son of France, go, go, go! I will help you. Go hardily to Verdun.”
Pierre sprang forward after the receding figure, tried to clasp the knee, the foot of the Maid. As he fell to the ground something sharp pierced his hand. It must be her spur, thought he.
Then he was aware that his eyes were shut. He opened them and looked at his hand carefully. There was only a scratch on it, and a tiny drop of blood. He had torn it on the thorns of the wild gooseberry-bushes.
His head lay close to the clear pool of the spring. He buried his face in it and drank deep. Then he sprang up, shaking the drops from his mustache, found his cap and pistol, and hurried up the glen toward the old Roman road.
“No more of that damned foolishness about Switzerland,” he said, aloud. “I belong to France. I am going with the other boys to save her. I was born for that.” He took off his cap and stood still for a moment. He spoke as if he were taking an oath. “By Jeanne d'Arc!”
It never occurred to Pierre Duval, as he trudged those long kilometres toward the front, that he was doing a penance.
The joy of a mind made up is a potent cordial.
The greetings of comrades on the road put gladness into his heart and strength into his legs.
It was a hot and dusty journey, and a sober one. But it was not a sad one. He was going toward that for which he was born. He was doing that which France asked of him, that which God told him to do. Josephine would be glad and proud of him. He would never be ashamed to meet her eyes. As he went, alone or in company with others, he whistled and sang a bit. He thought of _“L'Alouette”_ a good deal. But not too much. He thought also of the forts of Douaumont and Vaux.
_“Dame!”_ he cried to himself. “If I could help to win them back again! That would be fine! How sick that would make those cursed boches and their knock-kneed Crown Prince!”