"Shut up, Major!" cut in Jenks. "Remember the padre."

"Oh, he's broad-minded I know, aren't you, padre? By the way, did you
ever meet old Drennan who was up near Poperinghe with the Canadians? He
was a sport, I can tell you. Mind you, a real good chap at his job, but a
white man. Pluck! By jove! I don't think that chap had nerves. I saw him
one day when they were dropping heavy stuff on the station, and he was
getting some casualties out of a Red Cross train. A shell burst just down
the embankment, and his two orderlies ducked for it under the carriage,
but old Drennan never turned a hair. 'Better have a fag,' he said to the
Scottie he was helping. 'It's no use letting Fritz put one off one's
smoke.'"

Peter said he had not met him, but could not think of anything else to
say at the moment, except that he was just going out for the first time.

"You don't say?" said Donovan dryly.

"Wish I was!" ejaculated Jenks.

"Good chap," replied the Major. "Pity more of your sort don't come over.
When I was up at Loos, September last year, we didn't see a padre in
three months. Then they put on a little chap--forget his name--who used
to bike over when we were in rest billets. But he wasn't much use."

"I was in hospital seven weeks and never saw one," said Jenks.

"Good heavens!" said Graham. "But I've been trying to get out for
all these years, and I was always told that every billet was taken
and that there were hundreds on the waiting list. Last December the
Chaplain-General himself showed me a list of over two hundred names."

"Don't know where they get to, then, do you, Bevan?" asked Jenks.

"No," said the Major, "unless they keep 'em at the base."

"Plenty down at Rouen, anyway," said Donovan. "A sporting little blighter
I met at the Brasserie Opera told me he hadn't anything to do, anyway."

"I shall be a padre in the next war," said Jenks, stretching out his
legs. "A parade on Sunday, and you're finished for the week. No orderly
dog, no night work, and plenty of time for your meals. Padres can always
get leave too, and they always come and go by Paris."

Donovan laughed, and glanced sideways at Peter. "Stow it, Jenks," he
said. "Where you for, padre?" he asked.

"I've got to report at Rouen," said Peter. "I was wondering if you were
there."

"No such luck now," returned the other. "But it's a jolly place. Jenko's
there. Get him to take you out to Duclair. You can get roast duck at a
pub there that melt