War Office, and how should you know what is in the
mind of your chiefs?"

"Well, as it happens, I know a good deal," I answered. "Don't fret, for
we shall certainly get a move on soon."

"Soon! Next year may seem soon to some people."

"It's not next year."

"Must we wait another month?"

"Not even that."

She squeezed my hand in hers. "Oh, my darling boy, you have brought such
joy to my heart! What suspense I shall live in now! I think a week of
it would kill me."

"Well, perhaps it won't even be a week."

"And tell me," she went on, in her coaxing voice, "tell me just one
thing, Jack. Just one, and I will trouble you no more. Is it our brave
French soldiers who advance? Or is it your splendid Tommies? With whom
will the honour lie?"

"With both."

"Glorious!" she cried. "I see it all. The attack will be at the point
where the French and British lines join. Together they will rush forward
in one glorious advance."

"No," I said. "They will not be together."

"But I understood you to say--of course, women know nothing of such
matters, but I understood you to say that it would be a joint advance."

"Well, if the French advanced, we will say, at Verdun, and the British
advanced at Ypres, even if they were hundreds of miles apart it would
still be a joint advance."

"Ah, I see," she cried, clapping her hands with delight. "They would
advance at both ends of the line, so that the Boches would not know which
way to send their reserves."

"That is exactly the idea--a real advance at Verdun, and an enormous
feint at Ypres."

Then suddenly a chill of doubt seized me. I can remember how I sprang
back from her and looked hard into her face. "I've told you too much!" I
cried. "Can I trust you? I have been mad to say so much."

She was bitterly hurt by my words. That I should for a moment doubt her
was more than she could bear. "I would cut my tongue out, Jack, before I
would tell any human being one word of what you have said." So earnest
was she that my fears died away. I felt that I could trust her utterly.
Before we had reached Radchurch I had put the matter from my mind, and we
were lost in our joy of the present and in our plans for the future.

I had a business message to deliver to Colonel Worral, who commanded a
small camp at Pedley-Woodrow. I went there and was away for about two
hours. When I returned I inquired for Miss Garnier, and was told by the
maid that she had gone