of white tiled lavatory beyond. She
followed him.

"My God," he said, "yes. He's taken his toothbrush and his sleeping
draught.... You know he tried to get leave yesterday and they wouldn't
give it him?"

"No. That makes it simply awful."

"Pretty awful."

"Billy--we must get him back."

"I--I don't know about that. He isn't much good, is he? I think we'd
better let him go."

"Don't you see how awful it'll be for the Corps?"

"The Corps? Does that matter? McClane would take us all on to-morrow."

"I mean for _us_. You and me and Gwinnie. He's our Corps, and we're it."

"Sharlie--with the Germans coming into Ghent do you honestly believe
anybody'll remember what he did or didn't do?"

"Yes. We're going to stick on with the Belgian Army. It'll be remembered
against _us_. Besides, it'll kill his father."

"He'll do that any way. He's rotten through and through."

"No. He was splendid in the beginning. He might be splendid some day
again. But if we let him go off and do this he's done for."

"He's done for anyhow. Isn't it better to recognize that he's rotten?
McClane wouldn't have him. He saw what he was."

"He didn't see him at Berlaere. He _was_ splendid there."

"My dear child, don't you know why? He didn't see there was any danger.
He was too stupid to see it."

"I saw it."

"You're not stupid."

"He did see it at the end."

"At the end, yes--When he let you go back for the guns."

She remembered. She remembered his face, the little beads of sweat
glittering. He couldn't help that.

"Look here, from the time he realised the danger, did he go out or did he
stay under cover?"

She didn't answer.

"There," he said, "you see."

"Oh, Billy, won't you leave him one shred?"

"No. Not one shred."

Yet, even now, if he could only be splendid--If he could only be it! Why
shouldn't Billy leave him one shred? After all, he didn't know all the
awful things John had done; and she would never tell him.... He did know
two things, the two things she didn't know. She had got to know them. The
desire that urged her to the completion of her knowledge pursued her now.
She would possess him in her mind if in no other way.

"Billy--do you remember that day at Melle, when John lost me? Did you
tell him I was going back with you?"

"No. I didn't."

Then he _had_ left her. And he had lied to both of them.

"Was the boy dead or alive when he left him?"

"He was alive all right. We could have saved him."