Toward noon Marie met Anfossi in the great drawing-room that stretched the length of the terrace and from the windows of which, through the park gates, they could see the Paris road.

“This, that is passing now,” said Marie, “is the last of our rear-guard.  Go to your tower,” she ordered, “and send word that except for stragglers and the wounded our column has just passed through Neufchelles, and that any moment we expect the French.”  She raised her hand impressively.  “From now,” she warned, “we speak French, we think French, we are French!”

Anfossi, or Briand, as now he called himself, addressed her in that language.  His tone was bitter.  “Pardon my lese-majesty,” he said, “but this chief of your Intelligence Department is a dummer Mensch.  He is throwing away a valuable life.”

Marie exclaimed in dismay.  She placed her hand upon his arm, and the violet eyes filled with concern.

“Not yours!” she protested.

“Absolutely!” returned the Italian.  “I can send nothing by this knapsack wireless that they will not learn from others; from airmen, Uhlans, the peasants in the fields.  And certainly I will be caught.  Dead I am dead, but alive and in Paris the opportunities are unending.  From the French Legion Etranger I have my honorable discharge.  I am an expert wireless operator and in their Signal Corps I can easily find a place.  Imagine me, then, on the Eiffel Tower.  From the air I snatch news from all of France, from the Channel, the North Sea.  You and I could work together, as in Rome.  But here, between the lines, with a pass from a village sous prefet, it is ridiculous.  I am not afraid to die.  But to die because some one else is stupid, that is hard.”

Marie clasped his hand in both of hers.

“You must not speak of death,” she cried; “you know I must carry out my orders, that I must force you to take this risk.  And you know that thought of harm to you tortures me!”

Quickly the young man disengaged his hand.  The woman exclaimed with anger.

“Why do you doubt me?” she cried.

Briand protested vehemently.

“I do not doubt you.”

“My affection, then?” In a whisper that carried with it the feeling of a caress Marie added softly:  “My love?”

The young man protested miserably.  “You make it very hard, mademoiselle,” he cried.  “You are my superior officer, I am your servant.  Who am I that I should share with others—­”

The woman interrupted eagerly.

“Ah, you are jealous!” she cried.  “Is that why you are so cruel?  But when I tell you I love you, and only you, can you not feel it is the truth?”

The young man frowned unhappily.

“My duty, mademoiselle!” he stammered.

With an exclamation of anger Marie left him.  As the door slammed behind her, the young man drew a deep breath.  On his face was the expression of ineffable relief.