He laughed as he said, "Odd how near a chap
comes to going out, and yet lives to drink tea with you. Well, good-bye
and good luck if I don't see you again."
And off he marched, and I went into the library and sat down and sat
very still.
It was not more than half an hour after Captain Edwards left that the
corporal came in to ask me if I had a window in the roof. I told him
that there was, and he asked if he might go up. I led the way, picking
up my glasses as I went. He explained, as we climbed the two flights of
stairs, that the aeroplane had reported a part of the Germans they were
hunting "not a thousand feet from this house." I opened the skylight.
He scanned in every direction. I knew he would not see anything, and he
did not. But he seemed to like the view, could command the roads that
his posse was guarding, so he sat on the window ledge and talked. The
common soldier is far fonder of talking than his officer and apparently
he knows more. If he doesn't, he thinks he does. So he explained to me
the situation as the "men saw it." I remembered what Captain Edwards had
told me, but I listened all the same.
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