rs, will you? Cheerio."

"Let's go round by the lower road, skipper," said Mackay. "We can look
in at that toppin' little pub--what's its name, Croix something?--and
besides, the surface is capital down there."

"And see Marie, eh? But don't forget you've got a padre aboard."

"Oh, he's all right, and if he's going to be out here, it's time he knew
Marie."

Graham laughed. "Carry on," he said. "It's all one to me where we go,
skipper."

He lay back more comfortably than ever, and the big car leaped forward
through the forest, ever descending towards the river level. Soon the
trees thinned, and they were skirting ploughed fields. Presently they ran
through a little village, where a German prisoner straightened himself
from his work in a garden and saluted. Then through a wood which suddenly
gave a vista of an avenue to a stately house, turreted in the French
style, a quarter of a mile away; then over a little stream; then round a
couple of corners, past a dreamy old church, and a long immemorial wall,
and so out into the straight road along the river. The sun gleamed on the
water, and there were ships in view, a British and a couple of Norwegian
tramps, ploughing slowly down to the sea. On the far bank the level of
the land was low, but on this side only some narrow apple-orchards and
here and there lush water-meadows separated them from the hills.

The Croix de Guerre stood back from the road in a long garden just where
a forest bridle-path wound down through a tiny village to the main road.
Their chauffeur backed the car all but out of sight into this path after
they climbed out, and the three of them made for a sidedoor in a high
wall. Harold opened it and walked in. The pretty trim little garden had
a few flowers in bloom, so sheltered was it, and Mackay picked a red
rosebud as they walked up the path.

Harold led the way without ceremony into a parlour that opened off a
verandah, and, finding it empty, opened a door beyond. "Marie! Marie!"
he called.

"Ah, Monsieur le Capitaine, I come," came a girl's voice, and Marie
entered. Peter noticed how rapidly she took them all in, and how cold
were the eyes that nevertheless sparkled and greeted Harold and Mackay
with seeming gaiety. She was short and dark and not particularly
good-looking, but she had all the vivacity and charm of the French.

"Oh, monsieur, where have you been for so long? I thought you had
forgotten La Croix de Guerre altogether. It's the two