to this? Isn't it an awfully hopeless sort of
life?

GIRL. Yees, it ees. You haf been wounded?

YOUNG OFF. Just out of hospital to-day.

GIRL. The horrible war--all the misery is because of the war. When
will it end?

YOUNG OFF. [Leaning against the window-sill, looking at her
attentively] I say, what nationality are you?

GIRL. [With a quick look and away] Rooshian.

YOUNG OFF. Really! I never met a Russian girl. [The GIRL gives him
another quick look] I say, is it as bad as they make out?

GIRL. [Slipping her hand through his arm] Not when I haf anyone as
ni-ice as you; I never haf had, though. [She smiles, and her smile,
like her speech, is slow and confining] You stopped because I was
sad, others stop because I am gay. I am not fond of men at all.
When you know--you are not fond of them.

YOUNG OFF. Well, you hardly know them at their best, do you? You
should see them in the trenches. By George! They're simply
splendid--officers and men, every blessed soul. There's never been
anything like it--just one long bit of jolly fine self-sacrifice;
it's perfectly amazing.

GIRL. [Turning her blue-grey eyes on him] I expect you are not the
last at that. You see in them what you haf in yourself, I think.

YOUNG OFF. Oh, not a bit; you're quite out! I assure you when we
made the attack where I got wounded there wasn't a single man in my
regiment who wasn't an absolute hero. The way they went in--never
thinking of themselves--it was simply ripping.

GIRL. [In a queer voice] It is the same too, perhaps, with--the
enemy.

YOUNG OFF. Oh, yes! I know that.

GIRL. Ah! You are not a mean man. How I hate mean men!

YOUNG OFF. Oh! they're not mean really--they simply don't
understand.

GIRL. Oh! You are a babee--a good babee aren't you?

[The YOUNG OFFICER doesn't like this, and frowns. The GIRL
looks a little scared.]

GIRL. [Clingingly] But I li-ke you for it. It is so good to find a
ni-ice man.

YOUNG OFF. [Abruptly] About being lonely? Haven't you any Russian
friends?

GIRL. [Blankly] Rooshian? No. [Quickly] The town is so beeg.
Were you at the concert before you spoke to me?

YOUNG OFF. Yes.

GIRL. I too. I lofe music.

YOUNG OFF. I suppose all Russians do.

GIRL. [With another quick look tat him] I go there always when I
haf the money.

YOUNG OFF. What! Are you as badly on the rocks as that?

GIRL. Well, I haf just one shill