She
wanted to read it again to tell its contents to somebody with that
irresistible impulse which forestalls confession.

It was a letter which her brother had sent her from the Vosges. In it
he spoke of Laurier more than of himself. They belonged to different
batteries, but were in the same division and had taken part in the
same combats. The officer was filled with admiration for his former
brother-in-law. Who could have guessed that a future hero was hidden
within that silent and tranquil engineer! . . . But he was a genuine
hero, just the same! All the officials had agreed with Marguerite's
brother on seeing how calmly he fulfilled his duty, facing death with
the same coolness as though he were in his factory near Paris.

He had asked for the dangerous post of lookout, slipping as near as
possible to the enemy's lines in order to verify the exactitude of the
artillery discharge, rectifying it by telephone. A German shell had
demolished the house on the roof of which he was concealed, and Laurier,
on crawling out unhurt from the ruins, had readjusted his telephone and
gone tranquilly on, continuing the same work in the shelter of a nearby
grove. His battery, picked out by the enemy's aeroplanes, had received
the concentrated fire of the artillery opposite. In a few minutes all
the force were rolling on the ground--the captain and many soldiers
dead, officers wounded and almost all the gunners. There only remained
as chief, Laurier, the Impassive (as his comrades nicknamed him), and
aided by the few artillerymen still on their feet, he continued
firing under a rain of iron and fire, so as to cover the retreat of a
battalion.

"He has been mentioned twice in dispatches," Marguerite continued
reading. "I do not believe that it will be long before they give him the
cross. He is valiant in every way. Who would have supposed all this a
few weeks ago?" . . .

She did not share the general astonishment. Living with Laurier had
many times shown her the intrepidity of his character, the fearlessness
concealed under that placid exterior. On that account, her instincts had
warned her against rousing her husband's wrath in the first days of
her infidelity. She still remembered the way he looked the night he
surprised her leaving Julio's home. His was the passion that kills, and,
nevertheless, he had not attempted the least violence with her. . . .
The memory of his consideration was awakening in Marguerite a sentiment
of gra