more on the Anglet beach, sad and discomfited.
An airplane capsizes on the sand. What does he care about an
airplane--don't they know that his old passion and dream are dead? Since
August 2 he has not given them a thought. However, he begins a
conversation with the pilot, who is a sergeant. And all at once a new
idea takes possession of him; the old passion revives again under
another form; the dream rises once more.

"How can one enlist in the aviation corps?"

"Arrange it with the captain; go to Pau."

Georges runs at once to the Villa Delphine. His parents no longer
recognize the step and the face of the preceding days; he looks like
their son again; he is saved.

"Father, I want to go to Pau to-morrow."

"Why this trip to Pau?"

"To enlist in the aviation corps. Before the war you wouldn't hear of my
being an aviator, but in war aviation is no longer a sport."

"In war--yes, it is certainly quite another thing."

Next day he reached Pau, where Captain Bernard-Thierry was in command of
the aviation camp. He forced his way through Captain Bernard-Thierry's
door, over the expostulations of the sentries. He explained his case and
pleaded his cause with such fire in his eyes that the officer was dazed
and fascinated. From the tones of the captain's voice, when he referred
to the two successive rejections, Guynemer knew he had made an
impression. As he had done at Stanislas when he wanted to soften some
punishment inflicted by his master, so now he brought every argument to
bear, one after another; but with how much more ardor he made this plea,
for his future was at stake! He bewitched his hearer. And then suddenly
he became a child again, imploring and ready to cry.

"Captain, help me--employ me--employ me at anything, no matter what. Let
me clean those airplanes over there. You are my last resource. It must
be through you that I can do something at last in the war."

The captain reflected gravely. He felt the power hidden in this fragile
body. He could not rebuff a suppliant like this one.

"I can take you as student mechanician."

"That's it, that's it; I understand automobiles."

Guynemer exulted, as Jean Krebs' technical lessons flashed already into
his mind; they would be of great help in his work. The officer gave him
a letter to the recruiting officer at Bayonne, and he went back there
for the third time. This time his name was entered, he was taken, and he
signed a voluntary engagement. This was