"May I ask your name, Madame?" John asked politely.
"Poiret," she said. "My man is Jules Poiret, and this farm has been in his family since the great revolution. You and your comrade came from the air, as I saw, and you can tell us, can you not, whether the Poiret farm is to become German or remain French? The enemy has been pushed back today, but will he come so near to Paris again? Tell me truly, on your soul, Monsieur!"
"I don't believe the Germans will ever again be so near to Paris," replied John with sincerity. "My friend, who is the great Philip Lannes, the flying man, and I, have looked down upon a battle line fifty, maybe a hundred miles long, and nearly everywhere the Germans are retreating."
She bent her head a little as she poured the coffee for them, but not enough to hide the glitter in her eye. "Perhaps the good God intervened at the last moment, as Father Hansard promised he would," she said calmly. "At any rate, the Germans are gone. I gathered as much from chance words of the generals--never before have so many generals gathered under the Poiret roof, and it will never happen again--but I wished to hear it from one who had seen with his own eyes."
"We saw them withdrawing, Madame, with these two pairs of eyes of ours," said Lannes.
"And then Poiret can go back to his work with the vines. Whether it is war or peace, men must eat and drink, Monsieur."
"But certainly, Madame, and women too." "It is so. I trust that soon the Germans will be driven back much faster. The house quivers all the time. It is old and already several pieces of plaster have fallen."
Her anxiety was obvious. With the Germans driven back she thought now of the Poiret homestead. John, in the new strength that had come to him from food and drink, had forgotten for the moment that ceaseless quiver of the earth. He held the little bottle aloft and poured a thin stream of wine into his glass. The red thread swayed gently from side to side.
"You speak truly, Madame," he said. "The rocking goes on, but I'm sure that the concussion of the guns will be too far away tonight for you to feel it."
They offered her gold for the food and wine, but after one longing glance she steadfastly refused it.