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Page 3
"I think France could afford to take him back," he said, "and risk any
demands he might make or enforce."
"John," said Lannes, "you've fought with us and suffered with us, and so
you're one of us. You understand what I felt this morning when on the
edge of Paris I heard the German guns. They say that we can fight on,
after our foes have taken the capital, and that the English will come in
greater force to help us. But if victorious Germans march once through
the Arc de Triomphe I shall feel that we can never again win back all
that we have lost."
A note, low but deep and menacing, came from the far horizon. It might
be a German gun or it might be a French gun, but the effect was the
same. The threat was there. A shudder shook the frame of Lannes, but
John saw a sudden flame of sunlight shoot like a glittering lance from
the Arc de Triomphe.
"A sign! a sign!" he exclaimed, his imaginative mind on fire in an
instant. "I saw a flash from the arch! It was the soul of the Great
Captain speaking! I tell you, Philip, the Republic is not yet lost! I've
read somewhere, and so have you, that the Romans sold at auction at a
high price the land on which Hannibal's victorious army was camped, when
it lay before Rome!"
"It's so! And France has her glorious traditions, too! We won't give up
until we're beaten--and not then!"
The gray eyes of Lannes flamed, and his figure seemed to swell. All the
wonderful French vitality was personified in him. He put his hand
affectionately upon the shoulder of his comrade.
"It's odd, John," he said, "but you, a foreigner, have lighted the spark
anew in me."
"Maybe it's because I _am_ a foreigner, though, in reality, I'm now no
foreigner at all, as you've just said. I've become one of you."
"It's true, John, and I won't forget it. I'm never going to give up hope
again. Maybe somebody will arrive to save us at the last. Whatever the
great one, whose greatest monument stands there, may have been, he loved
France, and his spirit may descend upon Frenchmen."
"I believe it. He had the strength and courage created by a republic,
and you have them again, the product of another republic. Look at the
flying men, Lannes!"
Lannes glanced up where the aeroplanes hovered thick over Paris, and
toward the horizon where the invisible German host with its huge guns
was advancing. The look of despair came into his eyes again, but it
rested there only a moment. He remembered his new courage and banished
it.
"Perhaps I ought to be in the sky myself with the others," he said, "but
I'd only see what I don't like to see. The _Arrow_ and I can't be of any
help now."
"You brought me here in the _Arrow_, Lannes," said John, seeking to
assume a light tone. "Now what do you intend to do with me? As everybody
is leaving Paris you ought to get me out of it."
"I hardly know what to do. There are no orders. I've lost touch with the
commander of our flying corps, but you're right in concluding that we
shouldn't remain in Paris. Now where are we to go?"
"We'll make no mistake if we seek the battle front. You know I'm bound
to rejoin my company, the Strangers, if I can. I must report as soon as
possible to Captain Colton."
"That's true, John, but I can't leave Paris until tomorrow. I may have
orders to carry, I must obtain supplies for the _Arrow_, and I wish to
visit once more my people on the other side of the Seine."
"Suppose you go now, and I'll meet you this afternoon in the Place de
l'Op�ra."
"Good. Say three o'clock. The first to arrive will await the other
before the steps of the Opera House?"
John nodded assent and Lannes hurried away. Young Scott followed his
figure with his eyes until it disappeared in the crowd. A back may be an
index to a man's strength of mind, and he saw that Lannes, head erect
and shoulders thrown back, was walking with a rapid and springy step.
Courage was obviously there.
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