. . . I, too, will go tomorrow if I
can."
Why remain longer in Paris? His family was away. His father, according
to Argensola's investigations, also had gone off without saying whither.
Now Marguerite's mysterious flight was leaving him entirely alone, in a
solitude that was filling him with remorse.
That afternoon, when strolling through the boulevards, he had stumbled
across a friend considerably older than himself, an acquaintance in the
fencing club which he used to frequent. This was the first time they had
met since the beginning of the war, and they ran over the list of their
companions in the army. Desnoyers' inquiries were answered by the older
man. So-and-so? . . . He had been wounded in Lorraine and was now in
a hospital in the South. Another friend? . . . Dead in the Vosges.
Another? . . . Disappeared at Charleroi. And thus had continued the
heroic and mournful roll-call. The others were still living, doing brave
things. The members of foreign birth, young Poles, English residents in
Paris and South Americans, had finally enlisted as volunteers. The club
might well be proud of its young men who had practised arms in times of
peace, for now they were all jeopardizing their existence at the front.
Desnoyers turned his face away as though he feared to meet in the eyes
of his friend, an ironical and questioning expression.
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