But now her surroundings were khaki, and her background was the wonderful Flemish view from the windows--miles and miles of country, (p.

034) with the old sausage balloons floating sleepily in the distance.
I must have looked at Madame Blanche a lot--perhaps too much.

I remember she used to smile at me; but that was as far as our friendship could get--smiles, as I only knew about ten words of French, and she less of English.
But one day she surprised me, and left me thinking and wondering more of the strange, unbelievable things that happen to one in this world.
It was after lunch one Sunday: I had just got back to my room to work when there was a knock on the door, and in walked Madame Blanche, who, after much trouble to us both, I gathered wished me to go for a walk with her.

Impossible! I, a major, a Field Officer, to walk at large through the streets of Cassel, 2nd Army H.Q., with a serving-girl from the "Hotel Sauvage"! I succeeded in explaining this after some time; and then, to my amazement, she broke down and wept.

The convulsive sobbing continued, and I thought and wondered, and in the end decided that I was crazy to make a woman weep because I would not go for a walk with her.