He shook himself. Reflections like these were for men of middle years.
The tide of his own youth flowed back upon him and the world, even under
snow and with stray guns thundering behind him, was full of splendor.
Moreover, there was the village of Chastel before him! Chastel! Chastel!
He had never heard of it until two or three days ago, and yet it now
loomed in his mind as large as Paris or New York. Julie must have
arrived already, and he would see her again after so many months of
hideous war, but deep down in his mind persisted the belief that she
should not have come. Lannes must have had some reason that he could not
surmise, or he would not have written the letter asking her to meet him
at Chastel.
The village, he learned from one of the men in the automobile, was only
ten miles away and it was built upon a broad, low hill at the base of
which a little river flowed. It was very ancient. A town of the Belgae
stood there in Caesar's time, but it contained not more than two thousand
inhabitants, and its chief feature was a very beautiful Gothic
cathedral.
John's automobile could have reached Chastel in less than an hour,
despite the snow and the slush, but the train of the wounded was
compelled to move slowly, and he must keep with it. Meanwhile he scanned
the sky with powerful glasses, which he had been careful to secure after
his escape from Auersperg.
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