“It’s really a lovely watch,” she exclaimed.  “How kind you are!” She rewarded him with a warm kiss.  “I have always wanted a wrist-watch.  And now they are so chic.  In fact, one must have one.”  Moving her arm about, she admired the watch at different angles.

“It isn’t going.  And what’s more, it won’t go,” he said.

“Ah!” she politely murmured.

“No!  But do you know why I give you that watch?”

“Why?”

“Because it is a mascot.”

“True?”

“Absolutely a mascot.  It belonged to a friend of mine who is dead.”

“Ah!  A lady—­”

“No!  Not a lady.  A man.  He gave it me a few minutes before he died—­and he was wearing it—­and he told me to take it off his arm as soon as he was dead.  I did so.”

Christine was somewhat alarmed.

“But if he was wearing it when he died, how can it be a mascot?”

“That was what made it a mascot.  Believe me, I know about these things.  I wouldn’t deceive you, and I wouldn’t tell you it was a mascot unless I was quite certain.”  He spoke with a quiet, initiated authority that reassured her entirely and gave her the most perfect confidence.

“And why was your friend wearing a lady’s watch?”

“I cannot tell you.”

“You do not know?”

“I do not know.  But I know that watch is a mascot.”

“Was it at the Front—­all this?”

The man nodded.

“He was wounded, killed, your friend?”

“No, no, not wounded!  He was in my Battery.  We were galloping some guns to a new position.  He came off his horse—­the horse was shot under him—­he himself fell in front of a gun.  Of course, the drivers dared not stop, and there was no room to swerve.  Hence they had to drive right over him ...  Later, I came back to him.  They had got him as far as the advanced dressing-station.  He died in less than an hour....”

Solemnity fell between Christine and her client.

She said softly:  “But if it is a mascot—­do you not need it, you, at the Front?  It is wrong for me to take it.”

“I have my own mascot.  Nothing can touch me—­except my great enemy, and he is not German.”  With an austere gesture he indicated the glass.  His deep voice was sad, but very firm.  Christine felt that she was in the presence of an adept of mysticism.  The Virgin had sent this man to her, and the man had given her the watch.  Clearly the heavenly power had her in its holy charge.

“Ah, yes!” said the man in a new tone, as if realising the solemnity and its inappropriateness, and trying to dissipate it.  “Ah, yes!  Once we had the day of our lives together, he and I. We got a day off to go and see a new trench mortar, and we did have a time.”

“Trench mortar—­what is that?”

He explained.

“But tell me how it works,” she insisted, not because she had the slightest genuine interest in the technical details of war—­for she had not—­but because she desired to help him to change the mood of the scene.