“Score heavily for us,” said Lannes.  “I scarcely hoped for such a goodly blow as this while we were on our way!”

John would not look down again.  Despite the value of the deed, he shuddered and he was glad when the Arrow in its swift flight had left the area of devastation far behind.

“We’re flying over the French now,” he said.  “So I expected,” said Lannes.  “Can you see a hill crested with a low farm house?”

“Yes,” replied John, after looking a little while.  “It’s straight ahead.  The house is partly hidden by trees.”

“Then that’s the place.  You wouldn’t think we’d come nearly fifty miles, would you, John?”

“Fifty miles!  It feels more like a thousand!”

Lannes laughed, this time with satisfaction, not excitement.

“You’ll find there the general to whom we reported first,” he said, “and he’ll be glad to see us!  I can’t tell you how glad he will be.  His joy will be far beyond our personal deserts.  It will have little to do with the fact that you, John Scott, and I, Philip Lannes, have come back to him.”

The circling Arrow came down in a meadow just behind the house, and officers rushed forward to meet it.  Lannes and John, stepping out, left it in charge of two of the younger men.  Then, proudly waving the others aside, they walked to the low stone farmhouse, in front of which the elderly, spectacled general was standing.  He looked at Lannes inquiringly, but the young Frenchman, without a word, handed him a note.

John watched the general read, and he saw the transformation of the man’s face.  Doubting, anxious, worn, it was illumined suddenly.  In a voice that trembled he said to the senior officers who clustered about him: 

“We’re advancing in the center, and on the other flank.  Already we’ve driven a huge wedge between the German armies, and Paris, nay, France herself, is saved!”

The officers, mostly old men, did not cheer, but John had never before witnessed such relief expressed on human faces.  It seemed to him that they had choked up, and could not speak.  The commander held the note in a shaking hand and presently he turned to Lannes.

“Your fortune has been great.  It’s not often that one has a chance to bear such a message as this.”

“My pride is so high I can’t describe it,” said Lannes in a dramatic but sincere tone.

“Go in the house and an orderly will give food and wine to you and your comrade.  In a half hour, perhaps, I may have another message for you.”

Both John and Lannes needed rest and food, and they obeyed gladly.  The strain upon the two was far greater than they had realized at the time, and for a few moments they were threatened with collapse which very strong efforts of the will prevented.  They were conscious, too, as they stood upon the ground, of a quivering, shaking motion.  They were assailed once more by the violent waves of air coming from the concussion of cannon and rifles past counting.  The thin, whitish film which was a compound of dust and burned gunpowder assailed them again and lay, bitter, in their mouths and nostrils.