"A portable kitchen!" he explained. "See, here for soup and here for
coffee. And more are coming."

"Very soon, Henri, they will not need me," Sara Lee said wistfully.

But he protested almost violently. He even put the question to the
horse, and blowing in his ear made him shake his head in the negative.

She was needed, indeed. To the great base hospital at La Panne went
more and more wounded men. But to the little house of mercy came the
small odds and ends in increasing numbers. Medical men were scarce, and
badly overworked. There was talk, for a time, of sending a surgeon to
the little house, but it came to nothing. La Panne was not far away,
and all the surgeons they could get there were not too many.

So the little house went on much as before. Henri had moved to the mill.
He was at work again, and one day, in the King's villa and quietly,
because of many reasons, Henri, a very white and erect Henri, received a
second medal, the highest for courage that could be given.

He did not tell Sara Lee.

But though he and the men who served under him worked hard, they could
not always perform miracles. The German planes still outnumbered the
Allied ones. They had grown more daring with the spring, too, and
whatever Henri might learn of ground operations, he could not foretell
those of the air.