She was glad they had been sent out with the McClane Corps to Melle. She wanted McClane to see the stuff that John was made of. She knew what had been going on in the commandant's mind. He had been trying to persuade himself that John was no good, because, from the minute he had seen him with his ambulance on the wharf at Ostend, from the minute he had known his destination, he had been jealous of him and afraid. Why, he must have raced them all the way from Ostend, to get in first. Afraid and jealous, afraid of John's youth with its secret of triumph and of courage; jealous of John's face and body that men and women turned back to look at as they passed; even the soldiers going up to the battlefields, going up to wounds and death, turned to look at this creature of superb and brilliant life. Even on the boat he must have had a dreadful wonder whether John was bound for Ghent; he must have known from the beginning that wherever Conway placed himself he would stand out and make other men look small and insignificant. If he wasn't jealous and afraid of Sutton she supposed it was because John had had that rather diminishing effect on poor Billy.
If Billy Sutton distinguished himself that would open McClane's eyes a little wider, too.
She wondered why Billy kept on saying that McClane was a great psychologist. If it was true that would be very awful for McClane; he would see everything going on inside people, then, all the things he didn't want to see; he wouldn't miss anything, and he would know all the time what John was like. The little man was wilfully shutting his eyes because he was so mean that he couldn't bear to see John as he really was. Now he would have to see.
The thought of McClane's illumination consoled her for her own inferior place in the adventure. This time the chauffeurs would have to stay at the end of the village with their cars. The three were drawn up at the street side, close under the house walls, McClane's first. Then Sutton's, with Gwinnie. Then hers; behind it the short straight road where the firing would come down.
John stood in the roadway waiting for the others. He had his hand beside her hand, grasping the arm of the driver's seat.
"I wish you could take me with you," she said.
"Can't. The orders are, all chauffeurs to stand by the cars."
... His eyebrows knotted and twitched in sudden anxiety.