Yet in appearance he was not quite the Alphonse of old.
There was something less resilient about him, something more enduring
had crept into his personality; his elasticity had somehow turned to
bronze. He was slightly grey. Nevertheless he greeted me with a Gallic
warmth that gave refreshment to my jaded spirit.
"But M'sieu would be shaved.... Yes, a beard was permissible in time of
War, but in Peace--pouf! it was barbaric."
I allowed myself to be robed and tucked comfortably into the chair.
Alphonse busied himself with the instruments of his profession.
"Five years ago it was another world, M'sieu," he said, churning a
wooden bowl to mountains of lather. "It is never again the same. The
Marne ... Verdun ... Soissons. If M'sieu permits I would like to tell
him of those years."
I nodded and he advanced upon me with the brush. He spoke of the retreat
to Paris and the strategy of JOFFRE which so nearly overthrew three
Prussian armies. He brandished his razor and swept the Boches back over
the Marne, he swept them through Senlis, he swept them across the Aisne.
His intensity was inspiring. The smouldering fires of bygone battles
leapt into his eyes. But it was not the mesmeric shave of 1914. He
apologised humbly and applied small pieces of plaster.
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