Only when several of us were huddled together, with a
foot each on the sacred spot, were we told that it meant marriage before
the new year. If the spell works, Dierdre O'Farrell, Brian, and I will
all be married in less than four months. But St. Nicolas is a false
prophet where we are concerned. Brian and I will never marry. Even if
poor Brian should fall head over ears in love, he wouldn't ask a girl to
share his broken life: he has told me this. As for me, I can never love
any man after Jim Beckett. The least penance I owe is to be faithful
forever to his memory and my own falsehood!
St. Nicolas is the patron saint of the neighbourhood, so it's right that
from his little town and his big church all the country round should
open out to the eye, as if to do him homage.
From the hill of Leomont we could see to the south the far-off, famous
Forest of Parroy; away to the north, the blue heights of La Grande
Couronne, where the fate of Nancy was decided in 1914; to the west, a
purple haze like a mourning wreath of violets hung over the valley of
the Meurthe, and the tragic little tributary river Mortagne; beyond, we
could picture with our mind's eyes the Moselle and the Meuse.
But Leomont was not a place where one could stand coldly thinking of
horizons. It drew all thoughts to itself, and to the drama played out
upon its miniature mountain. There was fought one of the fiercest and
most heroic single battles of the war.
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