Yes, they had come back,--but how! The street was full of them,
thousands, driven along like dogs, taunted, beaten, if they fell down,
kicked until they either got up or lay forever still; hungry, exhausted
by the long retreat and the terrible battle. I could have screamed
aloud at what was enacted before my eyes, but there was my poor little
girlie to quiet; she cried so bitterly. I told her she should carry
bread to the Russians. My cook brought the bread cut up in chunks. I
told her to go down to the mounting block with Wanda, thinking surely
a little delicate child would be respected, and the surest means of
getting the bread into the prisoners' hands. It seemed to me if I could
not help some of those men I should go mad.
Leaving the nurse with my sons, I went to the balcony, seeing many
familiar faces in the company of misery. When Wanda and the cook
reached the block, there was a wild rush for the bread; trembling hands
reached out, only to be beaten down. One German took a piece from my
little girl's hands, broke off little bits, throwing them into the air
to see those starving men snatch at them and then hunt in the mud.
Finally one Christian among them gave the cook assistance; the bread
was getting to the men, only we had so little.
Then something so terrible happened that while I live it can never be
blotted from my memory. Wanda--my little tender, sensitive child, had
a chunk of bread in her hand, in the act of reaching it to a prisoner,
when Max, the Captain's orderly came up. Taking the bread from her hand
he threw it in the mud, stamping on it! The poor hungry prisoner with
a whimpering cry, stooped down, wildly searching, when Max raised his
foot, and kicked him violently in the mouth! Wanda screamed: "Don't
hurt Wanda's soldier!" The blood spurted all over her!
Rushing downstairs I gathered my poor little girlie into my arms, her
whole little body quivering with sobs, and faced the brute, which had
done the deed.
"What religion are you, Max?"
"Roman Catholic."
"Then I hope the Mother of God will not pray for you when you die, for
you have offended one of God's little ones."
The soldier with bleeding mouth was lying on the side of the road; my
cook tried to help him, but was roughly driven away.
Carrying Wanda upstairs, trying to still her; heartbroken myself, what
could I tell the little creature? Suddenly she asked:
"Mammy--why does God sleep?"
"God is not asleep, darling----"
"Then Wanda don't love God when He lets the soldiers be hurt and
kicked!"
"God sees all and loves all--but the bad man gets into the hearts of
some of His children----"
Difficult it was to do anything when I came back into that room
where my little sons lay raving, not to just sit down and nurse my
girlie, six years old, to have seen such sights! While attending the
boys, another scream from Wanda took me to the window. No wonder she
screamed! The captured guns were being brought into the town with the
Russians _hitched_ to them, driven with blows through the icy slush
of the streets, while _the horses were led along beside them_! Wanda
cried so hysterically, that she had to have bromide; the child was ill.
Surely there was nothing worse to come?
The Captain, hearing the sounds and wanting his supper, came into the
room.
"Go away, Captain, if you are a man, and leave me alone with my babies."
"What is the trouble? Is the little girl ill also?"
"Have you seen what is happening with the Russian soldiers, taken
prisoners?"
"Yes, I have seen."