PER ARDUA AD ASTRA
Then shall they begin to say to the mountains, Fall on us; and to
the hills, Cover us.--ST. LUKE.
In the days of her not far distant childhood Dorothea had never loved
any game like hide-and-seek; she flung herself into her present
escapade with much the same zest and little more discretion. Her
plan, so far as she had one, was to lie up in the fir wood till a
search-party appeared, then show herself and give them a lead away from
the farm. The rest she left to chance, naïvely confident that the luck
which had sent Denis to her would let her save him. She had had enough
hard knocks, one might have thought, to convince her that Fate does not
necessarily favor the young and hopeful; but that was a lesson Dorothea
never had learned, and never would.
Ten minutes after she had settled herself among the bracken a mounted
patrol rode over the brow of the opposite hill and began slowly to
descend towards the farm. Dorothea scrambled to her feet and came
to the edge of the wood; she began to crawl along under the hedge,
stooping, furtive, a fugitive in every line. She expected every minute
to hear the shout of discovery. None came, and presently she erected
herself and peeped over the bracken to see if they were stealing upon
her unawares. The officer in command was just riding through the
orchard gate, on his way to the farm.
This was a contingency she had not foreseen--that they wouldn't notice
her. Dorothea stamped. "Oh, you idiots!" she apostrophized the soldiers
of the Fatherland. She ventured herself clear of the wood. Still her
pursuers went tranquilly the wrong way; they were half down the
orchard--in another minute they would be knocking at the back door of
the farm. Dorothea, in a fright now, ran right out into the middle of
the field. Ah, at last! Some one shouted; the troop gathered itself
together, swept past the farm, galloped down the hill.
Dorothea turned and ran like a hare. She felt like one, too. They were
firing at her. They wanted to bring her down before she could take
cover. It wasn't believable. She couldn't be hit! But she was; it fell
like a lash on her shoulder, rolling her over with the sudden shock.
She was up in a minute and ran on again, crying as she went, poor
little Dorothea, with the unexpected sharp pain, mortally terrified
of the bullets flying past her and of the thundering hoofs behind,
beginning to feel she had undertaken more than she could carry through.
This wasn't a bit what she had expected--it wasn't any fun at all!
But the wood received her, and she knew its alleys better than they
did; and presently she was tumbling head first into a tiny dell, under
a low cliff veiled in ivy and drooping ferns. You might search the wood
from end to end without finding the way into the dell; and if you found
the dell, you would never guess that under the creepers there was a
hole, the entrance of the Grotte des Fées. Dorothea had once tried to
explore it: she got as far as a first chamber of exquisite white veils
and icicles of stalactite, and then dropped her candle. She never tried
again, because Madame Hasquin assured her the roof was unsafe. She
was rather glad of the excuse; underground adventures were not to her
taste. She crept inside now, but not far, not beyond the green light of
the entrance.
For some time she lay panting like a dog, thought foundered in panic;
but she gradually calmed down. She had a drink from the stream
trickling down the cave, and by and by, feeling a good deal ashamed of
herself, she made an effort, opened her coat and examined her wound. It
was neither wide nor deep; the bullet had gone clean through her arm
without touching the bone. But it had bled a good deal, and it hurt,
it hurt dreadfully. She made shift to tie it up, feeling more ashamed
than ever because she couldn't help whimpering with the pain. Oh, she
was a horrid little coward! She had come down with a bump from her
vainglory. But when it was done she took heart. She looked down on her
stained sleeve; how splendid to see her blood mingling with Denis's!
After all, she was a real casualty now; she had been really properly
wounded, like a real proper soldier. That was a sustaining thought.
It was while she lay there, listening to the cool drip of the water,
breathing in the cool mossy scent, that her active little brain got to
work on the position. She had gone into it headlong, without thinking;
she now saw many things she had ignored. First and foremost and at
any cost, she must not allow herself to be caught. She was tall for a
woman, and Denis slight for a man, and she had put on his leather coat
and leggings over all her own things, but even so there was a good
deal more of them, both lengthways and breadthways, than she could
fill out. "Gracious! why, my wig alone would give the show away!"
reflected Dorothea, with a dismaying vision of hidden dangers passed.
"Besides, they would recognize me--Major von Marwitz would, I think,
and Lieutenant Müller would, I know. And then, of course, they'd go
straight and search the farm, and Denis without his kit, they'd shoot
him as a spy, and Lettice too for hiding him--oh!" She had a moment of
panic. "But I'm not going to be caught," she wound up firmly.
A plan suggested itself. She would stay here till dusk, then get away
through the woods towards Vresse, say, show herself there, double
back to the cave, leave Denis's things under the rocks, and emerge
as her proper self once more. She had everything but her skirt,
and it wouldn't be the first time Dot O'Connor had run about in
knickerbockers. This was a beautiful scheme, and it would let her go
back to the farm--she did want to go back to the farm. A dimple came in
her brown cheek; her color rose; at that moment Dorothea did not look
much like an escaped airman.... Dreaming such nonsense! She lifted the
creepers resolutely and peeped out. Yes, it was already pretty dark,
she might start now--and suddenly she discovered that she didn't, no,
she didn't want to leave the safe shelter of the cave and adventure
herself in a world where bullets were flying and men hunting for her
life--"Oh, Dot O'Connor, you miserable little _worm_!" said Dorothea.
"It's just what people always say--women are no good when it comes to
the point. But I _will_ be some good!" She marched out of the cave.
They were still beating the wood; there were soldiers everywhere. But
Dorothea had been a Red Indian many times in the shrubbery at home.
She lay in the brake not ten yards from Lieutenant Müller (yes, it was
he in person), and laughed to hear him issuing his curt, disappointed
orders. It was dark, and the men were bored, and not very numerous; she
slipped between the cordon like a weasel, and had reached the next hill
when by accidental good luck she showed herself against the sky-line. A
sentry gave the alarm, and again she had the whole patrol streaming in
pursuit. This suited her to a T, for she was drawing them away from the
farm, and she was not in the least afraid of being caught. It was black
as a wolf's mouth, and she knew the woods between here and Vresse like
the palm of her hand. She had her second wind of courage now.
Somewhere about two in the morning she found herself--not at Vresse,
but at Mogimont, in a totally different direction. It didn't matter,
for it was miles away from Rochehaut, which was all she cared about;
but in her ignorance of her whereabouts she nearly blundered into the
tiny station, where a melancholy middle-aged German was brewing himself
coffee. Beating a hasty retreat, she found a haystack in a corner
of a meadow, and climbed into its warm depths to wait for the dawn.
_Imprimis_, she had not yet showed herself at Mogimont, and she must;
_secundis_, after her recent performance she wouldn't trust herself
in the dark to find the way back to the farm. She was extremely tired
(Dorothea liked a good eleven hours in her bed), and she fell fast
asleep. The sun was high when she was aroused by the shaking of her
couch. She opened drowsy eyes, to see the top of a ladder pushing
itself up against the sky; a moment later she was gazing into the round
astonished eyes and open mouth of the Landsturm sentry, who had come to
fetch a truss of hay.
Dorothea had meant to show herself, but not at such close quarters.
She hurled herself upon him and tipped his ladder over. He fell off,
she slipped down the other side of the stack and made for the woods.
Luckily she had only a few yards to cover. She was plunging through
the hedge as her adversary turned the corner of the stack. He fired,
and missed; out of the station rushed his comrades at the shot; down
the hill through the woods fled Dorothea, laughing--yes--laughing; his
expression had been so funny!
It was a close shave, nevertheless. She was up an oak-tree, flattened
against the trunk, when the pursuit went past, and there she stayed
until the alarm died away in another direction. She would have stayed
longer; but when the world turned to black mist and began to spin round
her she slid down as fast as she could, and ended by rolling out of the
lower branches. When she came to herself she was lying at the foot of
the tree in a pool of blood, ten feet from a path, at the mercy of any
chance wayfarer. Her arm had broken out bleeding again; she was parched
with thirst and felt like death. It was thirst which at last spurred
her to her feet, in the hope of finding water. And in that land of
brooks and springs she did find it--a tiny runnel, tasting of the brown
leaves through which it oozed, but water of life to Dorothea with the
wound-thirst on her. She drank and drank, and laved her head and face
and arms, and drank again, till the sky stood still, and the trees left
off dancing jigs before her eyes.
But she had lost a good deal of blood; she was weak, and feverish, and
muddle-headed; and in consequence she made a blunder. She ought now to
have stripped off Denis's things, which had served their turn, and left
them hidden. But she had got into her head that she was to take them
back to the cave, and she had not wits enough to mend her plan; she
could only carry out what was fixed before.
All that day, then, she toiled along, still in the character of the
escaped _avion_. But the forests of the Semois are lonely; she met no
one but a couple of children picking whortleberries, who dropped their
cans and their dinner and fled, taking her for a German. Dorothea
shuddered at the bread; she tried a few berries, but they made her
sick. She could not eat that day, but she drank of every brook she came
across. It was very hot, and Denis's coat and cap and leggings were
made of leather and lined with fleece, and their dark color attracted
an Egyptian plague of flies. Dorothea was far spent by the time she
struck the familiar track through the pine wood.
She was so far spent that for some time she walked along the track
itself, forgetting it was no place for her. It seemed too much trouble,
too much, to stoop and crawl and hide among the bracken. When a bramble
caught her sleeve she burst out crying. She missed her way and stumbled
into the hidden dell from the wrong side, brushing waist-high through
flowering willow-herb which streamed down the hill-side, rose-pink,
almost lilac in intensity of color.
Oh! the coolness, the green twilight of the cave! Dorothea with a great
sigh buried her face in icy crystal water. Oh! it was good! She lay
for some time before she discovered that one reason why she had been
feeling so queer was that her arm was bleeding again. She gave a twist
to her bandage, but she was too tired to see to it properly--too tired
even to get rid of her flying kit; a deadly lassitude weighed on every
limb. By and by, when it was cooler, and darker, and the flies were
less troublesome, she would slip off down to the farm.
"This is where he went," said an eager voice. "See how he has broken
these pink weeds! And here is the blood again."
"Himmel! I have passed this tree ten times, and never have I seen
this path! But what is become of him? He cannot have flown out of the
place!"
Dorothea sat up; she was cold enough now. Oh! why had she not thought
of the wood being still patrolled?
Steps came swishing through the long grass. Suddenly the cave grew
lighter, and there was a startled exclamation. They had lifted the
curtain of ivy. Both began to chatter at once, rapidly, excitedly. "I
tell you, it is not safe, these caves are dangerous!" "Aber, if we
fetch the Herr Lieutenant he will not give us the reward, we shall have
to share with the rest!" Private Blum had a young lady in Germany, and
he wanted all he could get. Dorothea could not follow all their talk,
but she gathered to her joy that one was going off to fetch help while
the other stayed on guard. Yes, he was certainly alone; she could hear
him walking up and down and singing to himself--"Ich weiss nicht was
soll es bedeuten--" Now, with any luck--
The song ceased. The ivy was lifted again.
"Englishman!" Pause. "Englishman, are you there? Do you hear me? If you
will come out you shall have your life--I will not harm you!"
Private Blum had a mind to steal a march on his comrade. Getting no
reply, he went head first into the hole on hands and knees, his rifle
tucked under his arm. It was very dark and very wet, and disagreeable
stories about underground rivers and bottomless abysses were running in
his head. He paused. "Englishman!" he called again less confidently.
This time there was a reply; a shot came out of the dark. He seized
his rifle and returned the compliment; then, feeling what seemed like
the entire grotto tumbling about his ears, he backed out hurriedly.
"Du lieber Gott!" he muttered, standing up in the sunshine and feeling
himself all over to make sure he was not hurt, "but that is a dangerous
one! I will leave him to the Herr Lieutenant--he will know how to
settle him!"
The luck was all with the enemy. Dorothea lay weeping tears of rage
over Denis's useless revolver. She had dropped it into the stream; she
had never let one off before, she had no idea they kicked like that!
And now what was she to do? If she could have disposed of Private Blum,
as she had hoped, she might have got away; but she had not disposed of
Private Blum. He was out there, very much alive, and in another minute
Lieutenant Müller would join him; and if Lieutenant Müller saw her--
Till this minute Dorothea had never doubted of success. But now? Dead
or alive, if she fell into German hands, it would be equally fatal;
Denis would be worse off than if she had never interfered. He might
even owe his death to her. "Oh, darling, darling!" Dorothea murmured,
crushing her hands together, an agonizing stricture at her heart. "Oh,
it isn't fair. Oh, God, let me save him! Oh, I must save him, I can't
_bear_ it if he dies through me, I can't, I can't, I _can't_. Oh, isn't
there any, _any_ way?"
Pieces of rock, loosened by the explosion, were still pattering down;
one fell on her hand. She glanced round impatiently, and saw to her
dismay that half the cave seemed ready to fall in; very little more
would bring down an avalanche. She sprang to her feet--and stood still.
She had seen how to save Denis.
So simple, after all! Why, of course it was what always happened, in
the ordinary course of operations. So much neater, too, than if she had
escaped. The search would come to an end, the roads would no longer
be guarded, Denis would have a far better chance of getting off. And
there would certainly be nothing left to identify. Oh, it was a topping
idea! Perhaps if Denis crossed the frontier into Holland she might
follow--no, she couldn't, though, she was forgetting; how queer! She
would be dead.
Death. She was going to die, all alone here in the dark. She would
never see the sunshine any more. She would never see Denis any more,
never be his wife, never taste the happiness which niggard Fate, at
long last, was offering her. It was the end. And while she was trying
to subdue her aching, unsatisfied rebellion, to remind herself that she
had only petitioned to be allowed to save him and should be thankful,
in a flash of sunset light which illumined and interpreted the past,
Dorothea saw that it was the only perfect end. She would have been his
wife? Ah, but it would never have been the same, he would never have
given her what he once gave; she had spoiled that. It would have been
pity, amends, the second best. He would never, never love her living;
no, but he would love her dead. For her sake he would go softly all
his days; she was sure, now, of an unfading shrine in his memory. Yes,
and even apart from Denis, little Dorothea was shyly proud. She was
not giving her life for him alone; she was dying as a soldier for her
country, and could claim the soldier's due of amnesty and an honored
grave.
How far away the world had gone! and how dim and queer she felt! Was
it her arm again? Those moments of waiting might have been very cruel,
but, more lucky in her death than in her life, Dorothea was spared
them. She did not hear Lieutenant Müller outside, nor his orders to the
men. She had drifted far away, to happy hours at Bredon and her beloved
aeroplane. It was evening; the solemn splendors of the sunset were all
about her in the sky. She was flying through a sea of gold--of pure
gold, like unto clear glass--or was it the glory of God?