How long have I been writing? I don't know. But there is Sergeant Young
coming back.
"You had better get ready," he says, "there is going to be an attack.
The Germans are coming over this way."
"Ah!" I answer quietly and begin preparing myself.
"I dare say," goes on the Sergeant, "that the Germans are very
Hun-wise. It will be a Hun-pleasant job for them."
When he starts on those puns it is a sign that he is in a good temper.
"If they think that they will get Hun-perturbed into our trenches, they
make a Hun-believable mistake. These trenches are Hun-approachable."
But time passes, ten minutes, twenty minutes, and no order comes.
You cannot imagine how bored one is during the long hours of waiting
between attacks, but the anxiety which precedes the moments of real
danger makes up for these weary intervals.
"Have you written something more?" finally asks Charlie.
Silently I offer him the sheets, and he begins to read. Meanwhile I
am thinking that I ought to write to dad and tell him that I cannot
compose a march in the trenches because of the booming of the guns
which will never keep time--and to mamma that nothing was easier than
to avoid the shells; she need not know that they cannot always avoid
us--and to Bean, that there was no reason for anxiety at all, war being
only an exaggerated picnic and casualties some sort of indigestion.
"I say," declares Sergeant Young, who has read the chapter in less
time than was necessary, "I say, your Miss Doblana behaves in a rather
Hun-maidenly manner. To call in the middle of the night upon a young,
Hun-married man, with her hair Hun-done! I am afraid the public will
find it Hun-conventional and even Hun-pardonable. Of course, she was in
love with the pretty Salzburg officer."
"You jump to conclusions. I do not think that anything in my story may
have suggested that."
"In this case, what did you think of her visit?"
"I thought ... that she had been obliged to go across her father's
room, and that she would not have done so without some necessity. Her
fear had been great, to judge from her wide eyes and her paleness.
Would she have undergone any risk if there had been some chance of
avoiding it?"
"Of course--if it was Hun-avoidable! And what did you feel?"
"Perhaps you think that I felt very happy? Certainly, there was joy
in my knowledge of having found her again. There was also, as I have
written, a desire to kiss her beautiful hands. But, above all, above
my surprise, my joy, and my desire, there was apprehension lest her
father should have noticed her absence, lest her step, in spite of its
lightness, should have been audible in the deep silence of the night.
What would I have done if the door had opened and the sad, old man had
appeared and reproached me with having violated his hospitality?"
"I see. You had a little chilliness, like when you heard the bullets
whistling around you for the first time and felt the wind caused by the
shells. It's a bit Hun-canny and one shivers a little, but one goes on.
Did you?"
"I did. But it was not an easy affair. For, to begin with, the next
morning our interview was spoiled. It was the first time since my
arrival in his house that Doblana was to be absent for several hours.
And, while on the two previous days he had left the door of his room
open, this time he had locked his daughter in. I waited in the _salon_
for a good while, in vain."
"It must have been Hun-comfortable."
"At last I heard a little noise at Mr. Doblana' s door, as though some
small dog were scratching at it. And a piece of note paper was pushed
through the split at the bottom of the door into the _salon_. At once I
rushed forth to it. As I came to the door I heard a well-known voice,
_her v_oice, talking through the door."
"'Is that you Mr. Cooper?'--'Yes.'--'Are you alone?'--'Yes.'--'Can you
open this door?'
"I tried. It was locked.
"'I cannot.'--'Nor can I. Take the letter I have pushed under the door.
Read it and then destroy it. Good-bye.'
"I tried to talk more, but there was no answer. So I read the letter.
It ran something like this:
'My father has locked me in. I can tell you nothing through the door.
But you may trust Fanny. She will do anything for a tip. I have no
money, but you have.'