The captive officer, apparently powerless, could not rise from the
stretcher, where he was lying with one of his soldiers who had been
wounded before him. He gazed devouringly at the blazing house. Suddenly
he shouted savagely: "There, at the window, under the roof! Look, she
is breaking the window--where the smoke is pouring out!"
We looked at the roof of the blazing house, and, in truth, there was
a woman's figure in white, with a red cross on her breast. The doctor
shouted: "Eh, fellows, it is true! A woman was left in the house--a
nurse--his wife!"
"What can be done?" asked the stunned soldiers. "The whole house is on
fire, and she is not strong enough to break through the window frame.
She must be weak from fright. But why did she go up? Why not down?"
"There's no use guessing!" shouted a bearded fellow, evidently from the
reserves, throwing off his overcoat.
"Where are you going?" cried the soldiers.
But he was already out of reach of their voices. He rushed into the
house. All were stupefied, fearing to breathe. A minute passed,
another, a third. Then at the window appeared the bearded face of the
Russian soldier. There came the sound of broken glass and wood. Above
our heads something was shrilling, but no one paid attention to the
German shells. The soldier broke the window, dragged the woman into the
open air. She was unconscious.
"Catch!" rang from above, and a big white parcel came down. The
soldiers caught it successfully on the hero's outspread overcoat. Only
one of them was hurt in the eye by the heel of her shoe.
"How will our chap get back to us now?" asked the soldiers of one
another. "It is hell inside."
"Oh, he will get out, all right," said some one. "It is easier to get
out than to get in. He knows the way. And if he burns some of his
beard, no harm; he has a large one."
"Carry her to her husband!" ordered the doctor, "and get out from
here immediately. The Germans are shelling us. Take away the rest, and
don't forget the couple," remarked jokingly the doctor, happy over the
incident. "I will wait for our hero. He may be burned."
The soldiers caught the remaining stretchers, and nearly ran out of the
yard. At that moment a big German shell struck the burning house. A
deafening explosion shook the air. The walls trembled, shook, and fell.
The heroic soldier had not had time to get out. He remained buried
under the ruins.
When the woman recovered consciousness near her wounded husband she
did not understand where she was. She murmured in perplexity: "Dream,
death? Otto, is that you? Are we together in heaven?"
"On earth and both alive," calmed the doctor.
"How did you get to the upper story?" asked the husband.
"I saw Russian soldiers run into the house. I feared violence, so I ran
upstairs. I thought I would run down later, but then came the fire....
A soldier appeared behind me and I was terrified to death."
"But that soldier saved you!" sighed the doctor.
"How? Where is he?"
"In heaven, if there is such a place for heroes." The doctor then told
them all. The German officer and his wife both cried.
"But how was it that your guns were firing at a farm which you were
occupying?" asked the prisoner.
"Our guns?" exclaimed the doctor, who was already bandaging a new
victim. "It was your guns that were shelling a house over which flew
a German Red Cross flag. Our soldiers were saving the lives of your
wounded, and your guns were firing at both ours and yours. They killed
the man who saved you. That's the way the Kaiser makes war."