TERRORS BY NIGHT
Victor’s letter did not come the next day, though the person with the
money did, giving Lucie a greater surprise than even the shoes. She had
eaten her slight midday meal, consisting of a small bowl of soup left
from the dinner of the day before, and a piece of not very good bread.
She was washing the bowl and picturing to herself the sort of person
likely to be her father’s messenger, a meager little old man probably,
all the young ones had gone to the war, it seemed; this one would wear
spectacles, have thin gray hair and be a trifle deaf; he would hold
his hand back of his ear and say “_Plait-il?_” when she answered his
questions; and then came the knock at the door.
Lucie jumped. The exciting moment had arrived. She went to open, fully
prepared to see the sort of person her fancy had created, and was so
taken aback that she could hardly reply to the question: “Is this where
Mlle. Lucie Du Bois lives?” for instead of a snuffy old man there stood
a radiant, well-dressed young woman.
“I am Lucie Du Bois”; the answer came stammeringly.
“May I come in?” The young lady smiled.
“Oh, surely. I beg your pardon, but I--I--was not prepared to see a
young lady.”
“What then?” Again the lady smiled so delightfully that Lucie smiled in
return as she said: “Oh, an old man, quite an old one.”
“Then you must be disappointed.”
“O, no, quite the contrary.”
“I am Mlle. Lowndes, Nora Lowndes.”
“Then you are not French.”
“No, I am an American.”
“Then, won’t you please speak English? It has been so long since I
heard it.”
“You speak English?” Miss Lowndes looked surprised.
“But yes. I speak it, you see, because my mother is American, and would
have me speak as well as read her language.”
“How perfectly delightful. It is much easier for me, of course. Let us
begin right away. Shall I sit here? Of course you want to know about
your father first thing and then we will talk business.”
“You have seen my father? You know him?”
“Oh, yes, for I have been helping the nurses at Madame Hautecœur’s
chateau which she has given for a convalescents’ home during the war. I
have just come from there.”
“Oh, miss, you have just come? You have seen him so recently?”
“Only three days ago. He was looking much better, still a little pale
as would be expected from one so long a patient in a hospital, but
still doing very well, and soon able to go back to his regiment. You
cannot believe what that letter from the young soldier, what is his
name? did for him. He seems to have taken on new life, and I do not
wonder, all these months without a word of his wife and daughter.”
“It was this way, you see: at first Paulette would not let me write
because we were at such a pass, unhappy refugees. We were expecting
every day to meet my grandfather and that everything then would be
settled, but you see my grandfather never came. Does my father know
about this? That we shall never see dear grandfather again?”
Miss Lowndes laid her hand caressingly on Lucie’s. “Yes, dear child, he
knows; your friend told him in his letter.”
“That was kind, but it was like Victor to do it. He would know that it
might be hard for me to tell my father.”
Miss Lowndes nodded. “I like that Victor. And so you did not write to
your father at all?”
“Not at first, but after a while, but it seems he did not get the
letter. Then we found that he had been moved to another hospital and
did not know where to write. You see, mademoiselle, Miss I mean--”
Miss Lowndes smiled. “That isn’t the way we say it, dear. We would say
Miss Lowndes, or just go on talking without saying Miss anything.”
“I am forgetting some of my English, I am afraid. You see, Miss
Lowndes, Paulette, she is the old peasant woman who took care of me
when I was a baby, and who has always lived with us. Paulette is so
lost here in Paris, and I am a very ignorant little girl. Neither of us
knew where to go to find out about things; Paulette would be afraid,
anyway, for she has a great fear of governments and officials, and but
for Victor I do not know when we should have heard about papa.”
“And who is this nice Victor person?”
“He is the cousin of my best friend, Annette Le Brun who lived next
door to us, at least she was my best friend; I do not know that I shall
ever see her again, but now I have Odette.”
“Tell me about Odette.”
“She is also my next door neighbor. Like myself she is a refugee, but
it is much worse for her. I have Paulette who loves me and would work
her fingers off for me, but Odette has lost her father and mother.
She has no one at all but a cross old great-aunt who wishes her off
her hands. You understand then, miss, I mean Miss Lowndes, that it is
not very happy for Odette, though since we have become friends it is
better. She is so bright, so full of courage, this Odette, that I
admire her much.”
“I must make her acquaintance, and Paulette’s, too. I know I shall love
Paulette. Now to business. In this envelope is a sum of money which
your father sends. I am sure you must need it, for I really don’t see
how you have managed all this time.”
“Paulette had her savings, you see, and then for a time she had good
work in two families as _femme de ménage_. They have left the city,
unfortunately, and now poor Paulette works in a laundry where she gets
small pay, but it is much better than nothing.”
“Dear Paulette, what a treasure she must be. Now, then, this is
not your allotment to which, as the daughter of a captain, you are
entitled. I shall see to your getting that, but your father wishes that
you have this, too, every month, and I shall see that you receive it,
that is, so long as I am in the city and you are here, too.”
“Paulette is always talking of going to the country where she can work
in the fields, which she would like much better than what she is doing.”
“I don’t blame her. We shall have to talk about that later on. I am
working with the Committee for Devastated France, and shall be here
until I am sent elsewhere. Now, dear child, if there is anything I can
do I want you to be sure to let me know. I want you to feel that you
have a friend, a countrywoman of your mother, whom you can turn to at
any time. I will give you a card with the address which will always
find me.”
“My mother, I don’t suppose my father has heard anything of her,” said
Lucie wistfully. “Has he any idea where she is?”
“I am afraid not. We think she must be in one of the towns behind the
German lines, so of course she cannot communicate with her people.
There is no reason to believe she is not safe. We are all making every
effort to get news of her but so far have not succeeded. You shall know
the very instant we do hear anything. Let me see, I suppose Sunday
would be the best day for seeing Paulette, and Odette, too. Of course
you, dear child, are to look upon me as a friend, but I want to find
out things that can be done for any refugee, and this little Odette,
I want to learn more about her. I cannot stop now, but Sunday I shall
see you again, and please call me Miss Nora, it sounds so much more
friendly.” She stooped to give Lucie a kiss and went off casting a
bright glance over her shoulder as she went out.
Lucie lost no time in hunting up Odette. This most wonderful thing must
be talked over at once, then, when that was discussed from every side,
there was the long letter to her father to be written, so that the
afternoon was all too short, and Paulette came near finding no dinner
ready when she arrived.
Lucie showed her the money triumphantly, saying: “And now you will not
have to go to that old laundry any more.”
But Paulette was entirely too canny to agree to this. “Why should I
not?” she asked. “Am I then to throw away good money merely that I may
sit with my hands folded? I shall work while I am able, for the winter
at least, and in the spring we shall see what we shall see.”
The next pleasant thing to happen was the Sunday visit of Miss Lowndes,
who made herself so agreeable that even Paulette, chary of praise at
most times, declared her a “young lady of parts.” Following this event
came the letter from Victor. An amusing letter it was, of rollicking
nonsense, and giving no hint of discomfort or discouragement.
“About those shoes,” he wrote, “I am very glad they were left at your
door. I think Pom Pom must have sent them, at least when I asked him
about them and charged him with being the giver he did not deny it, but
looked very conscious, and from his expression I should surmise that he
knows more than he chooses to tell. Very pretty of him, wasn’t it, to
send you a parting gift? By the way, he has captured all hearts, if he
has not yet captured a Boche, but we all expect such great things of
him that there is no telling what I shall have to report when I next
see you.”
In consequence, so far as the shoes were concerned, Lucie was no wiser
than before, and concluded that whatever Victor might know he did not
mean to tell; therefore, Paulette advised her to accept the situation
and wear the shoes, which she did.
So the weeks wore on. Autumn slipped into winter. Christmas came and
went, rather a sorrowful day for all in spite of an effort on the
part of every one to make it bright and cheerful. Miss Lowndes came
with little gifts for Paulette and Lucie, and a basketful of food for
the old women next door, but no one felt very gay; memories were too
poignant.
But the New Year brought two bright occurrences. Jean had his first
permission, granted every four months to the men in the trenches, but
somehow a little delayed in his case. Paulette took a week’s holiday
and undertook to show her son the city, with Lucie and Odette as two of
the party. Big, honest Jean was rather shy before Lucie, whom he knew
only as the young lady of his former employer’s family, but he was more
at home with Odette, who presented him with Nenette and Rintintin to
his delight and Paulette’s satisfaction. It was while he was still on
leave and was making his daily visit to his mother that news came from
Captain Du Bois, news that made Lucie happier than any gift, for he
wrote that he had had a message from her mother, a mysteriously sent
message, believed to have been smuggled in by some one through the
German lines. At all events there was no inkling of how it was sent.
The words: “I am safe and well,” were all the message contained but
they were enough to cheer Lucie and her father.
“Nothing, no New Year’s gift, could have made me so happy,” Lucie told
Miss Lowndes who had come in that very day. “Perhaps next year the war
will be over and we shall be together again in our home.”
“I would not expect too much, dear,” said Miss Lowndes, “though now
I think you may hope to see your mother again.” And this hope buoyed
Lucie up in many of the tragic days to come.
After Jean’s departure Paulette went back to her work, but because of
her son’s insistence she shortened her hours and reached home while it
was still daylight. “I shall not have a happy moment if I know you are
out after dark,” he said. “With those Zeppelins about I shall not be
satisfied to have you exposed at night.”
“But they may come in daylight, and one is not safe in one’s own home,”
protested Paulette.
“Just the same I shall not be satisfied,” returned Jean doggedly, and
Paulette yielded.
Perhaps it was just as well that she did, for along in March came a
disaster which, literally, struck near home, and which affected each
one of the little group occupying the rooms overlooking the old convent
garden. It was poor old Amelie Durand who was the victim. She was
coming home when the Zeppelin swooped down upon Paris to do its deadly
work, and with others she was killed. Lucie, trembling and terrified at
the news, cowered in a corner of her room till Paulette should come.
In the next room, Odette, pale and shivering, but outwardly calm, did
what she was told to do. She had no great love for this aunt of hers,
old Amelie Durand, but she was her nearest of kin and this stroke of
fate seemed even more ghastly than the others which had taken the ones
most beloved. It was a time of fear, of dread, of confusion. Curious
visitors came and went. There were footsteps on the stairs going up or
down all day long. Officials of the government came to investigate. Old
Henriette Jacquet, Amelie’s friend and companion, worked up to a state
of excitement which made her ill, talked incessantly in a shrill, high
key, to any one and every one who came in.
Lucie, who heard and saw most of all this, felt as if she were in worse
case than upon that dreadful journey to the city. She started at every
sound, dreading that she would next hear the threatening hum of another
Zeppelin. Paulette listened to the tale of the disaster with set lips
and lowering brows. “And I said I would not work in a munition factory,
because of the danger,” she said nodding meditatively. “Where is one
safe these days, surely not here in Paris. If those Boches can get here
once, they can again.” She did not go out the next day, but she spent
much time with old Henriette while Odette stayed with Lucie.
One morning Odette announced that Henriette had declared that she would
not remain another week in the city. She had relatives near Poitiers
and to them she would go.
“And what will you do, Odette?” asked Lucie with concern. This question
had been in her mind ever since Amelie’s death.
“I do not know,” Odette answered after a moment. “I think I shall go
into a munition factory. One can get work very easily, they tell me.”
“Oh, but Odette, I don’t want you to go into a munition factory. I am
afraid you will be killed.”
“One may as well be killed that way as by a Zeppelin, and the pay is
excellent.”
“Do you want to go, Odette?”
Odette looked at her with an inscrutable smile. “Has that anything to
do with it? I place myself in danger, perhaps, but so do our soldiers
and do they hesitate? I shall be helping France.”
“To be sure, but there are other ways of helping.”
“How and where?”
“In the fields. They say help is needed there for planting the crops.
We shall need all the food we can get, and it seems to me that I should
prefer that kind of work.”
“I should prefer it, but I do not know where to go or how to get there
when I do know.”
“We can ask Miss Lowndes. I am sure she can tell us. Please, Odette,
promise me that you will do nothing till I find out from Miss Lowndes.”
“And in the meantime am I to accept charity from Henriette Jacquet? No,
I thank you. She has endured me simply because of my aunt. She will be
leaving in a few days at the most.”
Lucie sat silent and troubled. She would like to have said at once that
Odette must come in with Paulette and herself, but she was not sure how
Paulette would regard such an arrangement, and Paulette could speak her
mind most positively when she wished, without regard to those concerned.
However, as if Paulette had read her mind she presently appeared from
next door. “Well, my child,” she began, “I do not intend to stay here
to be annihilated by those Boches. Enough of the city for me. We go.
We go to the fields, to the trees, the good earth. For me I have no
regrets.”
“When, when do we go?” asked Lucie eagerly.
“As soon as I learn some things that must be learned,” responded
Paulette oracularly. “In the meantime we prepare. You will not be
_triste_, you, to go?”
“I shall regret nothing but leaving Odette.”
“There is nothing to regret there,” said Paulette serenely, “for she
goes with us.”
Odette sprang to her feet and threw her arms around Paulette. “I? It
is I, Odette Moreau, that you mean? I do not then work in the munition
factory among strangers, but I shall be with you, madame, and my Lucie?”
“Why not?” returned Paulette. “Have you so many relatives that you
cannot go with us? I have settled it all with this Henriette Jacquet,
the stupid.” She did not explain why this epithet, but Odette had
reason to believe that Henriette had not favored the arrangement, and
that her objections were based upon a possible expense to herself.
Lucie settled herself comfortably on the arm of Paulette’s chair. “Now
tell us all about it,” she said. “You love to be mysterious, Paulette,
but this is no time for mysteries. Neither Odette nor I are in any
frame of mind to be tantalized. Just go ahead and tell us as much as
you know.”
Taken in this way Paulette was disposed to be communicative. “I have
told you that all is not ready, but so much is true that we adopt
Odette into the family. I have spoken to Mathilde. This Henriette goes.
We open the door leading from our rooms into hers. The rooms are taken
by the month, and the month is not up. We become one establishment in
this manner. By the end of the month we learn where we shall go, and
the rooms are given up.” This was quite a satisfactory report, although
Paulette did keep back the fact that Henriette was ready to go at once,
because Paulette had made it possible by paying the difference in the
rent from the present date to the end of the month.
So poor, old, worn, cross-grained Amelie Durand passed into
forgetfulness, and Henriette was not long in making her exit, leaving
no memories which in any way affected the lives of her associates in
Paris.
Neither Lucie nor Odette had known such happy days in Paris as the
next few weeks brought them. In the first place preparations included
the buying of new clothes, in which task Miss Lowndes offered to take
a hand, and which meant several visits to the big shops which neither
girl had ever seen. Paulette, too, turned to the American girl for
advice, and because her vision was clearer and her outlook broader she
was able to suggest things which had not occurred to the peasant woman.
“I should say that the first thing to do was to write to Captain Du
Bois and learn his wishes,” said Miss Lowndes.
“I agree with you,” returned Paulette, “but as I am not gifted with the
pen, mademoiselle, perhaps you will do this writing for me. You will be
able to put the case more clearly than the child, Lucie, who will be
guided by her own desires.”
“I will gladly write, for I think I know conditions pretty well. I
suppose Captain Du Bois must have relatives somewhere to whom you might
go.”
“I know of none who do not live in cities or so far away that it would
be a miserable journey to reach them, but he has friends no doubt, and
at least can advise.”
“In the meantime I will be making inquiries and it may be that a chance
will come which will be exactly what would be best.”
So the letter was written, but as it happened the chance came neither
through a suggestion of Captain Du Bois, nor through any scheme of Miss
Lowndes, and while waiting for an answer to the letter the girls and
Miss Lowndes did their shopping.
Lucie was quite ready to indulge herself in as pretty and becoming
clothes as she could afford, but Odette--who would give her credit
for so much good sense?--Odette insisted upon such things as she had
always worn, the simple dress of a little peasant. “I am to work in
the fields, mademoiselle,” she said. “How long would such a frock as
Lucie’s serve me? Again I shall be thrown with the country people and I
do not wish them to laugh at me or to think I am putting on airs.”
Miss Lowndes looked at her quite taken aback. “Did you ever!” she
exclaimed. “I did not think of that, Odette,” she said. “You are wiser
than I.” She told Paulette about it when she next saw her. The good
woman nodded approvingly. “She is clever, very clever, that Odette.”
“And if you could have seen how pretty she looked in the hat that was
tried on her.”
“No doubt, no doubt, but beauty is only skin deep, and does not earn
the bread and butter as readily as quick wit and busy hands.”
“Yet Odette is quite pretty; she has lovely eyes. She is not so good
looking as Lucie, to be sure.”
“She should not be. She is a skinny little cabbage, but she will do.
If she turns out as well as she has begun, she will not be half bad. I
shall keep my eye on her.”
Paulette spoke meditatively and Miss Lowndes wondered a little what was
in her mind. She was to discover in due course of time.