In the sitting-room are the Prince, two officers, M. le Précepteur,
looking hot and sticky yet deathly white, holding Germaine in his
arms. Mme la Précepteur in a morning wrapper is yelling in accents
which make pig-killing seem gentle by comparison. Hanging to her skirts
is M. Victor, decidedly unwashed, but, mercifully, by now too short of
breath to cry effectively.
“Mon pauvre mari, mes pauvres enfants,” sobs Madame. Her face is purple
with emotion, the tears are coursing down her cheeks. She is a piteous
spectacle of unrestrained grief.
The Prince of Meiningen says to me in quiet tones the words every
German seems to use when in a tight corner.
“Es ist unsere pflicht” (It is our duty).
In front of M. le Précepteur is a little travelling-bag with a shirt
and a few collars. I think he would go on packing if Madame would not
insist on half-throttling him with her embraces every other minute.
“It will only be for a short time,” I say comfortingly to Monsieur le
Précepteur.
“Only for the duration of the war,” says the Prince.
“The duration of the war!” But I am determined to look on the bright
side.
“He will have nothing to eat,” moans Madame between her sobs.
“He will live well,” asserts the Prince patiently. He would take his
prisoner off at once, only he does not wish to precipitate more scenes.
Live well! What a mockery. The German soldiers have themselves told me
that the civilian prisoners only get bread and water during the term of
their imprisonment.
I remember the words of my Belgian friend, the Tax-collector, when I
asked him if they ever killed civilian prisoners.
“Kill them? No, indeed,” he said nonchalantly. “They give them too
little to eat. That is all.”
I go into the little kitchen at the back and grope in the cupboard for
bread and for butter to make tartines for M. le Précepteur.
An officer comes in and coolly appropriates some eggs in a wire-work
basket.
“Fresh eggs,” he says appreciatively.
“Will you leave the poor woman nothing?” I ask fiercely.
He sets them on the table one by one and slinks back to the outer room.
“Come,” says the Prince.
Half fainting, Madame flings her arms round her husband’s neck for a
last embrace, then falls back moaning into a chair. He kisses Germaine
and Victor, then walks out into the sunlight and looks round him, half
dazed. We shake hands, but with such a lump in my throat I cannot say a
word.
The postmaster, carrying the little brown bag, walks off in the
direction of Malempré between the Prince and his brother. The soldiers
form up behind. The procession is soon lost to sight behind the tree
trunks....
The Germans have quite a lust for prisoners to-day. After lunch the
word goes round that the Bourgmestre is being sought for. At first they
cannot find him. Perhaps he is hiding ... in a cellar ... somewhere.
Presently he is brought along. He looks shrunken and very white. Poor
man, I am afraid he has heard rumours of the bread-and-water diet. He,
too, is led off under military escort in the direction of Malempré....
At Grand-Mesnil they have already secured 12,000 francs from the Caisse
Communale. Gold-thirsty brutes!
There is a panic-stricken cry in the village. The worst has happened.
The beloved Curés are here, jogging along in a little armoured tumbril
such as those in which one pictured folk passing bravely to the
guillotine in revolution time of old. They suffer no indignity of
bound hands or bandaged limbs. The swarming lines of troops remove all
need for that.
A squad of soldiers march stolidly behind. Through the forest of
notched bayonets one catches a glimpse of weeping women. There are
other ways of fighting than with swords. The Curé makes the Sign of
the Cross and smiles down on the scared faces of the villagers. If his
voice would only carry he would say, like his divine forerunner, “Be
not afraid.”
We run weeping after the tumbril. It seems sacrilege to take the
Curé. Poor things! They have no seats, but are dexterously balancing
themselves on the top of the Gendarmerie tin boxes. To the lay mind
their attitude savours of the undignified. But in the good peasants’
eyes their Curé cannot be ridiculous....