"When?"
I felt as if I were being rather severely cross-examined, but I answered
as civilly as I could, "The night before the battle."
He looked at me for the first time--and softened his tone a bit--my
white hair and beastly accent, I suppose--as he asked:
"What is it for?"
I told him it was to prevent a detachment of Uhlans from coming up the
hill. He hesitated a moment; then asked if it served any purpose now.
I might have told him that the Uhlans were still here, but I didn't, I
simply said that I did not know that it did. "Cut it down!" he ordered,
and in a moment it was cut on one end and swung round against the bank
and the regiment marched on.
It was just after that that I discovered the explanation of what had
happened to my Irish scout on Saturday. An exhausted soldier was in
need of a stimulant, and one of his comrades, who was supporting him,
asked me if I had anything. I had nothing but the bottle out of which
the Irish scout had drunk. I rushed for it, poured some into the tin
cup held out to me, and just as the poor fellow was about to drink,
his comrade pulled the cup away, smelt it, and exclaimed, "Don't drink
that--here, put some water in it. That's not cider. It's eau de vie
des prunes."
I can tell you I was startled. I had never tasted eau de vie des
prunes,--a native brew, stronger than brandy, and far more
dangerous,--and my Irishman had pulled off a full champagne glass at a
gulp, and never winked. No wonder he fell off his wheel. The wonder is
that he did not die on the spot. I was humiliated. Still, he was Irish
and perhaps he didn't care. I hope he didn't. But only think, he will
never know that I did not do it on purpose. He was probably gloriously
drunk. Anyway, it prevented his coming back to make that visit he
threatened me with.
The detachment of the regiment which staggered past my gate camped in
the fields below me and in the courtyards at Voisins, and the rest of
them made themselves comfortable in the fields at the other side of the
hill and the outbuildings on Amelie's place, and the officers and the
ambulance corps began to seek their quarters.
I was sitting in the library when my guest, Chef-Major Weitzel, rode up
to the gate. I had a good chance to look him over, as he marched up the
path. He was a dapper, upright, little chap. He was covered with dust
from his head to his heels. I could have written his name on him
anywhere. Then I went to the door to meet him. I suppose he had been
told that he was to be lodged in the house of an American. He stopped
abruptly, halfway up the path, as I appeared, clicked his heels
together, and made me his best bow, as he said:--
"I am told, madame, that you are so gracious as to offer me a bed."
I might have replied literally, "Offer? I had no choice," but I did not.
I said politely that if Monsieur le Chef-Major would take the trouble to
enter, I should do myself the distinguished honor of conducting him to
his chamber, having no servant for the moment to perform for him that
service, and he bowed at me again, and marched in--no other word for
it--and came up the stairs behind me.
As I opened the door of my guest-room, and stood aside to let him pass,
I found that he had paused halfway up and was giving my raftered green
salon and the library beyond a curious glance. Being caught, he looked
up at once and said: "So you are not afraid?" I supposed he was inspired
by the fact that there were no signs of any preparations to evacuate.
I replied that I could not exactly say that, but that I had not been
sufficiently afraid to run away and leave my house to be looted unless I
had to.
"Well," he said, with a pleasant laugh, "that is about as good an
account of himself as many a brave soldier can give the night before his
first battle "; and he passed me with a bow and I closed the door.
Half an hour later he came downstairs, all shaved and slicked up--in a
white sweater, white tennis shoes, with a silk handkerchief about his
neck, and a fatigue cap set rakishly on the side of his head, as if
there were no such thing as hot weather or war, while his orderly went
up and brought his equipment down to the terrace, and began such a
beating, brushing, and cleaning of boots as you never saw.
At the library door he stopped, looked in, and said, "This is nice"; and
before I could get together decent French enough to say that I was
honored--or my house was--at his approval, he asked if he might be so
indiscreet as to take the liberty of inviting some of his fellow
officers to come into the garden and see the view. Naturally I replied
that Monsieur le Chef-Major was at home and his comrades would be
welcome to treat the garden as if it were theirs, and he made me another
of his bows and marched away, to return in five minutes, accompanied by
half a dozen officers and a priest. As they passed the window, where I
still sat, they all bowed at me solemnly, and Chef-Major Weitzel stopped
to ask if madame would be so good as to join them, and explain the
country, which was new to them all.
Naturally madame did not wish to. I had not been out there since
Saturday night--was it less than forty-eight hours before? But equally
naturally I was ashamed to refuse. It would, I know, seem
super-sentimental to them. So I reluctantly followed them out. They
stood in a group about me--these men who had been in battles, come out
safely, and were again advancing to the firing line as smilingly as one
would go into a ballroom--while I pointed out the towns and answered
their questions, and no one was calmer or more keenly interested than
the Breton priest, in his long soutane with the red cross on his arm.
All the time the cannon was booming in the northeast, but they paid no
more attention to it than if it were a threshing-machine.
There was a young lieutenant in the group who finally noticed a sort of
reluctance on my part-which I evidently had not been able to conceal--to
looking off at the plain, which I own I had been surprised to find as
lovely as ever. He taxed me with it, and I confessed, upon which he
said:--
"That will pass. The day will come--Nature is so made, luckily--when
you will look off there with pride, not pain, and be glad that you saw
what may prove the turning of the tide in the noblest war ever fought
for civilization."