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+The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Broken Soldier and the Maid of France, by
+Henry Van Dyke, Illustrated by Frank E. Schoonover
+
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+
+
+
+Title: The Broken Soldier and the Maid of France
+
+
+Author: Henry Van Dyke
+
+Release Date: June 3, 2005  [eBook #15978]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)
+
+
+***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE BROKEN SOLDIER AND THE MAID OF
+FRANCE***
+
+
+E-text prepared by Michael Gray (Lost_Gamer@comcast.net)
+
+
+
+Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this
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+      See 15978-h.htm or 15978-h.zip:
+      (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/5/9/7/15978/15978-h/15978-h.htm)
+      or
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+
+
+
+
+
+THE BROKEN SOLDIER AND THE MAID OF FRANCE
+
+
+     *     *     *     *     *
+
+
+Books By Henry Van Dyke
+
+   The Broken Soldier and the Maid of France
+   The Americanism of Washington
+   The Christ Child in Art
+   The Lost Boy
+   The Mansion
+   The Story of the Other Wise Man
+
+Harper & Brothers, New York
+Established 1817
+
+
+     *     *     *     *     *
+
+
+THE BROKEN SOLDIER AND THE MAID OF FRANCE
+
+by
+
+HENRY VAN DYKE
+
+With Illustrations by Frank E. Schoonover
+
+New York and London
+Harper & Brothers Publishers
+
+MCMXIX
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+"God commands you," she cried. "It is for France."
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+   The Meeting at the Spring
+   The Green Confessional
+   The Absolving Dream
+   The Victorious Penance
+
+
+
+
+The Meeting at the Spring
+
+
+Along the old Roman road that crosses the rolling hills from the upper
+waters of the Marne to the Meuse, a soldier of France was passing in
+the night.
+
+In the broader pools of summer moonlight he showed as a hale and husky
+fellow of about thirty years, with dark hair and eyes and a handsome,
+downcast face. His uniform was faded and dusty; not a trace of the
+horizon-blue was left; only a gray shadow. He had no knapsack on his
+back, no gun on his shoulder. Wearily and doggedly he plodded his way,
+without eyes for the veiled beauty of the sleeping country. The quick,
+firm military step was gone. He trudged like a tramp, choosing always
+the darker side of the road.
+
+He was a figure of flight, a broken soldier.
+
+Presently the road led him into a thick forest of oaks and beeches, and
+so to the crest of a hill overlooking a long open valley with wooded
+heights beyond. Below him was the pointed spire of some temple or
+shrine, lying at the edge of the wood, with no houses near it. Farther
+down he could see a cluster of white houses with the tower of a church
+in the center. Other villages were dimly visible up and down the valley
+on either slope. The cattle were lowing from the barnyards. The cocks
+crowed for the dawn.  Already the moon had sunk behind the western
+trees. But the valley was still bathed in its misty, vanishing light.
+Over the eastern ridge the gray glimmer of the little day was rising,
+faintly tinged with rose. It was time for the broken soldier to seek
+his covert and rest till night returned.
+
+So he stepped aside from the road and found a little dell thick with
+underwoods, and in it a clear spring gurgling among the ferns and
+mosses. Around the opening grew wild gooseberries and golden broom and
+a few tall spires of purple foxglove. He drew off his dusty boots and
+socks and bathed his feet in a small pool, drying them with fern
+leaves. Then he took a slice of bread and a piece of cheese from his
+pocket and made his breakfast. Going to the edge of the thicket, he
+parted the branches and peered out over the vale.
+
+Its eaves sloped gently to the level floor where the river loitered in
+loops and curves. The sun was just topping the eastern hills; the heads
+of the trees were dark against a primrose sky.
+
+In the fields the hay had been cut and gathered. The aftermath was
+already greening the moist places. Cattle and sheep sauntered out to
+pasture. A thin silvery mist floated here and there, spreading in broad
+sheets over the wet ground and shredding into filmy scarves and ribbons
+as the breeze caught it among the pollard willows and poplars on the
+border of the stream. Far away the water glittered where the river made
+a sudden bend or a long smooth reach. It was like the flashing of
+distant shields. Overhead a few white clouds climbed up from the north.
+The rolling ridges, one after another, infolded the valley as far as
+eye could see; pale green set in dark green, with here and there an arm
+of forest running down on a sharp promontory to meet and turn the
+meandering stream.
+
+"It must be the valley of the Meuse," said the soldier. "My faith, but
+France is beautiful and tranquil here!"
+
+The northerly wind was rising. The clouds climbed more swiftly. The
+poplars shimmered, the willows glistened, the veils of mist vanished.
+From very far away there came a rumbling thunder, heavy, insistent,
+continuous, punctuated with louder crashes.
+
+"It is the guns," muttered the soldier, shivering. "It is the guns
+around Verdun! Those damned Boches!"
+
+He turned back into the thicket and dropped among the ferns beside the
+spring. Stretching himself with a gesture of abandon, he pillowed his
+face on his crossed arms to sleep.
+
+A rustling in the bushes roused him. He sprang to his feet quickly. It
+was a priest, clad in a dusty cassock, his long black beard streaked
+with gray. He came slowly treading up beside the trickling rivulet,
+carrying a bag on a stick over his shoulder.
+
+"Good morning, my son," he said. "You have chosen a pleasant spot to
+rest."
+
+The soldier, startled, but not forgetting his manners learned from
+boyhood, stood up and lifted his hand to take off his cap. It was
+already lying on the ground. "Good morning, Father," he answered. "I
+did not choose the place, but stumbled on it by chance. It is pleasant
+enough, for I am very tired and have need of sleep."
+
+"No doubt," said the priest. "I can see that you look weary, and I beg
+you to pardon me if I have interrupted your repose. But why do you say
+you came here 'by chance'? If you are a good Christian you know that
+nothing is by chance. All is ordered and designed by Providence."
+
+"So they told me in church long ago," said the soldier, coldly; "but
+now it does not seem so true--at least not with me."
+
+The first feeling of friendliness and respect into which he had been
+surprised was passing. He had fallen back into the mood of his
+journey--mistrust, secrecy, resentment.
+
+The priest caught the tone. His gray eyes under their bushy brows
+looked kindly but searchingly at the soldier and smiled a little. He
+set down his bag and leaned on his stick. "Well," he said, "I can tell
+you one thing, my son. At all events it was not chance that brought me
+here. I came with a purpose."
+
+The soldier started a little, stung by suspicion. "What then," he
+cried, roughly, "were you looking for me? What do you know of me? What
+is this talk of chance and purpose?"
+
+"Come, come," said the priest, his smile spreading from his eyes to his
+lips, "do not be angry. I assure you that I know nothing of you
+whatever, not even your name nor why you are here. When I said that I
+came with a purpose I meant only that a certain thought, a wish, led me
+to this spot. Let us sit together awhile beside, the spring and make
+better acquaintance."
+
+"I do not desire it," said the soldier, with a frown.
+
+"But you will not refuse it?" queried the priest, gently. "It is not
+good to refuse the request of one old enough to be your father. Look, I
+have here some excellent tobacco and cigarette-papers. Let us sit down
+and smoke together. I will tell you who I am and the purpose that
+brought me here."
+
+The soldier yielded grudgingly, not knowing what else to do. They sat
+down on a mossy bank beside the spring, and while the blue smoke of
+their cigarettes went drifting under the little trees the priest began:
+
+"My name is Antoine Courcy. I am the cure of Darney, a village among
+the Reaping Hook Hills, a few leagues south from here. For twenty-five
+years I have reaped the harvest of heaven in that blessed little field.
+I am sorry to leave it. But now this war, this great battle for freedom
+and the life of France, calls me. It is a divine vocation. France has
+need of all her sons to-day, even the old ones. I cannot keep the love
+of God in my heart unless I follow the love of country in my life. My
+younger brother, who used to be the priest of the next parish to mine,
+was in the army. He has fallen. I am going to replace him. I am on my
+way to join the troops--as a chaplain, if they will; if not, then as a
+private. I must get into the army of France or be left out of the host
+of heaven."
+
+The soldier had turned his face away and was plucking the lobes from a
+frond of fern. "A brave resolve, Father," he said, with an ironic note.
+"But you have not yet told me what brings you off your road, to this
+place."
+
+"I will tell you," replied the priest, eagerly; "it is the love of
+Jeanne d'Arc, the Maid who saved France long ago. You know about her?"
+
+"A little," nodded the soldier. "I have learned in the school. She was
+a famous saint."
+
+"Not yet a saint," said the priest, earnestly; "the Pope has not yet
+pronounced her a saint. But it will be done soon. Already he has
+declared her among the Blessed Ones. To me she is the most blessed of
+all. She never thought of herself or of a saint's crown. She gave her
+life entire for France. And this is the place that she came from! Think
+of that--right here!"
+
+"I did not know that," said the soldier.
+
+"But yes," the priest went on, kindling. "I tell you it was here that
+the Maid of France received her visions and set out to work. You see
+that village below us--look out through the branches--that is Dom-remy,
+where she was born. That spire just at the edge of the wood--you saw
+that? It is the basilica they have built to her memory. It is full of
+pictures of her. It stands where the old beech-tree, 'Fair May,' used
+to grow. There she heard the voices and saw the saints who sent her on
+her mission. And this is the Gooseberry Spring, the Well of the Good
+Fairies. Here she came with the other children, at the festival of the
+well-dressing, to spread their garlands around it, and sing, and eat
+their supper on the green. Heavenly voices spoke to her, but the others
+did not hear them. Often did she drink of this water. It became a
+fountain of life springing up in her heart. I have come to drink at the
+same source. It will strengthen me as a sacrament. Come, son, let us
+take it together as we go to our duty in battle."
+
+Father Courcy stood up and opened his old black bag. He took out a
+small metal cup. He filled it carefully at the spring. He made the sign
+of the cross over it.
+
+"In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit," he murmured,
+"blessed and holy is this water." Then he held the cup toward the
+soldier. "Come, let us share it and make our vows together."
+
+The bright drops trembled and fell from the bottom of the cup. The
+soldier sat still, his head in his hands.
+
+"No," he answered, heavily, "I cannot take it. I am not worthy. Can a
+man take a sacrament without confessing his sins?"
+
+Father Courcy looked at him with pitying eyes. "I see," he said,
+slowly; "I see, my son. You have a burden on your heart. Well, I will
+stay with you and try to lift it. But first I shall make my own vow."
+
+He raised the cup toward the sky. A tiny brown wren sang canticles of
+rapture in the thicket. A great light came into the priest's face--a
+sun-ray from the east, far beyond the tree-tops.
+
+"Blessed Jeanne d'Arc, I drink from thy fountain in thy name. I vow my
+life to thy cause. Aid me, aid this my son, to fight valiantly for
+freedom and for France. In the name of God, amen."
+
+The soldier looked up at him. Wonder, admiration, and shame were
+struggling in the look. Father Courcy wiped the empty cup carefully and
+put it back in his bag. Then he sat down beside the soldier, laying a
+fatherly hand on his shoulder.
+
+"Now, my son, you shall tell me what is on your heart."
+
+
+
+The Green Confessional
+
+
+For a long time the soldier remained silent. His head was bowed. His
+shoulders drooped. His hands trembled between his knees. He was
+wrestling with himself.
+
+"No," he cried, at last, "I cannot, I dare not tell you. Unless,
+perhaps"--his voice faltered--"you could receive it under the seal of
+confession? But no. How could you do that? Here in the green woods? In
+the open air, beside a spring? Here is no confessional."
+
+"Why not?" asked Father Courcy. "It is a good place, a holy place.
+Heaven is over our heads and very near. I will receive your confession
+here."
+
+The soldier knelt among the flowers. The priest pronounced the sacred
+words. The soldier began his confession:
+
+"I, Pierre Duval, a great sinner, confess my fault, my most grievous
+fault, and pray for pardon." He stopped for a moment and then
+continued, "But first I must tell you, Father, just who I am and where
+I come from and what brings me here."
+
+"Go on, Pierre Duval, go on. That is what I am waiting to hear. Be
+simple and very frank."
+
+"Well, then, I am from the parish of Laucourt, in the pleasant country
+of the Barrois not far from Bar-sur-Aube. My faith, but that is a
+pretty land, full of orchards and berry-gardens! Our old farm there is
+one of the prettiest and one of the best, though it is small. It was
+hard to leave it when the call to the colors came, two years ago. But I
+was glad to go. My heart was high and strong for France. I was in the
+Nth Infantry. We were in the center division under General Foch at the
+battle of the Marne. _Fichtre_! but that was fierce fighting! And what
+a general! He did not know how to spell 'defeat.' He wrote it'
+victory.' Four times we went across that cursed Marsh of Saint-Gond.
+The dried mud was trampled full of dead bodies. The trickling streams
+of water ran red. Four times we were thrown back by the Boches. You
+would have thought that was enough. But the general did not think so.
+We went over again on the fifth day, and that time we stayed. The
+Germans could not stand against us. They broke and ran. The roads where
+we chased them were full of empty wine-bottles. In one village we
+caught three officers and a dozen men dead drunk. _Bigre!_ what a fine
+joke!"
+
+Pierre, leaning back upon his heels, was losing himself in his recital.
+His face lighted up, his hands were waving. Father Courcy bent forward
+with shining eyes.
+
+"Continue," he cried. "This is a beautiful confession--no sin yet.
+Continue, Pierre."
+
+"Well, then, after that we were fighting here and there, on the Aisne,
+on the Ailette, everywhere. Always the same story--Germans rolling down
+on us in flood, green-gray waves. But the foam on them was fire and
+steel. The shells of the barrage swept us like hailstones. We waited,
+waited in our trenches, till the green-gray mob was near enough. Then
+the word came. _Sapristi!_ We let loose with mitrailleuse, rifle,
+field-gun, everything that would throw death. It did not seem like
+fighting with men. It was like trying to stop a monstrous thing, a
+huge, terrible mass that was rushing on to overwhelm us. The waves
+tumbled and broke before they reached us. Sometimes they fell flat.
+Sometimes they turned and rushed the other way. It was wild, wild, like
+a change of the wind and tide in a storm, everything torn and confused.
+Then perhaps the word came to go over the top and at them. That was
+furious. That was fighting with men, for sure--bayonet, revolver,
+rifle-butt, knife, anything that would kill. Often I sickened at the
+blood and the horror of it. But something inside of me shouted: 'Fight
+on! It is for France. It is for "_L'Alouette_," thy farm; for thy wife,
+thy little ones. Wilt thou let them be ruined by those beasts of
+Boches? What are they doing here on French soil? Brigands, butchers,
+Apaches! Drive them out; and if they will not go, kill them so they can
+do no more shameful deeds. Fight on!' So I killed all I could."
+
+The priest nodded his head grimly. "You were right, Pierre; your voice
+spoke true. It was a dreadful duty that you were doing. The Gospel
+tells us, if we are smitten on one cheek we must turn the other. But it
+does not tell us to turn the cheek of a little child, of the woman we
+love, of the country we belong to. No! that would be disgraceful,
+wicked, un-Christian. It would be to betray the innocent! Continue, my
+son."
+
+"Well, then," Pierre went on, his voice deepening and his face growing
+more tense, "then we were sent to Verdun. That was the hottest place of
+all. It was at the top of the big German drive. The whole sea rushed
+and fell on us--big guns, little guns, poison-gas, hand-grenades,
+liquid fire, bayonets, knives, and trench-clubs. Fort after fort went
+down. The whole pack of hell was loose and raging. I thought of that
+crazy, chinless Crown Prince sitting in his safe little cottage hidden
+in the woods somewhere--they say he had flowers and vines planted
+around it--drinking stolen champagne and sicking on his dogs of death.
+He was in no danger. I cursed him in my heart, that blood-lord! The
+shells rained on Verdun. The houses were riddled; the cathedral was
+pierced in a dozen places; a hundred fires broke out. The old citadel
+held good. The outer forts to the north and east were taken. Only the
+last ring was left. We common soldiers did not know much about what was
+happening. The big battle was beyond our horizon. But that General
+Petain, he knew it all. Ah, that is a wise man, I can tell you! He sent
+us to this place or that place where the defense was most needed. We
+went gladly, without fear or holding back. We were resolute that those
+mad dogs should not get through. '_They shall not pass!_' And they did
+not pass!"
+
+"Glorious!" cried the priest, drinking the story in. "And you, Pierre?
+Where were you, what were you doing?"
+
+"I was at Douaumont, that fort on the highest hill of all. The Germans
+took it. It cost them ten thousand men. The ground around it was like a
+wood-yard piled with logs. The big shell-holes were full of corpses.
+There were a few of us that got away. Then our company was sent to hold
+the third redoubt on the slope in front of Fort de Vaux. Perhaps you
+have heard of that redoubt. That was a bitter job. But we held it many
+days and nights. The Bodies pounded us from Douaumont and from the
+village of Vaux. They sent wave after wave up the slope to drive us
+out. But we stuck to it. That ravine of La Cail-lette was a boiling
+caldron of men. It bubbled over with smoke and 'fire. Once, when their
+second wave had broken just in front of us, we went out to hurry the
+fragments down the hill. Then the guns from Douaumont and the village
+of Vaux hammered us. Our men fell like nine-pins. Our lieutenant called
+to us to turn back. Just then a shell tore away his right leg at the
+knee. It hung by the skin and tendons. He was a brave lad. I could not
+leave him to die there. So I hoisted him on my back. Three shots struck
+me. They felt just like hard blows from a heavy fist. One of them made
+my left arm powerless. I sank my teeth in the sleeve of my lieutenant's
+coat as it hung over my shoulder. I must not let him fall off my back.
+Somehow--God knows how--I gritted through to our redoubt. They took my
+lieutenant from my shoulders. And then the light went out."
+
+The priest leaned forward, his hands stretched out around the soldier.
+"But you are a hero," he cried. "Let me embrace you!"
+
+The soldier drew back, shaking his head sadly. "No," he said, his voice
+breaking--"no, my father, you must not embrace me now. I may have been
+a brave man once. But now I am a coward. Let me tell you everything. My
+wounds were bad, but not desperate. The _brancardiers_ carried me down
+to Verdun, at night, I suppose, but I was unconscious; and so to the
+hospital at Vaudelaincourt. There were days and nights of blankness
+mixed with pain. Then I came to my senses and had rest. It was
+wonderful. I thought that I had died and gone to heaven. Would God it
+had been so! Then I should have been with my lieutenant. They told me
+he had passed away in the redoubt. But that hospital was beautiful, so
+clean and quiet and friendly. Those white nurses were angels. They
+handled me like a baby. I would have liked to stay there. I had no
+desire to get better. But I did. One day several officers visited the
+hospital. They came to my cot, where I was sitting up. The highest of
+them brought out a Cross of War and pinned it on the breast of my
+nightshirt. 'There,' he said, 'you are decorated, Pierre Duval! You are
+one of the heroes of France. You are soon going to be perfectly well
+and to fight again bravely for your country.' I thanked him, but I knew
+better. My body might get perfectly well, but something in my soul was
+broken. It was worn out. The thin spring had snapped. I could never
+fight again. Any loud noise made me shake all over. I knew that I could
+never face a battle--impossible! I should certainly lose my nerve and
+run away. It is a damned feeling, that broken something inside of one.
+I can't describe it."
+
+Pierre stopped for a moment and moistened his dry lips with the tip of
+his tongue.
+
+"I know," said Father Courcy. "I understand perfectly what you want to
+say. It was like being lost and thinking that nothing could save you; a
+feeling that is piercing and dull at the same time, like a heavy weight
+pressing on you with sharp stabs in it.    It was what they call
+shellshock, a terrible thing. Sometimes it drives men crazy for a
+while. But the doctors know what to do for that malady. It passes. You
+got over it."
+
+"No," answered Pierre, "the doctors may not have known that I had it.
+At all events, they did not know what to do for it. It did not pass. It
+grew worse. But I hid it, talking very little, never telling anybody
+how I felt. They said I was depressed and needed cheering up. All the
+while there was that black snake coiled around my heart, squeezing
+tighter and tighter. But my body grew stronger every day. The wounds
+were all healed. I was walking around. In July the doctor-in-chief sent
+for me to his office. He said: 'You are cured, Pierre Duval, but you
+are not yet fit to fight. You are low in your mind. You need cheering
+up. You are to have a month's furlough and repose. You shall go home to
+your farm. How is it that you call it?' I suppose I had been babbling
+about it in my sleep and one of the nurses had told him.  He was always
+that way, that little Doctor Roselly, taking an interest in the men,
+talking with them and acting friendly. I said the farm was called
+'_L'Alouette_'--rather a foolish name. 'Not at all,' he answered; 'it
+is a fine name, with the song of a bird in it. Well, you are going back
+to "_L'Alouette_" to hear the lark sing for a month, to kiss your wife
+and your children, to pick gooseberries and currants. Eh, my boy, what
+do you think of that? Then, when the month is over, you will be a new
+man. You will be ready to fight again at Verdun. Remember, they have
+not passed and they shall not pass! Good luck to you, Pierre Duval.' So
+I went back to the farm as fast as I could go."
+
+He was silent for a few moments, letting his thoughts wander through
+the pleasant paths of that little garden of repose. His eyes were
+dreaming, his lips almost smiled.
+
+"It was sweet at '_L'Alouette_,' very sweet, Father. The farm was in
+pretty good order and the kitchen-garden was all right, though the
+flowers had been a little neglected. You see, my wife, Josephine, she
+is a very clever woman. She had kept up the things that were the most
+necessary. She had hired one of the old neighbors and a couple of boys
+to help her with the plowing and planting. The harvest she sold as it
+stood. Our yoke of cream-colored oxen and the roan horse were in good
+condition. Little Pierrot, who is five, and little Josette, who is
+three, were as brown as berries. They hugged me almost to death. But it
+was Josephine herself who was the best of all. She is only twenty-six,
+Father, and so beautiful still, with her long chestnut hair and her
+eyes like brown stones shining under the waters of a brook. I tell you
+it was good to get her in my arms again and feel her lips on mine. And
+to wake in the early morning, while the birds were singing, and see her
+face beside me on the white pillow, sleeping like a child, that was a
+little bit of Paradise. But I do wrong to tell you of all this,
+Father."
+
+"Proceed, my big boy," nodded the priest. "You are saying nothing
+wrong. I was a man before I was a priest. It is all natural, what you
+are saying, and all according to God's law--no sin in it. Proceed. Did
+your happiness do you good?"
+
+Pierre shook his head doubtfully. The look of dejection came back to
+his face. He frowned as if something puzzled and hurt him. "Yes and no!
+That is the strange thing. It made me thankful--that goes without
+saying. But it did not make me any stronger in my heart. Perhaps it was
+too sweet. I thought too much of it. I could not bear to think of
+anything else. The idea of the war was hateful, horrible, disgusting.
+The noise and the dirt of it, the mud in the autumn and the bitter cold
+in the winter, the rats and the lice in the dugouts! And then the fury
+of the charge, and the everlasting killing, killing, or being killed!
+The danger had seemed little or nothing to me when I was there. But at
+a distance it was frightful, unendurable.  I knew that I could never
+stand up to it again. Besides, already I had done my share--enough for
+two or three men. Why must I go back into that hell? It was not fair.
+Life was too dear to be risking it all the time. I could not endure it.
+France? France? Of course I love France. But my farm, and my life with
+Josephine and the children mean more to me. The thing that made me a
+good soldier is broken inside me. It is beyond mending."
+
+His voice sank lower and lower. Father Courcy looked at him gravely.
+
+"But your farm is a part of France. You belong to France. He that
+saveth his life shall lose it!"
+
+"Yes, yes, I know. But my farm is such a small part of France. I am
+only one man. What difference does one man make, except to himself?
+Moreover, I had done my part, that was certain. Twenty times, really,
+my life had been lost. Why must I throw it away again? Listen, Father.
+There is a village in the Vosges, near the Swiss border, where a
+relative of mine lives. If I could get to him he would take me in and
+give me some other clothes and help me over the frontier into
+Switzerland. There I could change my name and find work until the war
+is over. That was my plan. So I set out on my journey, following the
+less-traveled roads, tramping by night and sleeping by day. Thus I came
+to this spring at the same time as you by chance, by pure chance. Do
+you see?"
+
+Father Courcy looked very stern and seemed about to speak in anger.
+Then he shook his head and said, quietly: "No, I do not see that at
+all. It remains to be seen whether it was by chance. But tell me more
+about your sin. Did you let your wife, Josephine, know what you were
+going to do? Did you tell her good-by, parting for Switzerland?"
+
+"Why, no! I did not dare. She would never have forgiven me. So I
+slipped down to the post-office at Bar-sur-Aube and stole a telegraph
+blank. It was ten days before my furlough was out. I wrote a message to
+myself calling me back to the colors at once. I showed it to her. Then
+I said good-by. I wept. She did not cry one tear. Her eyes were stars.
+She embraced me a dozen times. She lifted up each of the children to
+hug me. Then she cried: 'Go now, my brave man. Fight well. Drive the
+damned Boches out. It is for us and for France. God protect you. _Au
+revoir!_' I went down the road silent. I felt like a dog. But I could
+not help it."
+
+"And you were a dog," said the priest, sternly. "That is what you were,
+and what you remain unless you can learn to help it. You lied to your
+wife. You forged; you tricked her who trusted you. You have done the
+thing which you yourself say she would never forgive. If she loves you
+and prays for you now, you have stolen that love and that prayer. You
+are a thief. A true daughter of France could never love a coward
+to-day."
+
+"I know, I know," sobbed Pierre, burying his face in the weeds. "Yet I
+did it partly for her, and I could not do otherwise."
+
+"Very little for her and a hundred times for yourself," said the
+priest, indignantly. "Be honest. If there was a little bit of love for
+her, it was the kind of love she did not want. She would spit upon it.
+If you are going to Switzerland now you are leaving her forever. You
+can never go back to Josephine again. You are a deserter. She would
+cast you out, coward!"
+
+The broken soldier lay very still, almost as if he were dead. Then he
+rose slowly to his feet, with a pale, set face. He put his hand behind
+his back and drew out a revolver. "It is true," he said, slowly, "I am
+a coward. But not altogether such a coward as you think, Father. It is
+not merely death that I fear. I could face that, I think. Here, take
+this pistol and shoot me now! No one will know. You can say that you
+shot a deserter, or that I attacked you. Shoot me now, Father, and let
+me out of this trouble."
+
+Father Courcy looked at him with amazement. Then he took the pistol,
+uncocked it cautiously, and dropped it behind him. He turned to Pierre
+and regarded him curiously. "Go on with your confession, Pierre. Tell
+me about this strange kind of cowardice which can face death."
+
+The soldier dropped on his knees again, and went on, in a low, shaken
+voice: "It is this, Father. By my broken soul, this is the very root of
+it. _I am afraid of fear_."
+
+The priest thought for an instant. "But that is not reasonable, Pierre.
+It is nonsense. Fear cannot hurt you. If you fight it you can conquer
+it. At least you can disregard it, march through it, as if it were not
+there."
+
+"Not this fear," argued the soldier, with a peasant's obstinacy. "This
+is something very big and dreadful. It has no shape, but a dead-white
+face and red, blazing eyes full of hate and scorn. I have seen it in
+the dark. It is stronger than I am. Since something is broken inside of
+me, I know I can never conquer it. No, it would wrap its shapeless arms
+around me and stab me to the heart with its fiery eyes. I should turn
+and run in the middle of the battle. I should trample on my wounded
+comrades. I should be shot in the back and die in disgrace. O my God!
+my God! who can save me from this? It is horrible. I cannot bear it."
+
+The priest laid his hand gently on Pierre's quivering shoulder.
+"Courage, my son!"
+
+"I have none."
+
+"Then say to yourself that fear is nothing."
+
+"It would be a lie. This fear is real."
+
+"Then cease to tremble at it; kill it."
+
+"Impossible. I am afraid of fear."
+
+"Then carry it as your burden, your cross. Take it back to Verdun with
+you."
+
+"I dare not. It would poison the others. It would bring me dishonor."
+
+"Pray to God for help."
+
+"He will not answer me. I am a wicked man. Father, I have made my
+confession. Will you give me a penance and absolve me?"
+
+"Promise to go back to the army and fight as well as you can."
+
+"Alas! that is what I cannot do. My mind is shaken to pieces. Whither
+shall I turn? I can decide nothing. I am broken. I repent of my great
+sin. Father, for the love of God, speak the word of absolution."
+
+Pierre lay on his face, motionless, his arms stretched out. The priest
+rose and went to the spring. He scooped up a few drops in the hollow of
+his hand. He sprinkled it like holy water upon the soldier's head. A
+couple of tears fell with it.
+
+"God have pity on you, my son, and bring you back to yourself. The word
+of absolution is not for me to speak while you think of forsaking
+France. Put that thought away from you, do penance for it, and you will
+be absolved from your great sin."
+
+Pierre turned over and lay looking up at the priest's face and at the
+blue sky with white clouds drifting across it. He sighed. "Ah, if that
+could only be! But I have not the strength. It is impossible."
+
+"All things are possible to him that believeth. Strength will come.
+Perhaps Jeanne d'Arc herself will help you."
+
+"She would never speak to a man like me. She is a great saint, very
+high in heaven."
+
+"She was a farmer's lass, a peasant like yourself. She would speak to
+you, gladly and kindly, if you saw her, and in your own language, too.
+Trust her."
+
+"But I do not know enough about her."
+
+"Listen, Pierre. I have thought for you. I will appoint the first part
+of your penance. You shall take the risk of being recognized and
+caught. You shall go down to that village there and visit the places
+that belong to her--her basilica, her house, her church. Then you shall
+come back here and wait until you know--until you surely know what you
+must do. Will you promise this?"
+
+Pierre had risen and looked up at the priest with tear-stained face.
+But his eyes were quieter. "Yes, Father, I can promise you this much
+faithfully."
+
+"Now I must go my way. Farewell, my son. Peace in war be with you." He
+held out his hand.
+
+Pierre took it reverently. "And with you, Father," he murmured.
+
+
+
+The Absolving Dream
+
+
+Antoine Courcy was one of those who are fitted and trained by nature
+for the cure of souls. If you had spoken to him of psychiatry he would
+not have understood you. The long word would have been Greek to him.
+But the thing itself he knew well. The preliminary penance which he
+laid upon Pierre Duval was remedial. It belonged to the true healing
+art, which works first in the spirit.
+
+When the broken soldier went down the hill, in the blaze of the
+mid-morning sunlight, towards Domremey, there was much misgiving and
+confusion in his thoughts. He did not comprehend why he was going,
+except that he had promised. He was not sure that some one might not
+know him, or perhaps out of mere curiosity stop him and question him.
+It was a reluctant journey.
+
+Yet it was in effect an unconscious pilgrimage to the one health-resort
+that his soul needed. For Domremy and the region round about are
+saturated with the most beautiful story of France. The life of Jeanne
+d'Arc, simple and mysterious, humble and glorious, most human and most
+heavenly, flows under that place like a hidden stream, rising at every
+turn in springs and fountains. The poor little village lives in and for
+her memory. Her presence haunts the ridges and the woods, treads the
+green pastures, follows the white road beside the river, and breathes
+in the never-resting valley-wind that marries the flowers in June and
+spreads their seed in August.
+
+At the small basilica built to her memory on the place where her old
+beech-tree, "Fair May," used to stand there was an ancient caretaker
+who explained to Pierre the pictures from the life of the Maid with
+which the walls are decorated. They are stiff and conventional, but the
+old man found them wonderful and told with zest the story of _La
+Pucelle_--how she saw her first vision; how she recognized the Dauphin
+in his palace at Chinon; how she broke the siege of Orleans; how she
+saw Charles crowned in the cathedral at Rheims; how she was burned at
+the stake in Rouen. But they could not kill her soul. She saved France.
+
+In the village church there was a priest from the border of Alsace,
+also a pilgrim like Pierre, but one who knew the shrine better. He
+showed the difference between the new and the old parts of the
+building. Certain things the Maid herself had seen and touched.
+"Here is the old holy-water basin, an antique, broken column hollowed
+out on top. Here her fingers must have rested often. Before this
+ancient statue of Saint Michel she must have often knelt to say her
+prayers. The cure of the parish was a friend of hers and loved to talk
+with her. She was a good girl, devout and obedient, not learned, but a
+holy and great soul. She saved France."
+
+In the house where she was born, and passed her childhood, a crippled
+old woman was custodian. It was a humble dwelling of plastered stone,
+standing between two tall fir-trees, with ivy growing over the walls,
+lilies and hollyhocks blooming in the garden. Pierre found it not half
+so good a house as "_L'Alouette_." But to the custodian it was more
+precious than a palace. In this upper room with its low mullioned
+window the Maid began her life. Here, in the larger room below, is the
+kneeling statue which the Princess Marie d'Orleans made of her. Here,
+to the right, under the sloping roof, with its worm-eaten beams, she
+slept and prayed and worked.
+
+"See, here is the bread-board between two timbers where she cut the
+bread for the _croute-au-pot_. From this small window she looked at
+night and saw the sanctuary light burning in the church. Here, also, as
+well as in the garden and in the woods, her heavenly voices spoke to
+her and told her what she must do for the king and her country. She was
+not afraid or ashamed, though she lived in so small a house. Here in
+this very room she braided her hair and put on her red dress, and set
+forth on foot for her visit to Robert de Baudricourt at Vaucouleurs. He
+was a rough man and at first he received her roughly. But at last she
+convinced him. He gave her a horse and arms and sent her to the king.
+She saved France."
+
+[Illustration]
+
+At the rustic inn Pierre at thick slices of dark bread and drank a
+stoup of thin red wine at noon. He sat at a bare table in the corner of
+the room. Behind him, at a table covered with a white cloth, two
+captains on furlough had already made their breakfast. They also were
+pilgrims, drawn by the love of Jeanne d'Arc to Domremy. They talked of
+nothing else but of her. Yet their points of view were absolutely
+different.
+
+One of them, the younger, was short and swarthy, a Savoyard, the son of
+an Italian doctor at St. Jean de Maurienne. He was a skeptic; he
+believed in Jeanne, but not in the legends about her.
+
+"I tell you," said he, eagerly, "she was one of the greatest among
+women. But all that about her 'voices' was illusion. The priests
+suggested it. She had hallucinations. Remember her age when they
+began--just thirteen. She was clever and strong; doubtless she was
+pretty; certainly she was very courageous. She was only a girl. But she
+had a big, brave idea which--the liberation of her country. Pure? Yes.
+I am sure she was virtuous. Otherwise the troops would not have
+followed and obeyed her as they did. Soldiers are very quick about
+those things. They recognize and respect an honest woman. Several men
+were in love with her, I think. But she was '_une nature froide_.' The
+only thing that moved her was her big, brave idea--to save France. The
+Maid was a mother, but not of a mortal child. Her offspring was the
+patriotism of France."
+
+The other captain was a man of middle age, from Lyons, the son of an
+architect. He was tall and pale and his large brown eyes had the
+tranquillity of a devout faith in them. He argued with quiet tenacity
+for his convictions.
+
+"You are right to believe in her," said he, "but I think you are
+mistaken to deny her voices. They were as real as anything in her life.
+You credit her when she says that she was born here, that she went to
+Chinon and saw the king, that she delivered Orleans. Why not credit her
+when she says she heard God and the saints speaking to her? The proof
+of it was in what she did. Have you read the story of her trial? How
+clear and steady her answers were! The judges could not shake her. Yet
+at any moment she could have saved her life by denying the voices. It
+was because she knew, because she was sure, that she could not deny.
+Her vision was a part of her real life. She was the mother of French
+patriotism--yes. But she was also the daughter of true faith. That was
+her power."
+
+"Well," said the younger man, "she sacrificed herself and she saved
+France. That was the great thing."
+
+"Yes," said the elder man, stretching his hand across the table to
+clasp the hand of his companion, "there is nothing greater than that.
+If we do that, God will forgive us all."
+
+They put on their caps to go. Pierre rose and stood at attention. They
+returned his salute with a friendly smile and passed out.
+
+After a few moments he finished his bread and wine, paid his score, and
+followed them. He watched them going down the village street toward the
+railway station. Then he turned and walked slowly back to the spring in
+the dell.
+
+The afternoon was hot, in spite of the steady breeze which came out of
+the north. The air felt as if it had passed through a furnace. The low,
+continuous thunder of the guns rolled up from Verdun, with now and then
+a sharper clap from St. Mihiel.
+
+Pierre was very tired. His head was heavy, his heart troubled. He lay
+down among the ferns, looking idly at the foxglove spires above him and
+turning over in his mind the things he had heard and seen at Domremy.
+Presently he fell into a profound sleep.
+
+How long it was he could not tell, but suddenly he became aware of some
+one near him. He sprang up. A girl was standing beside the spring.
+
+She wore a bright-red dress and her feet were bare. Her black hair hung
+down her back. Her eyes were the color of a topaz. Her form was tall
+and straight. She carried a distaff under her arm and looked as if she
+had just come from following the sheep.
+
+"Good day, shepherdess," said Pierre. Then a strange thought struck him
+and he fell on his knees. "Pardon, lady," he stammered. "Forgive my
+rudeness. You are of the high society of heaven, a saint. You are
+called Jeanne d'Arc?"
+
+She nodded and smiled. "That is my name," said she. "Sometimes they
+call me _La Pucelle_, or the Maid of France. But you were right, I am a
+shepherdess, too. I have kept my father's sheep in the fields down
+there, and spun from the distaff while I watched them. I knew how to
+sew and spin as well as any girl in the Barrois or Lorraine. Will you
+not stand up and talk with me?"
+
+Pierre rose, still abashed and confused. He did not quite understand
+how to take this strange experience--too simple for a heavenly
+apparition, too real for a common dream.
+
+"Well, then," said he, "if you are a shepherdess why are you here?
+There are no sheep here."
+
+"But yes. You are one of mine. I have come here to seek you."
+
+"Do you know me, then? How can I be one of yours?"
+
+"Because you are a soldier of France and you are in trouble."
+
+Pierre's head drooped. "A broken soldier," he muttered, "not fit to
+speak to you. I am running away because I am afraid of fear."
+
+She threw back her head and laughed. "You speak very bad French. There
+is no such thing as being afraid of fear. For if you are afraid of it,
+you hate it. If you hate it, you will have nothing to do with it. And
+if you have nothing to do with it, it cannot touch you; it is nothing."
+
+"But for you, a saint, it is easy to say that. You had no fear when you
+fought. You knew you would not be killed."
+
+"I was no more sure of that than the other soldiers. Besides, when they
+bound me to the stake at Rouen and kindled the fire around me I knew
+very well that I should be killed. But there was no fear in it. Only
+peace."
+
+"Ah, you were strong, a warrior born. You were not wounded and broken."
+
+"Four times I was wounded," she answered, gravely. "At Orleans a bolt
+went through my right shoulder. At Paris a lance tore my thigh. I never
+saw the blood of Frenchmen flow without feeling my heart stand still. I
+was not a warrior born. I knew not how to ride or fight. But I did it.
+What we must needs do that we can do. Soldier, do not look on the
+ground. Look up."
+
+Then a strange thing took place before his eyes. A wondrous radiance, a
+mist of light, enveloped and hid the shepherdess. When it melted she
+was clad in shining armor, sitting on a white horse, and lifting a bare
+sword in her left hand.
+
+"God commands you," she cried. "It is for France. Be of good cheer. Do
+not retreat. The fort will soon be yours!"
+
+How should Pierre know that this was the cry with which the Maid had
+rallied her broken men at Orleans when the fort of _Les Toutelles_
+fell? What he did know was that something seemed to spring up within
+him to answer that call. He felt that he would rather die than desert
+such a leader.
+
+The figure on the horse turned away as if to go.
+
+"Do not leave me," he cried, stretching out his hands to her. "Stay
+with me. I will obey you joyfully."
+
+She turned again and looked at him very earnestly. Her eyes shone deep
+into his heart. "Here I cannot stay," answered a low, sweet, womanly
+voice. "It is late, and my other children need me."
+
+"But forgiveness? Can you give that to me--a coward?"
+
+"You are no coward. Your only fault was to doubt a brave man."
+
+"And my wife? May I go back and tell her?"
+
+"No, surely. Would you make her hear slander of the man she loves? Be
+what she believes you and she will be satisfied."
+
+"And the absolution, the word of peace? Will you speak that to me?"
+
+Her eyes shone more clearly; the voice sounded sweeter and steadier
+than ever. "After the penance comes the absolution. You will find peace
+only at the lance's point. Son of France, go, go, go! I will help you.
+Go hardily to Verdun."
+
+Pierre sprang forward after the receding figure, tried to clasp the
+knee, the foot of the Maid. As he fell to the ground something sharp
+pierced his hand. It must be her spur, thought he.
+
+Then he was aware that his eyes were shut. He opened them and looked at
+his hand carefully. There was only a scratch on it, and a tiny drop of
+blood. He had torn it on the thorns of the wild-gooseberry bushes.
+
+His head lay close to the clear pool of the spring. He buried his face
+in it, and drank deep. Then he sprang up, shaking the drops from his
+mustache, found his cap and pistol, and hurried up the glen toward the
+old Roman road.
+
+"No more of that damned foolishness about Switzerland," he said, aloud.
+"I belong to France. I am going with the other boys to save her. I was
+born for that." He took off his cap and stood still for a moment. He
+spoke as if he were taking an oath. "By Jeanne d'Arc!"
+
+
+
+The Victorious Penance
+
+
+It never occurred to Pierre Duval, as he trudged those long kilometers
+toward the front, that he was doing a penance.
+
+The joy of a mind made up is a potent cordial.
+
+The greetings of comrades on the road put gladness into his heart and
+strength into his legs.
+
+It was a hot and dusty journey, and a sober one. But it was not a sad
+on. He was doing that which France asked of him, that which God told
+him to do. Josephine would be proud of him. He would never be ashamed
+to meet her eyes. As he went, alone or in company with others, he
+whistled and sand a bit. He thought of "_L'Alouette_" a good deal. But
+not too much. He thought also of the forts of Douaumont and Vaux.
+
+"_Dame!_" he cried to himself. "If I could help to win them back again!
+That would be fine! How sick that would make those cursed Bodies and
+their knock-kneed Crown Prince!"
+
+At the little village of the headquarters behind Verdun he found many
+old friends and companions. They greeted him with cheerful irony.
+
+"Behold the prodigal! You took your time about coming back, didn't you?
+Was the hospital to your taste, the nurses pretty? How is the wife? Any
+more children? How goes it, old man?"
+
+"No more children yet," he answered, grinning; "but all goes well. I
+have come back from a far country, but I find the pigs are still
+grunting. What have you done to our old cook?"
+
+"Nothing at all," was the joyous reply. "He tried to swim in his own
+soup and he was drowned."
+
+When Pierre reported to the officer of the day, that busy functionary
+consulted the record.
+
+"You are a day ahead of your time, Pierre Duval," he said, frowning
+slightly.
+
+"Yes, sir," answered the soldier. "It costs less to be a day ahead than
+a day too late."
+
+"That is well," said the officer, smiling in his red beard. "You will
+report to-morrow to your regiment at the citadel. You have a new
+colonel, but the regiment is busy in the old way."
+
+As Pierre saluted and turned to go out his eye caught the look of a
+general officer who stood near, watching. He was a square, alert,
+vigorous man, his face bronzed by the suns of many African campaigns,
+his eyes full of intelligence, humor, and courage. It was Guillaumat,
+the new commander of the Army of Verdun.
+
+"You are prompt, my son," said he, pleasantly, "but you must remember
+not to be in a hurry.   You have been in hospital. Are you well again?
+Nothing broken?"
+
+"Something was broken, my General," responded the soldier, gravely,
+"but it is mended."
+
+"Good!" said the general. "Now for the front, to beat the Germans at
+their own game. '_We shall get them_.' It may be long, but we shall get
+them!"
+
+That was the autumn of the offensive of 1916, by which the French
+retook, in ten days, what it had cost the Germans many months to gain.
+
+Pierre was there in that glorious charge in the end of October which
+carried the heights of Douaumont and took six thousand prisoners. He
+was there at the recapture of the Fort de Vaux which the Germans
+evacuated in the first week of November. In the last rush up the slope,
+where he had fought long ago, a stray shell, an inscrutable messenger
+of fate, coming from far away, no one knows whence, caught him and
+ripped him horribly across the body.
+
+It was a desperate mass of wounds. But the men of his squad loved their
+corporal. He still breathed. They saw to it that he was carried back to
+the little transit hospital just behind the Fort de Souville.
+
+It was a rude hut of logs, covered with sand-bags, on the slope of the
+hill. The ruined woods around it were still falling to the crash of
+far-thrown shells. In the close, dim shelter of the inner room Pierre
+came to himself.
+
+He looked up into the face of Father Courcy. A light of recognition and
+gratitude flickered in his eyes. It was like finding an old friend in
+the dark.
+
+"Welcome!--But the fort?" he gasped.
+
+"It is ours," said the priest.
+
+Something like a smile passed over the face of Pierre. He could not
+speak for a long time. The blood in his throat choked him. At last he
+whispered:
+
+"Tell Josephine--love."
+
+Father Courcy bowed his head and took Pierre's hand. "Surely," he said.
+"But now, my dear son Pierre, I must prepare you--"
+
+The struggling voice from the cot broke in, whispering slowly, with
+long intervals: "Not necessary. . . . I know it already. . . . The
+penance. . . . France. . . . Jeanne d'Arc. . . . It is done."
+
+A few drops of blood gushed from the corner of his mouth. The look of
+peace that often comes to those who die of gunshot wounds settled on
+his face. His eyes grew still as the priest laid the sacred wafer on
+his lips. The broken soldier was made whole.
+
+
+
+***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE BROKEN SOLDIER AND THE MAID OF
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