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diff --git a/24349.txt b/24349.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..8d4af09 --- /dev/null +++ b/24349.txt @@ -0,0 +1,1748 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Coming Home, by Edith Wharton + +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: Coming Home + 1916 + +Author: Edith Wharton + +Release Date: January 17, 2008 [EBook #24349] +[Last updated: September 18, 2017]] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK COMING HOME *** + + + + +Produced by David Widger + + + + + +COMING HOME + +By Edith Wharton + +Copyright, 1916, By Charles Scribner's Sons + + + + +I + +The young men of our American Relief Corps are beginning to come back +from the front with stories. + +There was no time to pick them up during the first months--the whole +business was too wild and grim. The horror has not decreased, but nerves +and sight are beginning to be disciplined to it. In the earlier days, +moreover, such fragments of experience as one got were torn from their +setting like bits of flesh scattered by shrapnel. Now things that seemed +disjointed are beginning to link themselves together, and the broken +bones of history are rising from the battle-fields. + +I can't say that, in this respect, all the members of the Relief Corps +have made the most of their opportunity. Some are unobservant, or +perhaps simply inarticulate; others, when going beyond the bald +statistics of their job, tend to drop into sentiment and cinema scenes; +and none but H. Macy Greer has the gift of making the thing told seem as +true as if one had seen it. So it is on H. Macy Greer that I depend, +and when his motor dashes him back to Paris for supplies I never fail to +hunt him down and coax him to my rooms for dinner and a long cigar. + +Greer is a small hard-muscled youth, with pleasant manners, a +sallow face, straight hemp-coloured hair and grey eyes of unexpected +inwardness. He has a voice like thick soup, and speaks with the slovenly +drawl of the new generation of Americans, dragging his words along like +reluctant dogs on a string, and depriving his narrative of every shade +of expression that intelligent intonation gives. But his eyes see so +much that they make one see even what his foggy voice obscures. + +Some of his tales are dark and dreadful, some are unutterably sad, and +some end in a huge laugh of irony. I am not sure how I ought to classify +the one I have written down here. + + + + +II + +ON my first dash to the Northern fighting line--Greer told me the other +night--I carried supplies to an ambulance where the surgeon asked me to +have a talk with an officer who was badly wounded and fretting for news +of his people in the east of France. + +He was a young Frenchman, a cavalry lieutenant, trim and slim, with a +pleasant smile and obstinate blue eyes that I liked. He looked as if +he could hold on tight when it was worth his while. He had had a leg +smashed, poor devil, in the first fighting in Flanders, and had been +dragging on for weeks in the squalid camp-hospital where I found him. He +didn't waste any words on himself, but began at once about his family. +They were living, when the war broke out, at their country-place in +the Vosges; his father and mother, his sister, just eighteen, and his +brother Alain, two years younger. His father, the Comte de Rechamp, +had married late in life, and was over seventy: his mother, a good deal +younger, was crippled with rheumatism; and there was, besides--to +round off the group--a helpless but intensely alive and domineering +old grandmother about whom all the others revolved. You know how French +families hang together, and throw out branches that make new roots but +keep hold of the central trunk, like that tree--what's it called?--that +they give pictures of in books about the East. + +Jean de Rechamp--that was my lieutenant's name--told me his family was +a typical case. "We're very _province_," he said. "My people live +at Rechamp all the year. We have a house at Nancy--rather a fine old +hotel--but my parents go there only once in two or three years, for a +few weeks. That's our 'season.'...Imagine the point of view! Or rather +don't, because you couldn't...." (He had been about the world a good +deal, and known something of other angles of vision.) + +Well, of this helpless exposed little knot of people he had had no +word--simply nothing--since the first of August. He was at home, staying +with them at Rechamp, when war broke out. He was mobilised the first +day, and had only time to throw his traps into a cart and dash to the +station. His depot was on the other side of France, and communications +with the East by mail and telegraph were completely interrupted during +the first weeks. His regiment was sent at once to the fighting line, +and the first news he got came to him in October, from a communique in +a Paris paper a month old, saying: "The enemy yesterday retook Rechamp." +After that, dead silence: and the poor devil left in the trenches to +digest that "_retook_"! + +There are thousands and thousands of just such cases; and men bearing +them, and cracking jokes, and hitting out as hard as they can. Jean +de Rechamp knew this, and tried to crack jokes too--but he got his leg +smashed just afterward, and ever since he'd been lying on a straw pallet +under a horse-blanket, saying to himself: "_Rechamp retaken_." + +"Of course," he explained with a weary smile, "as long as you can tot +up your daily bag in the trenches it's a sort of satisfaction--though +I don't quite know why; anyhow, you're so dead-beat at night that no +dreams come. But lying here staring at the ceiling one goes through the +whole business once an hour, at the least: the attack, the slaughter, +the ruins...and worse.... Haven't I seen and heard things enough on +_this_ side to know what's been happening on the other? Don't try to +sugar the dose. I _like_ it bitter." + +I was three days in the neighbourhood, and I went back every day to see +him. He liked to talk to me because he had a faint hope of my getting +news of his family when I returned to Paris. I hadn't much myself, but +there was no use telling him so. Besides, things change from day to day, +and when we parted I promised to get word to him as soon as I could +find out anything. We both knew, of course, that that would not be till +Rechamp was taken a third time--by his own troops; and perhaps soon +after that, I should be able to get there, or near there, and make +enquiries myself. To make sure that I should forget nothing, he drew +the family photographs from under his pillow, and handed them over: +the little witch-grandmother, with a face like a withered walnut, the +father, a fine broken-looking old boy with a Roman nose and a weak chin, +the mother, in crape, simple, serious and provincial, the little sister +ditto, and Alain, the young brother--just the age the brutes have been +carrying off to German prisons--an over-grown thread-paper boy with too +much forehead and eyes, and not a muscle in his body. A charming-looking +family, distinguished and amiable; but all, except the grandmother, +rather usual. The kind of people who come in sets. + +As I pocketed the photographs I noticed that another lay face down by +his pillow. "Is that for me too?" I asked. + +He coloured and shook his head, and I felt I had blundered. But after a +moment he turned the photograph over and held it out. + +"It's the young girl I am engaged to. She was at Rechamp visiting my +parents when war was declared; but she was to leave the day after I +did...." He hesitated. "There may have been some difficulty about her +going.... I should like to be sure she got away.... Her name is Yvonne +Malo." + +He did not offer me the photograph, and I did not need it. That girl had +a face of her own! Dark and keen and splendid: a type so different +from the others that I found myself staring. If he had not said "_ma +fiancee_" I should have understood better. After another pause he went +on: "I will give you her address in Paris. She has no family: she lives +alone--she is a musician. Perhaps you may find her there." His colour +deepened again as he added: "But I know nothing--I have had no news of +her either." + +To ease the silence that followed I suggested: "But if she has no +family, wouldn't she have been likely to stay with your people, and +wouldn't that be the reason of your not hearing from her?" + +"Oh, no--I don't think she stayed." He seemed about to add: "If she +could help it," but shut his lips and slid the picture out of sight. + +As soon as I got back to Paris I made enquiries, but without result. +The Germans had been pushed back from that particular spot after a +fortnight's intermittent occupation; but their lines were close by, +across the valley, and Rechamp was still in a net of trenches. No one +could get to it, and apparently no news could come from it. For the +moment, at any rate, I found it impossible to get in touch with the +place. + +My enquiries about Mlle. Malo were equally unfruitful. I went to the +address Rechamp had given me, somewhere off in Passy, among gardens, in +what they call a "Square," no doubt because it's oblong: a kind of long +narrow court with aesthetic-looking studio buildings round it. Mlle. +Malo lived in one of them, on the top floor, the concierge said, and +I looked up and saw a big studio window, and a roof-terrace with dead +gourds dangling from a pergola. But she wasn't there, she hadn't been +there, and they had no news of her. I wrote to Rechamp of my double +failure, he sent me back a line of thanks; and after that for a long +while I heard no more of him. + +By the beginning of November the enemy's hold had begun to loosen in the +Argonne and along the Vosges, and one day we were sent off to the +East with a couple of ambulances. Of course we had to have military +chauffeurs, and the one attached to my ambulance happened to be a fellow +I knew. The day before we started, in talking over our route with him, +I said: "I suppose we can manage to get to Rechamp now?" He looked +puzzled--it was such a little place that he'd forgotten the name. "Why +do you want to get there?" he wondered. I told him, and he gave an +exclamation. "Good God! Of course--but how extraordinary! Jean de +Rechamp's here now, in Paris, too lame for the front, and driving +a motor." We stared at each other, and he went on: "He must take my +place--he must go with you. I don't know how it can be done; but done it +shall be." + +Done it was, and the next morning at daylight I found Jean de Rechamp at +the wheel of my car. He looked another fellow from the wreck I had left +in the Flemish hospital; all made over, and burning with activity, but +older, and with lines about his eyes. He had had news from his people in +the interval, and had learned that they were still at Rechamp, and well. +What was more surprising was that Mlle. Malo was with them--had never +left. Alain had been got away to England, where he remained; but none of +the others had budged. They had fitted up an ambulance in the chateau, +and Mlle. Malo and the little sister were nursing the wounded. There +were not many details in the letters, and they had been a long time on +the way; but their tone was so reassuring that Jean could give himself +up to unclouded anticipation. You may fancy if he was grateful for the +chance I was giving him; for of course he couldn't have seen his people +in any other way. + +Our permits, as you know, don't as a rule let us into the firing-line: +we only take supplies to second-line ambulances, and carry back the +badly wounded in need of delicate operations. So I wasn't in the least +sure we should be allowed to go to Rechamp--though I had made up my mind +to get there, anyhow. + +We were about a fortnight on the way, coming and going in Champagne and +the Argonne, and that gave us time to get to know each other. It was +bitter cold, and after our long runs over the lonely frozen hills we +used to crawl into the cafe of the inn--if there was one--and talk and +talk. We put up in fairly rough places, generally in a farm house or a +cottage packed with soldiers; for the villages have all remained empty +since the autumn, except when troops are quartered in them. Usually, to +keep warm, we had to go up after supper to the room we shared, and +get under the blankets with our clothes on. Once some jolly Sisters +of Charity took us in at their Hospice, and we slept two nights in +an ice-cold whitewashed cell--but what tales we heard around their +kitchen-fire! The Sisters had stayed alone to face the Germans, had seen +the town burn, and had made the Teutons turn the hose on the singed +roof of their Hospice and beat the fire back from it. It's a pity those +Sisters of Charity can't marry.... + +Rechamp told me a lot in those days. I don't believe he was talkative +before the war, but his long weeks in hospital, starving for news, had +unstrung him. And then he was mad with excitement at getting back to his +own place. In the interval he'd heard how other people caught in their +country-houses had fared--you know the stories we all refused to believe +at first, and that we now prefer not to think about.... Well, he'd been +thinking about those stories pretty steadily for some months; and he +kept repeating: "My people say they're all right--but they give no +details." + +"You see," he explained, "there never were such helpless beings. Even if +there had been time to leave, they couldn't have done it. My mother +had been having one of her worst attacks of rheumatism--she was in bed, +helpless, when I left. And my grandmother, who is a demon of activity in +the house, won't stir out of it. We haven't been able to coax her into +the garden for years. She says it's draughty; and you know how we all +feel about draughts! As for my father, he hasn't had to decide anything +since the Comte de Chambord refused to adopt the tricolour. My father +decided that he was right, and since then there has been nothing +particular for him to take a stand about. But I know how he behaved just +as well as if I'd been there--he kept saying: 'One must act--one +must act!' and sitting in his chair and doing nothing. Oh, I'm not +disrespectful: they were _like_ that in his generation! Besides--it's +better to laugh at things, isn't it?" And suddenly his face would +darken.... + +On the whole, however, his spirits were good till we began to traverse +the line of ruined towns between Sainte Menehould and Bar-le-Duc. "This +is the way the devils came," he kept saying to me; and I saw he was hard +at work picturing the work they must have done in his own neighbourhood. + +"But since your sister writes that your people are safe!" + +"They may have made her write that to reassure me. They'd heard I was +badly wounded. And, mind you, there's never been a line from my mother." + +"But you say your mother's hands are so lame that she can't hold a pen. +And wouldn't Mlle. Malo have written you the truth?" + +At that his frown would lift. "Oh, yes. She would despise any attempt at +concealment." + +"Well, then--what the deuce is the matter?" + +"It's when I see these devils' traces--" he could only mutter. + +One day, when we had passed through a particularly devastated little +place, and had got from the cure some more than usually abominable +details of things done there, Rechamp broke out to me over the +kitchen-fire of our night's lodging. "When I hear things like that I +don't believe anybody who tells me my people are all right!" + +"But you know well enough," I insisted, "that the Germans are not all +alike--that it all depends on the particular officer...." + +"Yes, yes, I know," he assented, with a visible effort at impartiality. +"Only, you see--as one gets nearer...." He went on to say that, when he +had been sent from the ambulance at the front to a hospital at Moulins, +he had been for a day or two in a ward next to some wounded German +soldiers--bad cases, they were--and had heard them talking. They didn't +know he knew German, and he had heard things.... There was one name +always coming back in their talk, von Scharlach, Oberst von Scharlach. +One of them, a young fellow, said: "I wish now I'd cut my hand off +rather than do what he told us to that night.... Every time the fever +comes I see it all again. I wish I'd been struck dead first." They all +said "Scharlach" with a kind of terror in their voices, as if he might +hear them even there, and come down on them horribly. Rechamp had asked +where their regiment came from, and had been told: From the Vosges. +That had set his brain working, and whenever he saw a ruined village, or +heard a tale of savagery, the Scharlach nerve began to quiver. At such +times it was no use reminding him that the Germans had had at least +three hundred thousand men in the East in August. He simply didn't +listen.... + + + + +III + +The day before we started for Rechamp his spirits flew up again, and +that night he became confidential. "You've been such a friend to me that +there are certain things--seeing what's ahead of us--that I should like +to explain"; and, noticing my surprise, he went on: "I mean about my +people. The state of mind in my _milieu_ must be so remote from anything +you're used to in your happy country.... But perhaps I can make you +understand...." + +I saw that what he wanted was to talk to me of the girl he was engaged +to. Mlle. Malo, left an orphan at ten, had been the ward of a neighbour +of the Rechamps', a chap with an old name and a starred chateau, who +had lost almost everything else at baccarat before he was forty, and had +repented, had the gout and studied agriculture for the rest of his life. +The girl's father was a rather brilliant painter, who died young, and +her mother, who followed him in a year or two, was a Pole: you may fancy +that, with such antecedents, the girl was just the mixture to shake down +quietly into French country life with a gouty and repentant guardian. +The Marquis de Corvenaire--that was his name--brought her down to his +place, got an old maid sister to come and stay, and really, as far as +one knows, brought his ward up rather decently. + +Now and then she used to be driven over to play with the young Rechamps, +and Jean remembered her as an ugly little girl in a plaid frock, who +used to invent wonderful games and get tired of playing them just as the +other children were beginning to learn how. But her domineering ways +and searching questions did not meet with his mother's approval, and her +visits were not encouraged. When she was seventeen her guardian died +and left her a little money. The maiden sister had gone dotty, there was +nobody to look after Yvonne, and she went to Paris, to an aunt, broke +loose from the aunt when she came of age, set up her studio, travelled, +painted, played the violin, knew lots of people; and never laid eyes on +Jean de Rechamp till about a year before the war, when her guardian's +place was sold, and she had to go down there to see about her interest +in the property. + +The old Rechamps heard she was coming, but didn't ask her to stay. +Jean drove over to the shut-up chateau, however, and found Mlle. Malo +lunching on a corner of the kitchen table. She exclaimed: "My little +Jean!" flew to him with a kiss for each cheek, and made him sit down and +share her omelet.... The ugly little girl had shed her chrysalis--and +you may fancy if he went back once or twice! + +Mlle. Malo was staying at the chateau all alone, with the farmer's wife +to come in and cook her dinner: not a soul in the house at night but +herself and her brindled sheep dog. She had to be there a week, and +Jean suggested to his people to ask her to Rechamp. But at Rechamp they +hesitated, coughed, looked away, said the sparerooms were all upside +down, and the valet-de-chambre laid up with the mumps, and the cook +short-handed--till finally the irrepressible grandmother broke out: "A +young girl who chooses to live alone--probably prefers to live alone!" + +There was a deadly silence, and Jean did not raise the question again; +but I can imagine his blue eyes getting obstinate. + +Soon after Mlle. Malo's return to Paris he followed her and began to +frequent the Passy studio. The life there was unlike anything he had +ever seen--or conceived as possible, short of the prairies. He had +sampled the usual varieties of French womankind, and explored most +of the social layers; but he had missed the newest, that of the +artistic-emancipated. I don't know much about that set myself, but from +his descriptions I should say they were a good deal like intelligent +Americans, except that they don't seem to keep art and life in such +water-tight compartments. But his great discovery was the new girl. +Apparently he had never before known any but the traditional type, which +predominates in the provinces, and still persists, he tells me, in the +last fastnesses of the Faubourg St. Germain. The girl who comes and goes +as she pleases, reads what she likes, has opinions about what she reads, +who talks, looks, behaves with the independence of a married woman--and +yet has kept the Diana-freshness--think how she must have shaken up +such a man's inherited view of things! Mlle. Malo did far more than make +Rechamp fall in love with her: she turned his world topsy-turvey, +and prevented his ever again squeezing himself into his little old +pigeon-hole of prejudices. + +Before long they confessed their love--just like any young couple of +Anglo-Saxons--and Jean went down to Rechamp to ask permission to marry +her. Neither you nor I can quite enter into the state of mind of a young +man of twenty-seven who has knocked about all over the globe, and +been in and out of the usual sentimental coils--and who has to ask his +parents' leave to get married! Don't let us try: it's no use. We should +only end by picturing him as an incorrigible ninny. But there isn't a +man in France who wouldn't feel it his duty to take that step, as Jean +de Rechamp did. All we can do is to accept the premise and pass on. + +Well--Jean went down and asked his father and his mother and his old +grandmother if they would permit him to marry Mlle. Malo; and they all +with one voice said they wouldn't. There was an uproar, in fact; and the +old grandmother contributed the most piercing note to the concert. Marry +Mlle. Malo! A young girl who lived alone! Travelled! Spent her time with +foreigners--with musicians and painters! _A young girl!_ Of course, if +she had been a married woman--that is, a widow--much as they would have +preferred a young girl for Jean, or even, if widow it had to be, a widow +of another type--still, it was conceivable that, out of affection for +him, they might have resigned themselves to his choice. But a young +girl--bring such a young girl to Rechamp! Ask them to receive her under +the same roof with their little Simone, their innocent Alain.... + +He had a bad hour of it; but he held his own, keeping silent while +they screamed, and stiffening as they began to wobble from exhaustion. +Finally he took his mother apart, and tried to reason with her. His +arguments were not much use, but his resolution impressed her, and he +saw it. As for his father, nobody was afraid of Monsieur de Rechamp. +When he said: "Never--never while I live, and there is a roof on +Rechamp!" they all knew he had collapsed inside. But the grandmother +was terrible. She was terrible because she was so old, and so clever +at taking advantage of it. She could bring on a valvular heart attack by +just sitting still and holding her breath, as Jean and his mother had +long since found out; and she always treated them to one when things +weren't going as she liked. Madame de Rechamp promised Jean that she +would intercede with her mother-in-law; but she hadn't much faith in +the result, and when she came out of the old lady's room she whispered: +"She's just sitting there holding her breath." + +The next day Jean himself advanced to the attack. His grandmother was +the most intelligent member of the family, and she knew he knew it, and +liked him for having found it out; so when he had her alone she listened +to him without resorting to any valvular tricks. "Of course," he +explained, "you're much too clever not to understand that the times have +changed, and manners with them, and that what a woman was criticised for +doing yesterday she is ridiculed for not doing to-day. Nearly all the +old social thou-shalt-nots have gone: intelligent people nowadays don't +give a fig for them, and that simple fact has abolished them. They +only existed as long as there was some one left for them to scare." His +grandmother listened with a sparkle of admiration in her ancient eyes. +"And of course," Jean pursued, "that can't be the real reason for your +opposing my marriage--a marriage with a young girl you've always known, +who has been received here--" + +"Ah, that's it--we've always known her!" the old lady snapped him up. + +"What of that? I don't see--" + +"Of course you don't. You're here so little: you don't hear things...." + +"What things?" + +"Things in the air... that blow about.... You were doing your military +service at the time...." + +"At what time?" + +She leaned forward and laid a warning hand on his arm. "Why did +Corvenaire leave her all that money--_why?_" + +"But why not--why shouldn't he?" Jean stammered, indignant. Then she +unpacked her bag--a heap of vague insinuations, baseless conjectures, +village tattle, all, at the last analysis, based, as he succeeded +in proving, and making her own, on a word launched at random by a +discharged maid-servant who had retailed her grievance to the cure's +housekeeper. "Oh, she does what she likes with Monsieur le Marquis, the +young miss! _She_ knows how...." On that single phrase the neighbourhood +had raised a slander built of adamant. + +Well, I'll give you an idea of what a determined fellow Rechamp is, when +I tell you he pulled it down--or thought he did. He kept his temper, +hunted up the servant's record, proved her a liar and dishonest, cast +grave doubts on the discretion of the cure's housekeeper, and poured +such a flood of ridicule over the whole flimsy fable, and those who +had believed in it, that in sheer shamefacedness at having based her +objection on such grounds, his grandmother gave way, and brought his +parents toppling down with her. + +All this happened a few weeks before the war, and soon afterward Mlle. +Malo came down to Rechamp. Jean had insisted on her coming: he wanted +her presence there, as his betrothed, to be known to the neighbourhood. +As for her, she seemed delighted to come. I could see from Rechamp's +tone, when he reached this part of his story, that he rather thought I +should expect its heroine to have shown a becoming reluctance--to +have stood on her dignity. He was distinctly relieved when he found I +expected no such thing. + +"She's simplicity itself--it's her great quality. Vain complications +don't exist for her, because she doesn't see them... that's what my +people can't be made to understand...." + +I gathered from the last phrase that the visit had not been a complete +success, and this explained his having let out, when he first told me +of his fears for his family, that he was sure Mlle. Malo would not have +remained at Rechamp if she could help it. Oh, no, decidedly, the visit +was not a success.... + +"You see," he explained with a half-embarrassed smile, "it was partly +her fault. Other girls as clever, but less--how shall I say?--less +proud, would have adapted themselves, arranged things, avoided startling +allusions. She wouldn't stoop to that; she talked to my family as +naturally as she did to me. You can imagine for instance, the effect of +her saying: 'One night, after a supper at Montmartre, I was walking home +with two or three pals'--. It was her way of affirming her convictions, +and I adored her for it--but I wished she wouldn't!" + +And he depicted, to my joy, the neighbours rumbling over to call in +heraldic barouches (the mothers alone--with embarrassed excuses for not +bringing their daughters), and the agony of not knowing, till they were +in the room, if Yvonne would receive them with lowered lids and folded +hands, sitting by in a _pose de fiancee_ while the elders talked; or +if she would take the opportunity to air her views on the separation of +Church and State, or the necessity of making divorce easier. "It's not," +he explained, "that she really takes much interest in such questions: +she's much more absorbed in her music and painting. But anything her +eye lights on sets her mind dancing--as she said to me once: 'It's your +mother's friends' bonnets that make me stand up for divorce!'" He broke +off abruptly to add: "Good God, how far off all that nonsense seems!" + + + + +IV + +The next day we started for Rechamp, not sure if we could get through, +but bound to, anyhow! It was the coldest day we'd had, the sky steel, +the earth iron, and a snow-wind howling down on us from the north. The +Vosges are splendid in winter. In summer they are just plump puddingy +hills; when the wind strips them they turn to mountains. And we seemed +to have the whole country to ourselves--the black firs, the blue +shadows, the beech-woods cracking and groaning like rigging, the bursts +of snowy sunlight from cold clouds. Not a soul in sight except the +sentinels guarding the railways, muffled to the eyes, or peering out +of their huts of pine-boughs at the cross-roads. Every now and then we +passed a long string of seventy-fives, or a train of supply waggons or +army ambulances, and at intervals a cavalryman cantered by, his cloak +bellied out by the gale; but of ordinary people about the common jobs of +life, not a sign. + +The sense of loneliness and remoteness that the absence of the civil +population produces everywhere in eastern France is increased by the +fact that all the names and distances on the mile-stones have been +scratched out and the sign-posts at the cross-roads thrown down. It was +done, presumably, to throw the enemy off the track in September: and the +signs have never been put back. The result is that one is forever losing +one's way, for the soldiers quartered in the district know only the +names of their particular villages, and those on the march can tell you +nothing about the places they are passing through. We had got badly +off our road several times during the trip, but on the last day's run +Rechamp was in his own country, and knew every yard of the way--or +thought he did. We had turned off the main road, and were running along +between rather featureless fields and woods, crossed by a good many +wood-roads with nothing to distinguish them; but he continued to push +ahead, saying: + +"We don't turn till we get to a manor-house on a stream, with a big +paper-mill across the road." He went on to tell me that the mill-owners +lived in the manor, and were old friends of his people: good old local +stock, who had lived there for generations and done a lot for the +neighbourhood. + +"It's queer I don't see their village-steeple from this rise. The +village is just beyond the house. How the devil could I have missed the +turn?" We ran on a little farther, and suddenly he stopped the motor +with a jerk. We were at a cross-road, with a stream running under the +bank on our right. The place looked like an abandoned stoneyard. I never +saw completer ruin. To the left, a fortified gate gaped on emptiness; to +the right, a mill-wheel hung in the stream. Everything else was as flat +as your dinner-table. + +"Was this what you were trying to see from that rise?" I asked; and I +saw a tear or two running down his face. + +"They were the kindest people: their only son got himself shot the first +month in Champagne--" + +He had jumped out of the car and was standing staring at the level +waste. "The house was there--there was a splendid lime in the court. I +used to sit under it and have a glass of _vin cris de Lorraine_ with the +old people.... Over there, where that cinder-heap is, all their children +are buried." He walked across to the grave-yard under a blackened +wall--a bit of the apse of the vanished church--and sat down on a +grave-stone. "If the devils have done this _here_--so close to us," he +burst out, and covered his face. + +An old woman walked toward us down the road. Rechamp jumped up and ran +to meet her. "Why, Marie Jeanne, what are you doing in these ruins?" The +old woman looked at him with unastonished eyes. She seemed incapable of +any surprise. "They left my house standing. I'm glad to see Monsieur," +she simply said. We followed her to the one house left in the waste of +stones. It was a two-roomed cottage, propped against a cow-stable, +but fairly decent, with a curtain in the window and a cat on the sill. +Rechamp caught me by the arm and pointed to the door-panel. "Oberst von +Scharlach" was scrawled on it. He turned as white as your table-cloth, +and hung on to me a minute; then he spoke to the old woman. "The +officers were quartered here: that was the reason they spared your +house?" + +She nodded. "Yes: I was lucky. But the gentlemen must come in and have a +mouthful." + +Rechamp's finger was on the name. "And this one--this was their +commanding officer?" + +"I suppose so. Is it somebody's name?" She had evidently never +speculated on the meaning of the scrawl that had saved her. + +"You remember him--their captain? Was his name Scharlach?" Rechamp +persisted. + +Under its rich weathering the old woman's face grew as pale as his. +"Yes, that was his name--I heard it often enough." + +"Describe him, then. What was he like? Tall and fair? They're all +that--but what else? What in particular?" + +She hesitated, and then said: "This one wasn't fair. He was dark, and +had a scar that drew up the left corner of his mouth." + +Rechamp turned to me. "It's the same. I heard the men describing him at +Moulins." + +We followed the old woman into the house, and while she gave us some +bread and wine she told us about the wrecking of the village and the +factory. It was one of the most damnable stories I've heard yet. Put +together the worst of the typical horrors and you'll have a fair idea of +it. Murder, outrage, torture: Scharlach's programme seemed to be +fairly comprehensive. She ended off by saying: "His orderly showed me a +silver-mounted flute he always travelled with, and a beautiful paint-box +mounted in silver too. Before he left he sat down on my door-step and +made a painting of the ruins...." + +Soon after leaving this place of death we got to the second lines and +our troubles began. We had to do a lot of talking to get through the +lines, but what Rechamp had just seen had made him eloquent. +Luckily, too, the ambulance doctor, a charming fellow, was short of +tetanus-serum, and I had some left; and while I went over with him to +the pine-branch hut where he hid his wounded I explained Rechamp's +case, and implored him to get us through. Finally it was settled that +we should leave the ambulance there--for in the lines the ban against +motors is absolute--and drive the remaining twelve miles. A sergeant +fished out of a farmhouse a toothless old woman with a furry horse +harnessed to a two-wheeled trap, and we started off by round-about +wood-tracks. The horse was in no hurry, nor the old lady either; for +there were bits of road that were pretty steadily currycombed by shell, +and it was to everybody's interest not to cross them before twilight. +Jean de Rechamp's excitement seemed to have dropped: he sat beside me +dumb as a fish, staring straight ahead of him. I didn't feel talkative +either, for a word the doctor had let drop had left me thinking. "That +poor old granny mind the shells? Not she!" he had said when our crazy +chariot drove up. "She doesn't know them from snow-flakes any more. +Nothing matters to her now, except trying to outwit a German. They're +all like that where Scharlach's been--you've heard of him? She had only +one boy--half-witted: he cocked a broomhandle at them, and they burnt +him. Oh, she'll take you to Rechamp safe enough." + +"Where Scharlach's been"--so he had been as close as this to Rechamp! I +was wondering if Jean knew it, and if that had sealed his lips and given +him that flinty profile. The old horse's woolly flanks jogged on under +the bare branches and the old woman's bent back jogged in time with it. +She never once spoke or looked around at us. "It isn't the noise we +make that'll give us away," I said at last; and just then the old woman +turned her head and pointed silently with the osier-twig she used as a +whip. Just ahead of us lay a heap of ruins: the wreck, apparently, of +a great chateau and its dependencies. "Lermont!" Rechamp exclaimed, +turning white. He made a motion to jump out and then dropped back into +the seat. "What's the use?" he muttered. He leaned forward and touched +the old woman's shoulder. + +"I hadn't heard of this--when did it happen?" + +"In September." + +"_They_ did it?" + +"Yes. Our wounded were there. It's like this everywhere in our country." + +I saw Jean stiffening himself for the next question. "At Rechamp, too?" + +She relapsed into indifference. "I haven't been as far as Rechamp." + +"But you must have seen people who'd been there--you must have heard." + +"I've heard the masters were still there--so there must be something +standing. Maybe though," she reflected, "they're in the cellars...." + +We continued to jog on through the dusk. + + + + +V + + +"There's the steeple!" Rechamp burst out. + +Through the dimness I couldn't tell which way to look; but I suppose in +the thickest midnight he would have known where he was. He jumped from +the trap and took the old horse by the bridle. I made out that he was +guiding us into a long village street edged by houses in which +every light was extinguished. The snow on the ground sent up a pale +reflection, and I began to see the gabled outline of the houses and +the steeple at the head of the street. The place seemed as calm and +unchanged as if the sound of war had never reached it. In the open space +at the end of the village Rechamp checked the horse. + +"The elm--there's the old elm in front of the church!" he shouted in +a voice like a boy's. He ran back and caught me by both hands. "It was +true, then--nothing's touched!" The old woman asked: "Is this Rechamp?" +and he went back to the horse's head and turned the trap toward a tall +gate between park walls. The gate was barred and padlocked, and not a +gleam showed through the shutters of the porter's lodge; but Rechamp, +after listening a minute or two, gave a low call twice repeated, and +presently the lodge door opened, and an old man peered out. Well--I +leave you to brush in the rest. Old family servant, tears and hugs and +so on. I know you affect to scorn the cinema, and this was it, tremolo +and all. Hang it! This war's going to teach us not to be afraid of the +obvious. + +We piled into the trap and drove down a long avenue to the house. Black +as the grave, of course; but in another minute the door opened, and +there, in the hall, was another servant, screening a light--and then +more doors opened on another cinema-scene: fine old drawing-room with +family portraits, shaded lamp, domestic group about the fire. They +evidently thought it was the servant coming to announce dinner, and +not a head turned at our approach. I could see them all over Jean's +shoulder: a grey-haired lady knitting with stiff fingers, an old +gentleman with a high nose and a weak chin sitting in a big carved +armchair and looking more like a portrait than the portraits; a pretty +girl at his feet, with a dog's head in her lap, and another girl, who +had a Red Cross on her sleeve, at the table with a book. She had been +reading aloud in a rich veiled voice, and broke off her last phrase +to say: "Dinner...." Then she looked up and saw Jean. Her dark face +remained perfectly calm, but she lifted her hand in a just perceptible +gesture of warning, and instantly understanding he drew back and pushed +the servant forward in his place. + +"Madame la Comtesse--it is some one outside asking for Mademoiselle." + +The dark girl jumped up and ran out into the hall. I remember wondering: +"Is it because she wants to have him to herself first--or because she's +afraid of their being startled?" I wished myself out of the way, but she +took no notice of me, and going straight to Jean flung her arms about +him. I was behind him and could see her hands about his neck, and +her brown fingers tightly locked. There wasn't much doubt about those +two.... + +The next minute she caught sight of me, and I was being rapidly tested +by a pair of the finest eyes I ever saw--I don't apply the term to their +setting, though that was fine too, but to the look itself, a look at +once warm and resolute, all-promising and all-penetrating. I really +can't do with fewer adjectives.... + +Rechamp explained me, and she was full of thanks and welcome; not +excessive, but--well, I don't know--eloquent! She gave every intonation +all it could carry, and without the least emphasis: that's the wonder. + +She went back to "prepare" the parents, as they say in melodrama; and +in a minute or two we followed. What struck me first was that these +insignificant and inadequate people had the command of the grand +gesture--had _la ligne_. The mother had laid aside her knitting--_not_ +dropped it--and stood waiting with open arms. But even in clasping +her son she seemed to include me in her welcome. I don't know how to +describe it; but they never let me feel I was in the way. I suppose +that's part of what you call distinction; knowing instinctively how to +deal with unusual moments. + +All the while, I was looking about me at the fine secure old room, in +which nothing seemed altered or disturbed, the portraits smiling from +the walls, the servants beaming in the doorway--and wondering how such +things could have survived in the trail of death and havoc we had been +following. + +The same thought had evidently struck Jean, for he dropped his sister's +hand and turned to gaze about him too. + +"Then nothing's touched--nothing? I don't understand," he stammered. + +Monsieur de Rechamp raised himself majestically from his chair, +crossed the room and lifted Yvonne Malo's hand to his lips. "Nothing is +touched--thanks to this hand and this brain." + +Madame de Rechamp was shining on her son through tears. "Ah, yes--we owe +it all to Yvonne." + +"All, all! Grandmamma will tell you!" Simone chimed in; and Yvonne, +brushing aside their praise with a half-impatient laugh, said to her +betrothed: "But your grandmother! You must go up to her at once." + +A wonderful specimen, that grandmother: I was taken to see her after +dinner. She sat by the fire in a bare panelled bedroom, bolt upright +in an armchair with ears, a knitting-table at her elbow with a shaded +candle on it. + +She was even more withered and ancient than she looked in her +photograph, and I judge she'd never been pretty; but she somehow made +me feel as if I'd got through with prettiness. I don't know exactly what +she reminded me of: a dried bouquet, or something rich and clovy that +had turned brittle through long keeping in a sandal-wood box. I suppose +her sandal-wood box had been Good Society. Well, I had a rare evening +with her. Jean and his parents were called down to see the cure, who had +hurried over to the chateau when he heard of the young man's arrival; +and the old lady asked me to stay on and chat with her. She related +their experiences with uncanny detachment, seeming chiefly to resent +the indignity of having been made to descend into the cellar--"to avoid +French shells, if you'll believe it: the Germans had the decency not to +bombard us," she observed impartially. I was so struck by the absence +of rancour in her tone that finally, out of sheer curiosity, I made +an allusion to the horror of having the enemy under one's roof. "Oh, +I might almost say I didn't see them," she returned. "I never go +downstairs any longer; and they didn't do me the honour of coming beyond +my door. A glance sufficed them--an old woman like me!" she added with a +phosphorescent gleam of coquetry. + +"But they searched the chateau, surely?" "Oh, a mere form; they were +very decent--very decent," she almost snapped at me. "There was a first +moment, of course, when we feared it might be hard to get Monsieur de +Rechamp away with my young grandson; but Mlle. Malo managed that very +cleverly. They slipped off while the officers were dining." She looked +at me with the smile of some arch old lady in a Louis XV pastel. "My +grandson Jean's fiancee is a very clever young woman: in my time no +young girl would have been so sure of herself, so cool and quick. After +all, there is something to be said for the new way of bringing up girls. +My poor daughter-in-law, at Yvonne's age, was a bleating baby: she is so +still, at times. The convent doesn't develop character. I'm glad Yvonne +was not brought up in a convent." And this champion of tradition smiled +on me more intensely. + +Little by little I got from her the story of the German approach: the +distracted fugitives pouring in from the villages north of Rechamp, the +sound of distant cannonading, and suddenly, the next afternoon, after a +reassuring lull, the sight of a single spiked helmet at the end of the +drive. In a few minutes a dozen followed: mostly officers; then all at +once the place hummed with them. There were supply waggons and motors in +the court, bundles of hay, stacks of rifles, artillery-men unharnessing +and rubbing down their horses. The crowd was hot and thirsty, and in a +moment the old lady, to her amazement, saw wine and cider being handed +about by the Rechamp servants. "Or so at least I was told," she added, +correcting herself, "for it's not my habit to look out of the window. I +simply sat here and waited." Her seat, as she spoke, might have been a +curule chair. + +Downstairs, it appeared, Mlle. Malo had instantly taken her measures. +_She_ didn't sit and wait. Surprised in the garden with Simone, she had +made the girl walk quietly back to the house and receive the officers +with her on the doorstep. The officer in command--captain, or whatever +he was--had arrived in a bad temper, cursing and swearing, and growling +out menaces about spies. The day was intensely hot, and possibly he had +had too much wine. At any rate Mlle. Malo had known how to "put him in +his place"; and when he and the other officers entered they found +the dining-table set out with refreshing drinks and cigars, melons, +strawberries and iced coffee. "The clever creature! She even remembered +that they liked whipped cream with their coffee!" + +The effect had been miraculous. The captain--what was his name? Yes, +Chariot, Chariot--Captain Chariot had been specially complimentary on +the subject of the whipped cream and the cigars. Then he asked to see +the other members of the family, and Mlle. Malo told him there were only +two--two old women! "He made a face at that, and said all the same he +should like to meet them; and she answered: 'One is your hostess, the +Comtesse de Rechamp, who is ill in bed'--for my poor daughter-in-law +was lying in bed paralyzed with rheumatism--'and the other her +mother-in-law, a very old lady who never leaves her room.'" + +"But aren't there any men in the family?" he had then asked; and she had +said: "Oh yes--two. The Comte de Rechamp and his son." + +"And where are they?" + +"In England. Monsieur de Rechamp went a month ago to take his son on a +trip." + +The officer said: "I was told they were here to-day"; and Mlle. Malo +replied: "You had better have the house searched and satisfy yourself." + +He laughed and said: "The idea _had_ occurred to me." She laughed also, +and sitting down at the piano struck a few chords. Captain Chariot, who +had his foot on the threshold, turned back--Simone had described the +scene to her grandmother afterward. "Some of the brutes, it seems, are +musical," the old lady explained; "and this was one of them. While he +was listening, some soldiers appeared in the court carrying another who +seemed to be wounded. It turned out afterward that he'd been climbing a +garden wall after fruit, and cut himself on the broken glass at the top; +but the blood was enough--they raised the usual dreadful outcry about +an ambush, and a lieutenant clattered into the room where Mlle. Malo +sat playing Stravinsky." The old lady paused for her effect, and I was +conscious of giving her all she wanted. + +"Well--?" + +"Will you believe it? It seems she looked at her watch-bracelet and said: +'Do you gentlemen dress for dinner? _I_ do--but we've still time for a +little Moussorgsky'--or whatever wild names they call themselves--'if +you'll make those people outside hold their tongues.' Our captain looked +at her again, laughed, gave an order that sent the lieutenant right +about, and sat down beside her at the piano. Imagine my stupour, dear +sir: the drawing-room is directly under this room, and in a moment I +heard two voices coming up to me. Well, I won't conceal from you that +his was the finest. But then I always adored a barytone." She folded her +shrivelled hands among their laces. "After that, the Germans were +_tres bien--tres bien_. They stayed two days, and there was nothing to +complain of. Indeed, when the second detachment came, a week later, they +never even entered the gates. Orders had been left that they should be +quartered elsewhere. Of course we were lucky in happening on a man of +the world like Captain Chariot." + +"Yes, very lucky. It's odd, though, his having a French name." + +"Very. It probably accounts for his breeding," she answered placidly; +and left me marvelling at the happy remoteness of old age. + + + + +VI + +The next morning early Jean de Rechamp came to my room. I was struck +at once by the change in him: he had lost his first glow, and seemed +nervous and hesitating. I knew what he had come for: to ask me to +postpone our departure for another twenty-four hours. By rights we +should have been off that morning; but there had been a sharp brush a +few kilometres away, and a couple of poor devils had been brought to +the chateau whom it would have been death to carry farther that day and +criminal not to hurry to a base hospital the next morning. "We've simply +_got_ to stay till to-morrow: you're in luck," I said laughing. + +He laughed back, but with a frown that made me feel I had been a brute +to speak in that way of a respite due to such a cause. + +"The men will pull through, you know--trust Mlle. Malo for that!" I +said. + +His frown did not lift. He went to the window and drummed on the pane. + +"Do you see that breach in the wall, down there behind the trees? +It's the only scratch the place has got. And think of Lennont! It's +incredible--simply incredible!" + +"But it's like that everywhere, isn't it? Everything depends on the +officer in command." + +"Yes: that's it, I suppose. I haven't had time to get a consecutive +account of what happened: they're all too excited. Mlle. Malo is the +only person who can tell me exactly how things went." He swung about on +me. "Look here, it sounds absurd, what I'm asking; but try to get me an +hour alone with her, will you?" + +I stared at the request, and he went on, still half-laughing: "You +see, they all hang on me; my father and mother, Simone, the cure, the +servants. The whole village is coming up presently: they want to stuff +their eyes full of me. It's natural enough, after living here all these +long months cut off from everything. But the result is I haven't said +two words to her yet." + +"Well, you shall," I declared; and with an easier smile he turned to +hurry down to a mass of thanksgiving which the cure was to celebrate +in the private chapel. "My parents wanted it," he explained; "and after +that the whole village will be upon us. But later--" + +"Later I'll effect a diversion; I swear I will," I assured him. + +***** + +By daylight, decidedly, Mlle. Malo was less handsome than in the +evening. It was my first thought as she came toward me, that afternoon, +under the limes. Jean was still indoors, with his people, receiving +the village; I rather wondered she hadn't stayed there with him. +Theoretically, her place was at his side; but I knew she was a young +woman who didn't live by rule, and she had already struck me as having a +distaste for superfluous expenditures of feeling. + +Yes, she was less effective by day. She looked older for one thing; her +face was pinched, and a little sallow and for the first time I noticed +that her cheek-bones were too high. Her eyes, too, had lost their velvet +depth: fine eyes still, but not unfathomable. But the smile with +which she greeted me was charming: it ran over her tired face like a +lamp-lighter kindling flames as he runs. + +"I was looking for you," she said. "Shall we have a little talk? The +reception is sure to last another hour: every one of the villagers is +going to tell just what happened to him or her when the Germans came." + +"And you've run away from the ceremony?" + +"I'm a trifle tired of hearing the same adventures retold," she said, +still smiling. + +"But I thought there _were_ no adventures--that that was the wonder of +it?" + +She shrugged. "It makes their stories a little dull, at any rate; we've +not a hero or a martyr to show." She had strolled farther from the house +as we talked, leading me in the direction of a bare horse-chestnut walk +that led toward the park. + +"Of course Jean's got to listen to it all, poor boy; but I needn't," she +explained. + +I didn't know exactly what to answer and we walked on a little way in +silence; then she said: "If you'd carried him off this morning he would +have escaped all this fuss." After a pause she added slowly: "On the +whole, it might have been as well." + +"To carry him off?" + +"Yes." She stopped and looked at me. "I wish you _would_." + +"Would?--Now?" + +"Yes, now: as soon as you can. He's really not strong yet--he's drawn +and nervous." ("So are you," I thought.) "And the excitement is greater +than you can perhaps imagine--" + +I gave her back her look. "Why, I think I _can_ imagine...." + +She coloured up through her sallow skin and then laughed away her blush. +"Oh, I don't mean the excitement of seeing _me!_ But his parents, his +grandmother, the cure, all the old associations--" + +I considered for a moment; then I said: "As a matter of fact, you're +about the only person he _hasn't_ seen." + +She checked a quick answer on her lips, and for a moment or two we faced +each other silently. A sudden sense of intimacy, of complicity almost, +came over me. What was it that the girl's silence was crying out to me? + +"If I take him away now he won't have seen you at all," I continued. + +She stood under the bare trees, keeping her eyes on me. "Then take +him away now!" she retorted; and as she spoke I saw her face change, +decompose into deadly apprehension and as quickly regain its usual calm. +From where she stood she faced the courtyard, and glancing in the same +direction I saw the throng of villagers coming out of the chateau. "Take +him away--take him away at once!" she passionately commanded; and the +next minute Jean de Rechamp detached himself from the group and began to +limp down the walk in our direction. + +What was I to do? I can't exaggerate the sense of urgency Mlle. Malo's +appeal gave me, or my faith in her sincerity. No one who had seen her +meeting with Rechamp the night before could have doubted her feeling for +him: if she wanted him away it was not because she did not delight in +his presence. Even now, as he approached, I saw her face veiled by +a faint mist of emotion: it was like watching a fruit ripen under a +midsummer sun. But she turned sharply from the house and began to walk +on. + +"Can't you give me a hint of your reason?" I suggested as I followed. + +"My reason? I've given it!" I suppose I looked incredulous, for she +added in a lower voice: "I don't want him to hear--yet--about all the +horrors." + +"The horrors? I thought there had been none here." + +"All around us--" Her voice became a whisper. "Our friends... our +neighbours... every one...." + +"He can hardly avoid hearing of that, can he? And besides, since you're +all safe and happy.... Look here," I broke off, "he's coming after us. +Don't we look as if we were running away?" + +She turned around, suddenly paler; and in a stride or two Rechamp was +at our side. He was pale too; and before I could find a pretext for +slipping away he had begun to speak. But I saw at once that he didn't +know or care if I was there. + +"What was the name of the officer in command who was quartered here?" he +asked, looking straight at the girl. + +She raised her eye-brows slightly. "Do you mean to say that after +listening for three hours to every inhabitant of Bechamp you haven't +found that out?" + +"They all call him something different. My grandmother says he had a +French name: she calls him Chariot." + +"Your grandmother was never taught German: his name was the Oberst von +Scharlach." She did not remember my presence either: the two were still +looking straight in each other's eyes. + +Bechamp had grown white to the lips: he was rigid with the effort to +control himself. + +"Why didn't you tell me it was Scharlach who was here?" he brought out +at last in a low voice. + +She turned her eyes in my direction. "I was just explaining to Mr. +Greer--" + +"To Mr. Greer?" He looked at me too, half-angrily. + +"I know the stories that are about," she continued quietly; "and I was +saying to your friend that, since we had been so happy as to be spared, +it seemed useless to dwell on what has happened elsewhere." + +"Damn what happened elsewhere! I don't yet know what happened here." + +I put a hand on his arm. Mlle. Malo was looking hard at me, but I +wouldn't let her see I knew it. "I'm going to leave you to hear the +whole story now," I said to Rechamp. + +"But there isn't any story for him to hear!" she broke in. She pointed +at the serene front of the chateau, looking out across its gardens to +the unscarred fields. "We're safe; the place is untouched. Why brood on +other horrors--horrors we were powerless to help?" + +Rechamp held his ground doggedly. "But the man's name is a curse and an +abomination. Wherever he went he spread ruin." + +"So they say. Mayn't there be a mistake? Legends grow up so quickly in +these dreadful times. Here--" she looked about her again at the peaceful +scene--"here he behaved as you see. For heaven's sake be content with +that!" + +"Content?" He passed his hand across his forehead. "I'm blind with +joy...or should be, if only..." + +She looked at me entreatingly, almost desperately, and I took hold of +Rechamp's arm with a warning pressure. + +"My dear fellow, don't you see that Mlle. Malo has been under a great +strain? _La joie fait peur_--that's the trouble with both of you!" + +He lowered his head. "Yes, I suppose it is." He took her hand And kissed +it. "I beg your pardon. Greer's right: we're both on edge." + +"Yes: I'll leave you for a little while, if you and Mr Greer will excuse +me." She included us both in a quiet look that seemed to me extremely +noble, and walked slowly away toward the chateau. Rechamp stood gazing +after her for a moment; then he dropped down on one of benches at +the edge of the path. He covered his face with his hands. +"Scharlach--Scharlach!" I heard him say. + +We sat there side by side for ten minutes or more without speaking. +Finally I said: "Look here, Rechamp--she's right and you're wrong. I +shall be sorry I brought you here if you don't see it before it's too +late." + +His face was still hidden; but presently he dropped his hands and +answered me. "I do see. She's saved everything for me--my, people and +my house, and the ground we're standing on. And I worship it because she +walks on it!" + +"And so do your people: the war's done that for you, anyhow," I reminded +him. + + + + +VII + +The morning after we were off before dawn. Our time allowance was up, +and it was thought advisable, on account of our wounded, to slip across +the exposed bit of road in the dark. + +Mlle. Malo was downstairs when we started, pale in her white dress, but +calm and active. We had borrowed a farmer's cart in which our two men +could be laid on a mattress, and she had stocked our trap with food and +remedies. Nothing seemed to have been forgotten. While I was settling +the men I suppose Rechamp turned back into the hall to bid her good-bye; +anyhow, when she followed him out a moment later he looked quieter +and less strained. He had taken leave of his parents and his sister +upstairs, and Yvonne Malo stood alone in the dark driveway, watching us +as we drove away. + +There was not much talk between us during our slow drive back to the +lines. We had to go it a snail's pace, for the roads were rough; and +there was time for meditation. I knew well enough what my companion was +thinking about and my own thoughts ran on the same lines. Though the +story of the German occupation of Rechamp had been retold to us a dozen +times the main facts did not vary. There were little discrepancies of +detail, and gaps in the narrative here and there; but all the household, +from the astute ancestress to the last bewildered pantry-boy, were +at one in saying that Mlle. Malo's coolness and courage had saved the +chateau and the village. The officer in command had arrived full of +threats and insolence: Mlle. Malo had placated and disarmed him, turned +his suspicions to ridicule, entertained him and his comrades at dinner, +and contrived during that time--or rather while they were making music +afterward (which they did for half the night, it seemed)--that Monsieur +de Rechamp and Alain should slip out of the cellar in which they had +been hidden, gain the end of the gardens through an old hidden passage, +and get off in the darkness. Meanwhile Simone had been safe upstairs +with her mother and grandmother, and none of the officers lodged in the +chateau had--after a first hasty inspection--set foot in any part of the +house but the wing assigned to them. On the third morning they had left, +and Scharlach, before going, had put in Mlle. Malo's hands a +letter requesting whatever officer should follow him to show +every consideration to the family of the Comte de Rechamp, and if +possible--owing to the grave illness of the Countess--avoid taking up +quarters in the chateau: a request which had been scrupulously observed. + +Such were the amazing but undisputed facts over which Rechamp and I, in +our different ways, were now pondering. He hardly spoke, and when he did +it was only to make some casual reference to the road or to our wounded +soldiers; but all the while I sat at his side I kept hearing the echo +of the question he was inwardly asking himself, and hoping to God he +wouldn't put it to me.... + +It was nearly noon when we finally reached the lines, and the men had to +have a rest before we could start again; but a couple of hours later we +landed them safely at the base hospital. From there we had intended +to go back to Paris; but as we were starting there came an unexpected +summons to another point of the front, where there had been a successful +night-attack, and a lot of Germans taken in a blown-up trench. The place +was fifty miles away, and off my beat, but the number of wounded on +both sides was exceptionally heavy, and all the available ambulances had +already started. An urgent call had come for more, and there was nothing +for it but to go; so we went. + +We found things in a bad mess at the second line shanty-hospital where +they were dumping the wounded as fast as they could bring them in. At +first we were told that none were fit to be carried farther that night; +and after we had done what we could we went off to hunt up a shake-down +in the village. But a few minutes later an orderly overtook us with a +message from the surgeon. There was a German with an abdominal wound who +was in a bad way, but might be saved by an operation if he could be got +back to the base before midnight. + +Would we take him at once and then come back for others? + +There is only one answer to such requests, and a few minutes later we +were back at the hospital, and the wounded man was being carried out on +a stretcher. In the shaky lantern gleam I caught a glimpse of a livid +face and a torn uniform, and saw that he was an officer, and nearly done +for. Rechamp had climbed to the box, and seemed not to be noticing what +was going on at the back of the motor. I understood that he loathed the +job, and wanted not to see the face of the man we were carrying; so when +we had got him settled I jumped into the ambulance beside him and called +out to Bechamp that we were ready. A second later an _infirmier_ ran +up with a little packet and pushed it into my hand. "His papers," he +explained. I pocketed them and pulled the door shut, and we were off. + +The man lay motionless on his back, conscious, but desperately weak. +Once I turned my pocket-lamp on him and saw that he was young--about +thirty--with damp dark hair and a thin face. He had received a +flesh-wound above the eyes, and his forehead was bandaged, but the rest +of the face uncovered. As the light fell on him he lifted his eyelids +and looked at me: his look was inscrutable. + +For half an hour or so I sat there in the dark, the sense of that face +pressing close on me. It was a damnable face--meanly handsome, basely +proud. In my one glimpse of it I had seen that the man was suffering +atrociously, but as we slid along through the night he made no sound. +At length the motor stopped with a violent jerk that drew a single moan +from him. I turned the light on him, but he lay perfectly still, lips +and lids shut, making no sign; and I jumped out and ran round to the +front to see what had happened. + +The motor had stopped for lack of gasolene and was stock still in the +deep mud. Rechamp muttered something about a leak in his tank. As he +bent over it, the lantern flame struck up into his face, which was set +and businesslike. It struck me vaguely that he showed no particular +surprise. + +"What's to be done?" I asked. + +"I think I can tinker it up; but we've got to have more essence to go on +with." + +I stared at him in despair: it was a good hour's walk back to the lines, +and we weren't so sure of getting any gasolene when we got there! But +there was no help for it; and as Rechamp was dead lame, no alternative +but for me to go. + +I opened the ambulance door, gave another look at the motionless man +inside and took out a remedy which I handed over to Rechamp with a word +of explanation. "You know how to give a hypo? Keep a close eye on him +and pop this in if you see a change--not otherwise." + +He nodded. "Do you suppose he'll die?" he asked below his breath. + +"No, I don't. If we get him to the hospital before morning I think he'll +pull through." + +"Oh, all right." He unhooked one of the motor lanterns and handed it +over to me. "I'll do my best," he said as I turned away. + +Getting back to the lines through that pitch-black forest, and finding +somebody to bring the gasolene back for me was about the weariest job I +ever tackled. I couldn't imagine why it wasn't daylight when we finally +got to the place where I had left the motor. It seemed to me as if I had +been gone twelve hours when I finally caught sight of the grey bulk of +the car through the thinning darkness. + +Rechamp came forward to meet us, and took hold of my arm as I was +opening the door of the car. "The man's dead," he said. + +I had lifted up my pocket-lamp, and its light fell on Rechamp's face, +which was perfectly composed, and seemed less gaunt and drawn than at +any time since we had started on our trip. + +"Dead? Why--how? What happened? Did you give him the hypodermic?" I +stammered, taken aback. + +"No time to. He died in a minute." + +"How do you know he did? Were you with him?" + +"Of course I was with him," Rechamp retorted, with a sudden harshness +which made me aware that I had grown harsh myself. But I had been almost +sure the man wasn't anywhere near death when I left him. I opened the +door of the ambulance and climbed in with my lantern. He didn't appear +to have moved, but he was dead sure enough--had been for two or three +hours, by the feel of him. It must have happened not long after I +left.... Well, I'm not a doctor, anyhow.... + +I don't think Rechamp and I exchanged a word during the rest of that +run. But it was my fault and not his if we didn't. By the mere rub of +his sleeve against mine as we sat side by side on the motor I knew he +was conscious of no bar between us: he had somehow got back, in the +night's interval, to a state of wholesome stolidity, while I, on the +contrary, was tingling all over with exposed nerves. + +I was glad enough when we got back to the base at last, and the grim +load we carried was lifted out and taken into the hospital. Rechamp +waited in the courtyard beside his car, lighting a cigarette in the +cold early sunlight; but I followed the bearers and the surgeon into the +whitewashed room where the dead man was laid out to be undressed. I had +a burning spot at the pit of my stomach while his clothes were ripped +off him and the bandages undone: I couldn't take my eyes from the +surgeon's face. But the surgeon, with a big batch of wounded on his +hands, was probably thinking more of the living than the dead; and +besides, we were near the front, and the body before him was an enemy's. + +He finished his examination and scribbled something in a note-book. +"Death must have taken place nearly five hours ago," he merely remarked: +it was the conclusion I had already come to myself. + +"And how about the papers?" the surgeon continued. "You have them, I +suppose? This way, please." + +We left the half-stripped body on the blood-stained oil-cloth, and he +led me into an office where a functionary sat behind a littered desk. + +"The papers? Thank you. You haven't examined them? Let us see, then." + +I handed over the leather note-case I had thrust into my pocket the +evening before, and saw for the first time its silver-edged corners and +the coronet in one of them. The official took out the papers and spread +them on the desk between us. I watched him absently while he did so. + +Suddenly he uttered an exclamation. "Ah--that's a haul!" he said, and +pushed a bit of paper toward me. On it was engraved the name: Oberst +Graf Benno von Scharlach.... + +"A good riddance," said the surgeon over my shoulder. + +I went back to the courtyard and saw Rechamp still smoking his cigarette +in the cold sunlight. I don't suppose I'd been in the hospital ten +minutes; but I felt as old as Methuselah. + +My friend greeted me with a smile. "Ready for breakfast?" he said, and +a little chill ran down my spine.... But I said: "Oh, all right--come +along...." + +For, after all, I _knew_ there wasn't a paper of any sort on that +man when he was lifted into my ambulance the night before: the French +officials attend to their business too carefully for me not to have been +sure of that. And there wasn't the least shred of evidence to prove that +he hadn't died of his wounds during the unlucky delay in the forest; or +that Rechamp had known his tank was leaking when we started out from the +lines. + +"I could do with a _cafe complet_, couldn't you?" Rechamp suggested, +looking straight at me with his good blue eyes; and arm in arm we +started off to hunt for the inn.... + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Coming Home, by Edith Wharton + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK COMING HOME *** + +***** This file should be named 24349.txt or 24349.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/4/3/4/24349/ + +Produced by David Widger + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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