The Day of Wrath Part 16

But a motor cyclist dashed up with a despatch, and he forgot all about "Schultz" and his family. As it happened, he was a man of some ability, and the hopeless block at Aix caused by the stubborn defence of Liege had brought about the summary dismissal of a General by the wrathful Kaiser. Hence, the Argenteau major was promoted and recalled to the base. His next in rank, summoned to the post an hour later, knew nothing of the _laisser pa.s.ser_ granted to a party which closely resembled the much-wanted miller of Vise and his companions; he read an "urgent general order" for their arrest without the least suspicion that they had slipped through the net in that very place.

Meanwhile these things were in the lap of the G.o.ds. For the moment, the six people were free, and actually under German protection.

CHAPTER IX

AN EXPOSITION OF GERMAN METHODS

Three large and powerful automobiles stood at rest in the tiny square of Argenteau. Nearly every little town in Belgium and France possesses its _place_, the hub of social and business life, the centre where roads converge and markets are held. In the roadway, near the cars, were several officers, deep in conversation.

"Look," murmured Irene to Dalroy, "the high-shouldered, broadly-built man, facing this way, is General von Emmich!"

By this time Dalroy was acquainted with the name of the German commander-in-chief. He found a fleeting interest in watching him now, while Joos and the others loitered irresolutely on the pavement outside the improvised office of the _Kommandantur_.

Though the moon was high and clear, there was no other light, and the diffused brilliance of the "orbed maiden, with white fire laden," is not favourable to close observation. But Von Emmich's bearing and gestures were significant. He put an abrupt end to the conclave by an emphatic sweep of his right arm, and the larger number of his staff disposed themselves in two of the cars, in which the chauffeurs and armed escorts were already seated. They made off in the direction of Aix. It was easy to guess their errand. More cannon, more cannon-fodder!

The generalissimo himself remained apart from the colonel and captain who apparently formed his personal suite. He strode to and fro, evidently in deep thought. Once he halted quite close to the little company of peasants, and Dalroy believed he saw tears in his eyes, tears instantly brushed away by an angry hand. Whatever the cause of this emotion, the General quickly mastered a momentary weakness. Indeed, that spasmodic yielding seemed to have braced his will to a fixed purpose, because he walked to the waiting car, wrote something by the light of an electric torch, and said to the younger of the staff officers, "Take that to the field telegraph. It must have priority."

Somehow, Dalroy sensed the actual text of the message. Von Emmich was making the humiliating admission that Liege, far from having fallen, as he had announced during the first hours of the advance, was still an immovable barrier against a living torrent of men. So the heart of this middle-aged warrior, whose repute was good when measured by the Prussian standard, had not melted because of the misery and desolation he and his armed ruffians had brought into one of the most peaceful, industrious, and law-abiding communities in the world. His tears flowed because of failure, not of regret. His withers were wrung by mortification, not pity. He would have waded knee-deep in the blood of Belgium if only he could have gained his ends and substantiated by literal fact that first vainglorious telegram to the War Lord of Potsdam. Now he had to ask for time, reinforcements, siege guns, while the clock ticked inexorably, and England, France, and Russia were mobilising. Perhaps it was in that hour that his morbid thoughts first turned to a suicide's death as the only reparation for what he conceived to be a personal blunder. Yet his generalship was marked by no grave strategical fault. If aught erred, it was the German State machine, which counted only on mankind having a body and a brain, but denied it a soul.

Von Emmich's troubles were no concern of Dalroy's, save in their reaction on his own difficulties. He was conscious of a certain surprise that Irene Beresford should recognise one of the leaders of modern Germany so promptly; but this feeling, in its turn, yielded to the vital things of the moment. "Let us be moving," he said quietly, and led the way with Joos.

"Why did you give Andenne as your destination?" he inquired.

"My wife's cousin lives there, monsieur. She is married to a man named Alphonse Stauwaert. I _had_ to say something. I remembered Madame Stauwaert in the nick of time."

"But Andenne lies beyond Liege. To get there we shall have to traverse the whole German line, and pa.s.s some of the outlying forts, which is impossible."

"We must go somewhere."

"True. But why not make for a place that is attainable? Heaven--or Purgatory, at any rate--is far more easily reached to-night than Andenne."

"I didn't say we were going there at once," snapped the miller. "It's more than twenty-five kilometres from here, and is far enough away to be safe when I'm asked where I am bound for. My wife couldn't walk it to-morrow, let alone to-night."

"Andenne lies down the valley of the Meuse too, doesn't it?"

"Ay."

"Well, isn't that simply falling off a rock into a whirlpool? The Germans must pa.s.s that way to France, and it is France they are aiming at, not Belgium."

"They talk mostly about England," said Joos sapiently.

"Yes, because they fear her. But let us avoid politics, my friend. Our present problem is how and where to bestow these women for the night.

After that, the sooner we three men leave them the better. I, at least, must go. I may be detected any minute, and then--G.o.d help you others!"

"_Saperlotte!_ That isn't the way you English are treating us. No, monsieur, we sink or swim together."

That ready disavowal of any clash of interests was cheering. The little man's heart was sound, though his temper might be short. Good faith, however, was not such a prime essential now as good judgment, and Dalroy halted again at a corner of the square. To stay in Argenteau was madness. But--there were three roads. One led to Vise, one to Liege, and one to the German frontier! The first two were closed hopelessly. The third, open in a sense, was fantastic when regarded as a possible avenue of escape. Yet that third road offered the only path toward comparative security and rest.

"I wish you wouldn't look so dejected," whispered Irene, peeping up into Dalroy's downcast face with the winsome smile which had so taken his fancy during the long journey from Berlin. "I've been counting our gains and losses. Surely the balance is heavy on our side. We--you, that is--have defeated the whole German army. We've lost some sleep and some clothes, but have secured a safe-conduct from our enemies, after knocking a good many of them on the head. Some men, I know, look miserable when most successful; but I don't put you in that category."

She was careful to talk German, not that there was much chance of being actually overheard, but to prevent the sibilant accents of English speech reaching suspicious ears. Britons who have no language but their own are often surprised when abroad at hearing children mimicking them by hissing. Curiously enough, such is the effect of our island tongue on foreign ears. Monosyllables like "yes," "this," "it's," and scores of others in constant use, no less than the almost invariable plural form of nouns, lead to the illusion, which Irene was aware of, and guarded against.

Yet, despite the uncouth, harsh-sounding words on her lips, and the coa.r.s.e Flemish garments she wore, she was adorably English. Leontine Joos was a pretty girl; but, in true feminine parlance, "lumpy." Some three inches less in height than her "sister," she probably weighed a stone more. Leontine trudged when she walked, Irene moved with a grace which not even a pair of clumsy sabots could hide. Luckily they were alike in one important particular. Their faces and hands were soiled, their hair untidy, and the pa.s.sage through the wood had scratched foreheads and cheeks until the skin was broken, and little patches of congealed blood disfigured them.

"I may look more dejected than I feel," Dalroy rea.s.sured her. "I'm playing a part, remember. I've kept my head down and my knees bent until my joints ache."

"Oh, is that it?" she cooed, with a relieved air. How could he know then that the sabots were chafing her ankles until the pain had become well-nigh unbearable. If she could have gratified her own wishes she would have crept to the nearest hedge and flung herself down in utter weariness.

Joos, having pondered the Englishman's views on Andenne as an unattainable refuge, scratched his head perplexedly. "I think we had better go toward Herve," he said at last. "This is the road," and he pointed to the left. "On the way we can branch off to a farm I know of, if it happens to be clear of soldiers."

Any goal was preferable to none. They entered the eastward-bound road, but had not advanced twenty yards along it before the way was blocked by a ma.s.s of commissariat wagons and scores of Uhlans standing by their horses.

Two officers, heedless who heard, were wrangling loudly.

"There is nothing else for it, _Herr Hauptmann_," said one. "It doesn't matter who is actually to blame. You have taken the wrong road, and must turn back. Every yard farther in this direction puts you deeper in the mire."

"But I was misdirected as far away as Bleyberg," protested the other.

"Some never-to-be-forgotten hound of h.e.l.l told me that this was the Verviers road. _Gott in himmel!_ and I _must_ be there by dawn!"

Dalroy was gazing at the wagons. They seemed oddly familiar. The painted legend on the tarpaulins placed the matter beyond doubt. These were the very vehicles he had seen in the station-yard at Aix-la-Chapelle!

At this crisis Jan Maertz's sluggish brain evolved a really clever notion. The Germans wanted a guide, and who so well qualified for the post as a carter to whom each turn and twist in every road in the province was familiar? Without consulting any one, he pushed forward.

"Pardon, _Herr General_," he said in his offhand way. "Give me and my friends a lift, and I'll have you and your wagons in Verviers in three hours."

Brutality is so engrained in the Prussian that an offer which a man of another race would have accepted civilly was treated almost as an insult by the angry leader of the convoy.

"You'll guide me with the point of a lance close to your liver, you Belgian swine-dog," was the ungracious answer.

"Not me!" retorted Maertz. "Here, papa!" he cried to Joos, "show this gentleman your paper. He can't go about sticking people as he likes, even in war-time."

Joos went forward. Moved by contemptuous curiosity, the two officers examined the miller's _laisser pa.s.ser_ by the light of an electric torch.

The commissariat officer changed his tone when he saw the signature. The virtue of military obedience becomes a grovelling servitude in the German army, and a man who was ready to act with the utmost unfairness if left to his own instincts grew almost courteous at sight of the communications officer's name. "Your case is different," he admitted grudgingly. "Is this your party? The old man is Herr Schultz, I suppose. Which are you?"

"I'm Georges Lambert, _Herr General_."

"And what do you want?"

"We're all going to Andenne. It's on the paper. This infernal fighting has smashed up our place at Aubel, and the women are footsore and frightened. So is papa. Put them in a wagon. Dampier and I can leg it."

The Prussian was becoming more civil each moment. He realised, too, that this gruff fellow who moved about the country under such powerful protection was a veritable G.o.dsend to him and his tired men.

"No, no," he cried, grown suddenly complaisant, "we can do better than that. I'll dump a few trusses of hay, and put you all in the same wagon, which can then take the lead."