FullReads

“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….