got out at the terminus and went down the road. A wind was still running. He could hear the faint whisper of the rye, and the stronger swish as a sudden gust was upon it. No one was about. Feeling detached and impersonal, he went down a field-path between the low vines. Many little vine trees rose up in spires, holding out tender pink shoots, waving their tendrils. He saw them distinctly and wondered over them. In a field a little way off, men and women were taking up the hay. The bullock-waggon stood by on the path, the men in their blue shirts, the women with white cloths over their heads carried hay in their arms to the cart, all brilliant and distinct upon the shorn, glowing green acres. He felt himself looking out of darkness on to the glamorous, brilliant beauty of the world around him, outside him.
The Baron’s house, where Emilie was maidservant, stood square and mellow among trees and garden and fields. It was an old French grange. The barracks was quite near. Bachmann walked, drawn by a single purpose, towards the courtyard. He entered the spacious, shadowy, sun-swept place. The dog, seeing a soldier, only jumped and whined for greeting. The pump stood peacefully in a corner, under a lime tree, in the shade.
The kitchen door was open. He hesitated, then walked in, speaking shyly and smiling involuntarily. The two women started, but with pleasure. Emilie was preparing the tray for afternoon coffee. She stood beyond the table, drawn up, startled, and challenging, and glad. She had the proud, timid eyes of some wild animal, some proud animal. Her black hair was closely banded, her grey eyes watched steadily. She wore a peasant dress of blue cotton sprigged with little red roses, that buttoned tight over her strong maiden breasts.
At the table sat another young woman, the nursery governess, who was picking cherries from a huge heap, and dropping them into a bowl. She was young, pretty, freckled.
“Good day!” she said pleasantly. “The unexpected.”
Emilie did not speak. The flush came in her dark cheek. She still stood watching, between fear and a desire to escape, and on the other hand joy that kept her in his presence.
“Yes,” he said, bashful and strained, while the eyes of the two women were upon him. “I’ve got myself in a mess this time.”
“What?” asked the nursery governess, dropping her hands in her lap. Emilie stood rigid.
Bachmann could not raise his head. He looked sideways at the glistening, ruddy cherries. He could not recover the normal world.
“I knocked Sergeant Huber over the fortifications down into the moat,” he said. “It was an accident—but——”
And he grasped at the cherries, and began to eat them, unknowing, hearing only Emilie’s little exclamation.
“You knocked him over the fortifications!” echoed Fräulein Hesse in horror. “How?”
Spitting the cherry-stones into his hand, mechanically, absorbedly, he told them.
“Ach!” exclaimed Emilie sharply.
“And how did you get here?” asked Fräulein Hesse.
“I ran off,” he said.
There was a dead silence. He stood, putting himself at the mercy of the women. There came a hissing from the stove, and a stronger smell of coffee. Emilie turned swiftly away. He saw her flat, straight back and her strong loins, as she bent over the stove.
“But what are you going to do?” said Fräulein Hesse, aghast.
“I don’t know,” he said, grasping at more cherries. He had come to an end.
“You’d better go to the barracks,” she said. “We’ll get the Herr Baron to come and see about it.”
Emilie was swiftly and quietly preparing the tray. She picked it up, and stood with the glittering china and silver before her, impassive, waiting for his reply. Bachmann remained with his head dropped, pale and obstinate. He could not bear to go back.
“I’m going to try to get into France,” he said.
“Yes, but they’ll catch you,” said Fräulein Hesse.
Emilie watched with steady, watchful grey eyes.
“I can have a try, if I could hide till tonight,” he said.
Both women knew what he wanted. And they all knew it was no good. Emilie picked up the tray, and went out. Bachmann stood with his head dropped. Within himself he felt the dross of shame and incapacity.
“You’d never get away,” said the governess.
“I can try,” he said.
Today he could not put himself between the hands of the military. Let them do as they liked with him tomorrow, if he escaped today.
They were silent. He ate cherries. The colour flushed bright into the cheek of the young governess.
Emilie returned to prepare another tray.
“He could hide in your room,” the governess said to her.
The girl drew herself away. She could not bear the intrusion.
“That is all I can think of that is safe from the children,” said Fräulein Hesse.
Emilie gave no answer. Bachmann stood waiting for the two women. Emilie did not want the close contact with him.
“You could sleep with me,” Fräulein Hesse said to her.
Emilie lifted her eyes and looked at the young man, direct, clear, reserving herself.
“Do you want that?” she asked, her strong virginity proof against him.
“Yes—yes——” he said uncertainly, destroyed by shame.
She put back her head.
“Yes,” she murmured to herself.
Quickly she filled the tray, and went out.
“But you can’t walk over the frontier in a night,” said Fräulein Hesse.
“I can cycle,” he said.
Emilie returned, a restraint, a neutrality, in her bearing.
“I’ll see if it’s all right,” said the governess.
In a moment or two Bachmann was following Emilie through the square hall, where hung large maps on the walls. He noticed a child’s blue coat with brass buttons on the peg, and it reminded him of Emilie walking holding the hand of the youngest child, whilst he watched, sitting under the lime tree. Already this was a long way off. That was a sort of freedom he had lost, changed for a new, immediate anxiety.
They went quickly, fearfully up the stairs and down a long corridor. Emilie opened her door, and he entered, ashamed, into her room.
“I must go down,” she murmured, and she departed, closing the door softly.
It was a small, bare, neat room. There was a little dish for holy-water, a picture of the Sacred
