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ON THE WAY TO THE FIFTH ARMY yy
" They haven’t done me or my family the sHghtest harm ;
they are always polite and take no liberties. They have
bought everything in my shop that they can make use of and
paid for it like men, and if I could only get fresh goods from
Luxemburg I should do excellent business. I and three others
are the only ones who keep our shops open. All the others
closed and fled when the Germans came."
In the shop were two knitting machines at which the
eighteen-year-old Blanche Desserrey and her sister of fourteen
were sitting ; they were knitting socks for the Germans, whilst
their brother, eleven years old, was sitting on the steps outside
watching the soldiers. Mademoiselle Blanche was a sweet
and pretty girl, but she did not seem very strong ; she had a
look of melancholy in her dark eyes and wore an anchor of
hope in her brooch. I asked if she had many relations at the
war. She answered yes, and she longed for her friends who
had fled from the town. " How horrible this war is," she cried,
"how awful for everybody." Then she enquired whether they
had been fighting hard at the front that day—she had heard
the booming of the guns in the early morning. Yes, I said,
they were fighting hard. It was the Germans and the French
who were fighting against one another, and many a brave
and promising youth had died for his country. Mademoiselle
Blanche, I soon found, was not merely a seamstress for the
soldiers, she was also a dreamer of beautiful dreams, sensitive
and high-minded, and her heart was pure and without guile.
She was cheerful, amiable, and could even raise a laugh in
the midst of the billeting bothers and the knitting, but it was
clear that she considered gaiety one of the transient things
of this earth. The German officers and soldiers who entered
eyed her with interest and treated her with respect. She
assured me that she had never yet had occasion to complain of
their conduct. She did not quite understand how she managed
to disarm even the strongest by a look from her eyes. Soyez
comme Voiseau, penché -pour un instant sur les rameaux trop
freles. II sent plier la branche mats il cjiante pourtant, sachani
qu’il a des ailes, Blanche Desserrey would have made an
ideal heroine of a touching romance.
But I for my part had no time for romances just then.
When I came out into the street the clock in a church tower
struck six in the solemn French way, and I hastened to my
room to make a few notes. Then there was a knock at the
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