"But I learned how boastful men could be—especially Germans. One—he was a major and one of the nobility—stayed here overnight. He promised to take me back to Germany when the war was over—which would be in a few weeks. They were to be in Paris in a few days then.
"He promised I would be proud when I became all German. France, he said, would never be a separate country again. For most of the people—my people—he said, were weaklings. They would emigrate to America and the remaining would intermarry with Germans. So all France would become Germany.
"When he was awake, he was full of bombast, that major! When he was asleep he snored outrageously. Ugh! For the first time in my life I hate anybody," declared Mother Gervaise, shuddering.
"But he paid me well for his lodging. And his men paid me for the soup. They marched past steadily for two days. Then they were gone and the country all about was peaceful for a week. At the end of that time they come back."
Here Mother Gervaise smiled, but it was a victorious smile. Her face lighted up and her eyes shone again.
"Pellmell back they came," she repeated. "It was a retreat. Many had lost their guns and their packs. I had no soup for them. I said I had lost my poulets and all. But it was not so. I had them hidden.
"The orderly of my major came in here, threw up his hands, and shouted: 'No Paris! No Paris!' And then he tramped on with his fellows. They chopped the trees and blew up many houses. But mine was marked, as the Boches did in those first days: 'These are good people. Let them be.' So I was not molested," finished Mother Gervaise.
"Now, sit you down, Mademoiselle, at the table. Here where I have spread a napkin. The ragout——
"Bless us and save us!" she added, as a sudden roar of voices sounded outside the cot and the throaty rattle of a motor engine. "Whom have we here?"
She went to the door and flung it open. Ruth hesitated at the chair in which she had been about to be seated. Outside she saw bunched several uniformed men. They were hilariously pushing into the cottage, thrusting the excited Mother Gervaise aside.