I greet the young Lepouses, Mademoiselle Irma, the pretty eldest daughter, the sixteen-year-old Louisa, Messieurs Floribert and Alfred, the stalwart sons. Last of all, the inn’s proprietor, wrinkled kindly Monsieur Job. I am introduced to M. le Précepteur,[A] the postmaster, at the post office, and his wife and children. Together we sit out on the terrasse and discuss the one and only topic.
[A] M. le Précepteur is a descendant of the owners of Hougomont.
“Caught in the war. A nice ending to my summer’s holiday,” I say cheerfully.
“You had better return to England to-day—it will be your last chance,” says a dispatch carrier, a khaki-clad, dusty figure standing before us in the village street.
“The trains are taken for the soldiers. Besides, I have only Belgian paper money—unnegotiable now.”
“Walk then.”
“Too far,” I protest.
“Please yourself, Mademoiselle. But in war-time, a little hotel, on a high road, with the post office opposite and the Gendarmerie next door, is not the place of residence I should personally choose. Good-bye, Mademoiselle; good-bye, all. I must be off.”
The dispatch carrier mounts his machine, bends over the handle bars in best professional style, and is quickly lost to view in a cloud of dust.
We remain chatting out-of-doors for a little while. There is a careworn look on the faces of the women, a certain quiet determination in the eyes of the men. I understand. At midnight, in a neighbouring village, I had heard the dreaded Tocsin sound out the call to arms. The tones of the harsh, crude bell, mingled with the agonised cries of sorrow-stricken women. No one slept. Some were helping loved ones to make their preparations for departure, others were quietly watching the ceaseless stream of men pass by. Hour after hour they came pouring into the village from outlying hamlets, summoned by beacon fires from the surrounding hills. Many paused to admire the long queue of patient, fly-tormented horses waiting to be shoed by the maréchal. In five hours the last message had been delivered, the last good-bye said. The men were gone. But the memory of their going is not easily effaced....