The next day's sun rose hot and angry. It was the 30th of July. By ten o'clock Frieda had packed everything. Amour had been put into his picnic-basket and his humped-up back coaxed and patted and finally forcibly pressed down, and the lid shut over him. Then they awaited the carriage ordered by telephone from Ostend the night before.
But no carriage arrived. At eleven Chérie ran across to the telephone-office and spoke in her sternest tones to the livery stable in Ostend.
"Eh bien? Is this carriage coming? We ordered it for ten o'clock."
"No, Madame, it is not coming," replied a gruff voice from the other end.
"Not coming?"
"No, Madame." Then in lower, almost confidential tones, "It has been requisitioned."
"What is that? Then send another one," said Chérie. But Ostend had cut off the communication and Chérie returned crestfallen and wondering to the glum Frieda and the doleful Mireille sitting on the trunks in Madame Guillaume's narrow hall.
"No carriage," she said.
"What?" exclaimed Frieda.
"Why not?" asked Mireille.