"'Coward, of a country of cowards! You and cattle like you have cut off the ears and torn out the eyes of our glorious Bavarians. I'll slit your throat to pay for that!'
"Ah, but this was too much—more than I could bear! I said 'No!' and I put my two hands—so—between the throat of that boy and the German knife."
When Sœur Julie came to this part of the tale, she made a beautiful, unconscious gesture, re-enacting the part she had played. I knew then how she had looked when she faced the Bavarian officer, and why he had not hacked those two work-worn but nobly shaped hands of hers, to get at the French chasseur's throat. She seemed the incarnate spirit of the mother-woman, whose selfless courage no brute who had known a mother could resist. And her "No!" rang out deep and clear as a warning tocsin. I felt that the wounded boy must have been as safe behind those hands and that "No!" as if a thick though transparent wall of glass had magically risen to protect him.
"All this time," Sœur Julie went on, gathering herself together after a moment. "All this time Germans led by non-commissioned officers were searching the hospice. But they found no hiding soldiers, because there were none such to find. And somehow that captain and his lieutenant did not touch our wounded ones. They had a look of shame and sullenness on their faces, as if they were angry with themselves for yielding their wicked will to an old woman. Yet they did yield, thank God! And then I got the captain's promise to spare the hospice—got it by saying we would care for his wounded as faithfully as we tended our own. I said, 'If you leave this house standing to take in your men, you must leave the whole street. If the buildings round us burn, we shall burn, too—and with us your German wounded. Will you give me your word that this whole quarter shall be safe?'
"The man did not answer. But he looked down at his boots. And I have always noticed that, when men of any nation look at their boots, it is that they are undecided. It was so with him. A few more arguments from me, and he said: 'It shall be as you ask.'
"Soon he must have been glad of his promise, for there were many German wounded, and we took them all in. Ah, this room, which you see so clean and white now, ran blood. We had to sweep blood into the hall, and so out at the front door, where at least it washed away the German footprints from our floor! For days we worked and did our best, even when we knew of the murders committed: innocent women with their little children. And the fifteen old men they shot for hostages. Oh, we did our best, though it was like acid eating our hearts. But our reward came the day the Germans had to gather up their wounded in wild haste, as the French commandant had gathered ours before the retreat. They fled, and our Frenchmen marched back—too late to save the town, but not too late to redeem its honour. And that is all my story."
As she finished with a smile half sad, half sweet, Sœur Julie looked over our heads at some one who had just come in—some one who had stood listening in silence, unheard and unseen by us. I turned mechanically, and my eyes met the eyes of Paul Herter, the "Wandering Jew."
CHAPTER XV
Dierdre O'Farrell and I were sitting side by side, our backs to the door, so it was only as we turned that Herter could have recognized us. He had no scruple in showing that I was the last person he wished to meet. One look was enough for him! His pale face—changed and aged since London—flushed a dark and violent red. Backing out into the hall he banged the door.