We heard the muffling snort of his motor die away in the snowy night. It was after three before the Baron returned.
"I am so sorry," he apologized, "but there has been a mistake. They know nothing here about us. We must go in the morning to the —th Army headquarters at Goldap. And now," and the Baron looked about him in dismay, "we must sleep."
So we stretched our sleeping bags on the floor of the shack and in a moment were sleeping like the soldiers, whom not even a cannon could awaken....
I awoke to find the brown coats of Russian soldiers passing outside the window. Rubbing the drowsiness out of my eyes, I saw follow, larger men in goat and sheepskins, and then a squad of black hatted, slit-eyed Siberians, a squad of strapping fair haired Finns. A guard of mature looking Landsturm complacently puffing at big German pipes were watching them shoveling away the snow.
It was the second night I had not been able to take my clothes off, and as for the civilized luxuries, given a tooth brush, a morning shave is not a matter of grave concern.
"Roll up your bag," advised Captain von Stietencron, "and leave it here. We'll go to the Officers' Casino for coffee. There a motor will meet us. We can pick up the baggage here and then we start for Goldap."
As we walked down the long shaded street that seemed to be the main street of Lyck, a gray transport train of "prairie schooners," slowly but steadily rattled by. The way was strewn with discarded cartridge clips and smashed rifles. On the walls of the houses we began to see the spatter of shrapnel.
"This is where General von Buelow's army broke through," explained the Captain. "One division of our soldiers rolled up four Russian divisions here and put them in retreat for the frontier."
An automobile of the Flying Corps shrieked past. We came into a zone of looted shops. We entered a store where bottled liquors had been sold, a chaos now of smashed glass. On the day of the battle when all discipline flew to the winds the Russians had evidently sought their solace or courage in vodka. We became aware that not a house nor store in Lyck had escaped their pillage. As we crossed a little public park we found they had vented their revenge at defeat by smashing every bench in the square. Since we learned that no Germans had remained in the town of Lyck, and no sniping could have been possible, this orgy of broken shop windows, blown up safes, and robbery, before our eyes, was the indisputable evidence of Russian barbarism.
We had our coffee in a little inn that had been the Russian Officers' Casino where a squad of Germans were already at work cleaning out the filth. Black coffee, black bread, in a room where the wall was riddled with bullets, from the pistols of drunken Russian officers who had sat there making a target of a portrait of the German Emperor, now lying on the floor. A tired officer of the Hussars came in as we left and I heard him say to Von Stietencron, "So their officers were here, were they?" And Von Stietencron replied: "I'm afraid they were as bad as their men...."