The few words spoken to her by the man who attended her boasted that such were the facts. She thought of that front from Soissons to Reims, where the French lay unaware, perhaps, that upon them was soon to come the final, overwhelming attack. It must be in the last stages of preparation, with the hundreds of thousands of reserve troops secretly concentrated by night marches; with the thousands of guns and millions of shells secreted and in place for another such surprise attack to be delivered in some amazing, unforeseen manner as that assault which two months ago swept over the plains of Picardy and broke the English line. Perhaps already the attack was begun; perhaps——
Such terrors held her when she lay sleepless or only half drowsing in the dark; they formed the background for more personal affrights visualizing her own friends—Hubert and Milicent and Mrs. Mayhew, French girls whom she had known, and many others. Most particularly her terror dwelt upon Gerry Hull. She had ventured to inquire of the Germans regarding his fate; at first they refused information, then they told her he was dead, next that he was a prisoner; and they even supplied her with a paragraph from one of their papers boasting of the fact and making capital of his capture.
He was in one of their camps, to be treated by the Germans—how? Her dismay would dwell with him; then, suddenly considering her own fate, she would sit up, stark, and grasping tight to the sides of her cot. Her mother and her sisters in Onarga—would they ever know? Cynthia Gail’s people—what, at last, would they learn?
A sudden resounding shock, accompanied by a dull rolling sound, vibrated through the air. A great gun was being tested somewhere nearby, Ruth thought. No; they would not do that at night. Then it was an explosion at the chemical works; something had gone wrong. The shocks and the sounds increased. Also they drew nearer. Now guns—small, staccato, barking guns—began firing; shells smashed high in the air. Ruth had dragged her chair below her window and was standing upon it. Ah! Now she could see the flashes and lights in the sky; an air raid was on. There within sight—not a mile off—and fighting, were allied machines! Transcendent exaltation intoxicated her.
The bombs bursting in air!
The stanza of the glorious song of her country sang in her soul with full understanding of its great feeling. An American prisoner long ago had written those wonderful words—written them, she remembered, when lying a captive upon an enemy vessel and when fearing for the fate of the fort manned by his people. But
... the rocket’s red glare,
The bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night
That our flag was still there.