All through that dark journey as the car bumped and lurched over the atrocious roads, the words beat in a refrain through the mind of the neutral. "Nach Verdun—Verdunkelung!" He wondered. Eclipse? Was it the sun of Germany that set on the French position? The Oberst was loquaciously cheerful.
That night, in the great map-hung apartment, the War-Lords received the news that their further advance was barred.
Next morning a furious counter-attack surrounded a handful of defenders in the fort for which they had paid so much. The French reinforcements had arrived.
FOOTNOTES:
[11] War economy.
[12] "The thing is absolutely simple!"
[13] Vide Mr. John Buchan's History of the War, Vol. XIII.
[14] "Nach" means "to, towards," and also "after."—"To Verdun! After Verdun—Paris!"
[15] "I beg permission, Your Majesty."
[16] "Granted."