She hoped that her mother was still sleeping; and she had seconds when she was startled by her own calmness. Again, the faces of the children in her school were as clear as in life. She breathed her gratitude that the procession in which they moved to the rear was hours ago out of the theatre of danger. In the simplicity of big things, her duty was to teach them, a future generation, no less than Feller's duty was to the pursuing shadow of his conscience. She should see war, alive, naked, bloody, and she would tell her children what she had seen as a warning.
Silence, except an occasional rifle-shot—silence and the darkness before dawn which would, she knew, concentrate the lightnings around the house. She glanced into her mother's room and marvelled as at a miracle to find her sleeping. Then she stole down-stairs and opened the outer door of the dining-room. A step or two brought her to the edge of the veranda. There she paused and leaned against one of the stone pillars. Dellarme himself was in a half-reclining position, his back to a tree. He seemed to be nodding. Except for a few on watch over the sand-bags, his men were stretched on the earth, moving restlessly at intervals, either in an effort to sleep or waking suddenly after a spell of harassed unconsciousness.
XXVI
FELLER IS TEMPTED
With the first sign of dawn there was a movement of shadowy forms taking position in answer to low-spoken commands. The search-light yielded its vigil to the wide-spread beam out of the east, and the detail of the setting where Marta was to watch the play of one of man's passions, which he dares not permit the tender flesh of woman to share, grew distinct. Bayonets were fixed on the rifles that lay along the parapet of sand-bags in front of the row of brown shoulders. Back of them in the yard was a section of infantry in reserve, also with bayonets fixed, ready to fill the place of any who fell out of line, a doctor and stretchers to care for the wounded, and a detachment of engineers to mend any breaches made in the breastwork by shell fire.
The gunner of the automatic sighted his barrel, slightly adjusted its elevation, and swung it back and forth to make sure that it worked smoothly, while his assistant saw that the fresh belts of cartridges which were to feed it were within easy reach. Dellarme, walking behind his men, cautioning them not to expose their heads and at the same time to fire low, had his cheery smile in excellent working order.
"We expect great things of you!" this smile said as he bent over the gunner with a pat on the shoulder.
"I understand!" said the upward glance in reply.