At the War Office, Count Chabeau has given me a special permit to go to Lierre.
Out past Mortsell, I notice a Belgian lady standing among a crowd of soldiers. She wears black. Her dress is elegant, yet simple. I admire her furs, and I wonder what on earth she is doing here, right out in the middle of the fortifications, far from the city. Belgian ladies are seldom seen in these specified zones.
Suddenly her eyes meet mine, and she comes towards me, drawn by the knowledge that we are both women.
She leans in at my car window. And then she tells me her story, and I learn why she looks so pale and worried.
Just down the road, a little further on, in the region in which we may not pass, is her villa, which has been suddenly requisitioned by the English. All in a hurry yesterday, Madame packed up, and hurried away to Antwerp, to arrange for her stay there. This morning she has returned to fetch her dogs.
But voilà! She reaches this point and is stopped. The way is blocked. She must not go on. No one can pass without a special laisser-passer; which she hasn't got.
A Special Permit.
So here, hour after hour, since six o'clock in the morning, she stands, waiting pitifully for a chance to get back to her villa and take away her dogs, that she fears may be starving.