And yet the prevailing note of the people we met along that road was still gaiety, rather than sadness or terror.
"Il y a des Allemands?"
"Il y a de danger?"
We went on perpetually with our questions, and the answers would come back laughingly with shakings of the head.
"No! Not met any Germans!" or:
"They are fighting round Ninove. We've been making détours all the morning to try and get out of their way!"
And now the road was so steep, that Jean and I jumped down from our sloping seat at the back and walked up the hill to save the bony horses.
Every now and then, we would pause to look back at that wide dreamlike view, which grew more and more magnificent the higher we ascended, until at last fair Brabant lay stretched out behind us, bathed in a glittering sunlight that had in it, that day, some exquisitely poignant quality as though it were more golden than gold, just because, across that great plain to the left, the fierce detonations of heavy artillery told of the terrific struggles that were going on there for life and death.
Presently we met a couple of black-robed Belgian priests walking down the hill, and mopping their pale faces under their black felt hats.
"The Germans are all over the place to-day," they told us. "And yesterday they arrested a train-full of people between Enghien and Hall. They suspected them of carrying letters into Brussels. So they cut the train lines last night, and marched the people off to be searched. The young men have been sent into Germany to-day. Or so rumour says. That may or may not be true. But anyway it is quite true that the train-load of passengers was arrested wholesale, and that every single one of them was searched, and those who were found carrying letters were taken prisoners. Perhaps to be shot."