As the van moved off he waved his hand with a cheery smile, and then turned away up the spiral staircase.
Mr Poerringer sat silent in a corner of the carriage (the same vehicle in which we had gone down to the baths). We crossed the courtyard, passed the entrance to the terrace, the sentries guarding the bridge over the moat. We entered the tunnelled archway, went slowly down the steep hill, and drove through the last barrier. These things I could see, for the window was open.
My thought was still struggling with the realisation of what these things meant, and of what lay beyond these prison walls, when, as we drove into the main road, Mr Poerringer broke the silence, and there was a tinge of envy in his voice, "La guerre est fini pour vous," he said, "La guerre est fini pour vous."
Festung Marienberg—Entrance to Inner Courtyard.
CHAPTER VIII.
WÜRZBURG TO ENGLAND.
"La guerre est fini pour vous."
The van drove slowly down the road which runs along the outer fortification of the Castle. Mr Poerringer did not speak again, and I was silently trying to grasp the reality of the situation.
We stopped at the hut hospital barracks where I had been taken on my arrival at Würzburg five weeks before. Mr Poerringer got out and saluted Doctor Zinck, who was waiting outside the gates. The Doctor caught my eye and grinned from ear to ear, behind the back of some other officers; probably he would have spoken to me had it not been for their presence. I smiled at him rather feebly. At this time my mind contained but one idea—the fear that something would occur to prevent my departure from Würzburg. I was frightened to speak lest some word of mine might be made an excuse for detention. The four British soldiers who now got into the van were evidently in a similar state of mind. Two of them had travelled with me from Cambrai. We none of us spoke. The door of the van shut out the face of the still smiling doctor (bless the man! he was perhaps really pleased to see me safely off), and we jogged slowly on.
Our conveyance stopped in the goods station yard. Three of the soldiers managed to hobble along without help, but the fourth, the same young fellow in the K.O.S.B. who had travelled in my carriage from Cambrai, had to be carried on a stretcher. I followed very slowly across the railway tracks, and then along the platform to where our train was waiting. Two first-class carriages were reserved for us, one for the "Offizier" I heard them say, and another for the men. The train was full, and passengers at every window stretched out their heads in curiosity, but none made any remark. We did not stay many minutes in the station. As the train moved off, Mr Poerringer was talking to some of the station officials and did not look up. He had not spoken to me since leaving the gates of Marienberg, and perhaps had mistaken my state of stupor for sulks.