“But you don’t mean that you continued inside the fort to the very end?” Barbara demanded almost angrily. “I suppose you were forgotten.”
“I think I was at the last,” Mildred returned. “You see, at first when General Alexis discovered that I was the Red Cross nurse who had been chosen to stay behind, he was angry and insisted that I leave at once. But by the time he learned of my presence, it was too late to find me an escort. Besides, the doctor did not wish me to go. There was a Russian woman, a kind of servant, who was also with us, and did the cooking, I believe, if we ever ate. Anyhow, she stayed with me and looked after me when she could, so that I was never actually alone.”
“But Mildred,” Nona asked, guessing at many details that her friend did not mention, “how did you finally get away at last? And have you come directly here from Grovno? Surely the fort did not hold out all these weeks.”
“No, we have been away from Grovno nearly two weeks, I can’t remember the exact passage of time very well,” Mildred explained, lifting her hands to let down the long braids of her heavy flaxen hair, and allowing the hairpins to drop girl fashion, carelessly into her lap. She was wearing Nona’s kimono, and it is always easier to talk confidentially with one’s hair down, if one happens to have the mass that Mildred had. The very weight of it was oppressive when she was tired.
“Yes, it was terribly interesting toward the last,” she went on, “although I don’t believe even then we were in great danger. General Alexis is too wise to have permitted that. Everything was in readiness; all the plans were made days beforehand for our getting away. The different regiments of private soldiers with their officers continued to march away from Grovno, and so much ammunition was moved that I think almost no stores of any value were left. Then the moment finally came for our own retreat.”
To Barbara’s intense irritation, Mildred actually paused for an instant at this point in her story. But she continued almost immediately.
“There was an underground passage outside the fort, leading all the way to the river. The seven of us at last left the fort together. By this time General Alexis had almost to be carried, the pain from his wound had grown so intense. Then every once in a while, as we went on, one of the soldiers would place a bomb in such a position that it would explode after we had gone. In this way the underground passage was wrecked, so there never was any possibility of the Germans being able to follow us. When we reached the bridge over the river two motor cars were waiting for us. Colonel Feodorovitch, one of the lieutenants and the two private soldiers stayed to see that the last bridge over the Styr was blown up. The other five, General Alexis, his physician, and one officer and we two women started west in an effort to join the retreating regiments, who were to come up with a portion of the Grand Duke’s army.”
“Goodness, Mildred Thornton, what an experience you have been through!” Nona ejaculated. “Yet you talk as quietly as if it were almost an ordinary occurrence!”
Mildred shook her head. “It is not because I feel it an ordinary experience, Nona, but because so much has happened I am overpowered by the bigness of it. Really, when we got safely away from the fort, the battle, or at least my share in it, was only about to begin. We had gone a few miles into the country, when General Alexis became desperately ill. Unless he could have immediate attention his physician said there was no possible hope for his life.”
Barbara had by this time slipped out of her chair and was sitting on the floor with her hands clasped over her knees, looking all eyes, and rocking herself slowly back and forward as a relief for her excitement.