Two days after the departure of Jackdaw's Leg we heard a beat of the rural constable's drum ... women from sixteen to fifty ... one o'clock ... market-place.... We hardly listened to it. It was no concern of ours. But at one o'clock Mme. Lantois ran up breathless: "Do you know that the lieutenant just said that everybody must go to the market-place? He even told us that if you didn't go, he would send four soldiers to fetch you, and take you off to Chalandry."
Consternation! Alarm! It was twelve o'clock according to German time. Without waiting for luncheon we ran out in all directions to look for substitutes. At one we arrived on the place, attended by four old women, still hale and hearty, and well pleased to fill our places, for of course to the scanty pay of the Germans we had agreed to add the usual price of a day's work. The sight of the place suggested a picture of the slave-market. Women, wearing light blouses and coarse linen aprons, had gathered on both sides. To shield themselves from the glare of the sun, the most of them wore a handkerchief tied under the chin; a few of them laughing, tossed their sunburnt hair, and many with weary faces leant against the tools they had brought. There were gloomy-eyed women, who up to that time had never done any work but housekeeping; there were young girls, carefully looked after by their mothers, who did not know what to do with themselves; there were sedate, stern-looking workers, and at last the usual set of soldiers' wenches, laughing at and making fun of the others, noisier than the rest of the company, and thinking that they might do what they liked.
Under the shade of the plane-trees was seated Jacob—such was the Christian name of the lieutenant, and no one gave him another—busy calling the names over. Ours was among the last; we answered without wincing, and then presented our substitutes. Thus did we baffle the trick which Jacob wanted to play us.
This enforced service brought about many troubles between the invaders and the inhabitants, so the Germans had prudently turned the sugar-mill of Aulnois into a prison for male culprits, and converted a house at Chalandry into a jail for women. And if you showed the least disposition to disobedience, you were immediately taken into custody. Did you call a private soldier such names as he had deserved a hundred times? To prison with you. Had you kept back any goods from the perquisitioners? To prison with you. Were you unwilling to comply with the requisitioners' orders? To prison with you. Were you penniless when liable to a fine? To prison with you, to prison, to prison!
Half a dozen men from Morny were for ever ruralising at Aulnois. Of course it is no disgrace to be put into prison by the Germans, but it is a well-known fact that the diet of the Prussian jails is anything but engaging.
A girl of sixteen coming back one evening from the fields threw her pickaxe on her threshold, and cried out in tears:
"I won't work any longer for those barbarians!"
An indiscreet ear overheard the sentence, which was repeated in high quarters.
Now, the word "barbarians" is to a German like a red rag to a bull.
So, two days afterwards, the family of the imprudent little person were awakened out of their sleep at four o'clock in the morning. A sergeant and four men came to fetch the guilty girl and take her to Chalandry. Half an hour was granted her to get ready. Mad with despair and shaken with sobs herself, she left her parents sunk in desolation and in tears. They even did not know how long their child would be imprisoned. Towards evening the father succeeded in seeing the commandant, who told him his daughter would be in prison for three weeks.