In order to carry out our plan, we had to look for a favourable place. In front of the house stretches a velvet lawn planted here and there with firs and pretty reeds. We could do nothing there. But beyond there are beds in the gardens, shaped like a lozenge, a crescent, and what not, box-edged and planted with shrubs. That was the right place, and we proved it by digging there six or seven big holes. The largest received the drawing-room clock, carefully wrapped up in oilcloth, with other clocks almost as dearly cherished. On this side, we buried silver, on that, old china, with a great deal of bustle and haste.
"Is the old Rouen jug buried? And my yellow tea-set? I will bury that too; it is too lovely to lose."
The work drew to an end, and, by a masterpiece of cunning, we strewed the newly-dug ground with dry leaves, twigs, and small pebbles.
Dr. Laison went into ecstasies about the garden he had made over the grave of the clocks. He was thinking himself a match for Le Nôtre, when he gave a start. "What is that?" The buried treasures, indignant at their ill-usage, protested against it by the voice of the Empire clock, which began to strike the hour. As we listened to the silvery yet hollow sound which came from the earth, we were reminded of a tale by Edgar Poe. But we had to apply our thoughts to other cares, and hide the linen and clothes. After our guests were gone—loaded with grateful blessings—we hardly spared the time to swallow a hasty dinner, and went to give the finishing touch to our work.
Now there is between the ceiling of my bedroom and the roof a very dark and lofty space that might serve as a very good hiding-place; but the ladder was too short to get to it, so we put it on a table, and I, astride on a beam, concealed in the accommodating shadow the things which my sisters-in-law, posted on the ladder like so many tilers busy with new roofing, handed up to me. We spread out and heaped up, at first linen, then clothes, furs, shawls, carpets, curtains, eider-down coverlets, and a big lion-skin; with many exertions we even hoisted up to the loft a console table. Colette, standing on tiptoe at the other end of the attic, declared:
"It looks quite empty; you can put in more things."
"Thanks! We are quite stiff enough for once. Thank Heaven the Germans don't come every day, or we should not be equal to the job."
Downstairs we took down looking-glasses and pictures, and concealed them as well as we could behind cupboards and bed-curtains. They showed a little, but we hoped the Germans would see nothing of them. We could not bury water-colours or oil-paintings, could we?
At last the house was in order, and we went out for a little stroll. The village was silent, dead, not a cat in the streets; all the doors and windows were closed. It was evident that every one was giving himself wholly up to the very sport we had just enjoyed. All were vying with one another in hiding their treasures, and were racking their brains to find unknown holes and undiscoverable hiding-places. I wish to state here that there is a gap in our public instruction, a want in our literature. Since we are provided with such alarming neighbours, every school-master should devote two hours a week to teach our youth what precautions to take in case of invasion. Moreover, in my leisure hours, I intend to write a book on "The Art of Concealing applied to Invasion." This may open a new field of literature, for they will certainly lose no time in answering the work from the other side of the Rhine with "The Treasure-seeker's Guide, or a Hand-book for the Complete Plunderer." We shall have, therefore, to study the question and improve the art of hiding. In this respect, it is true, an ancient instinct may serve as a guide, an instinct which has had no better chance of expansion than in the corner of France we belong to. This rich country has excited the lust of all conquerors. Before the Christian era the Romans subdued it, and later on the Franks laid hands upon it. Attila, as Colette said but yesterday, may have sent a few patrols down here. Then came the Normans, who levied contributions on us; and the English, who took their ease at the inhabitants' cost during the Hundred Years' War. Later the troops of Philip the Second plundered us, and last century, 1814, 1870—two inauspicious dates—we knew the strangers twice more. Therefore, when the alarm spread, "the enemy are advancing," the order of the day, which we knew by right of inheritance, went round: "let us hide, let us hide!" All kept on hiding, and we hid too.
And our departure? We had decided to go, that was well and good; but how should we go? We could not by railway, and we could not find a horse and a carriage in the village for their weight in gold. Mme. Valaine went in haste to M. Laserbe, who was setting out with three carts drawn by oxen. He promised to take us and our luggage with him, as little luggage as possible.