He shook his head. The philosophy of life was of less concern to him than the facts of life.
“I will not gainsay Hélène’s wish,” he exclaimed, “but it will be a life in the cellars, my child. Don’t forget that. If we are to save Strasburg, all must suffer, even the women.”
“Do the women complain, then, General?”
“Complain—God send that the men show half their courage!”
“Then do not let me be the exception to your rule. If Edmond should come back—”
He laughed doubtingly.
“He will never give his parole, Madame, even for the sake of the bravest heart in Strasburg. And you would not wish it. It is a dishonour. There have been too many victims of that shame already. I would cut off my right hand before setting my name to such a promise as that. When your husband comes back, the war will be over and the Prussians across the Rhine. You help me to that day by remaining at the Place Kleber.”
He left her with the promise, alone in the great house with the shattered rooms and the bulging walls and the roof of tarpaulin which builders had dared to carry for old Hélène’s sake. In the streets about her the crash of bursting shell and falling building ceased not by night or day. Even from the great deserted rooms through which she passed as a figure of solitude, she could see the débris of ruined houses and forgotten homes. But the city’s distress was not her distress. For her own life she had ceased to care. The lonely man in the tavern of the troopers was always in her thoughts. Her secret had become a burden intolerable. When, on that night of terror, she ran from them into the burning house and knelt at the side of her whose voice she nevermore would hear, the prayer on her lips was a prayer of that confession she had wished so ardently to make. There was no other in all the city to whom she could go and say—Help me to save my friend. It was left to her to give Brandon life or death. Her own folly and thoughtlessness had brought this as her recompense.
She was alone in the great house, alone with her secret. Few came to her, for there was peril to life in the streets, and ever arose that deafening music of the guns, that thunder of tumultuous sounds which spoke of a city crumbling to the dust, of a people living below the ground, of flames leaping to the crimson heavens, of passion and death and a nation’s despair. There was scarce another voice that she heard save the voice of Guillaumette, who trembled in the cellars and shrieked aloud as the shells fell with a great flame of light and the homes of the children for their victory. Her friends—they had all found shelter of the darkness and the earth, or had fled Strasburg to give the story to the valleys and the lakes of Switzerland. None whose business was not of the city’s safety ventured then to look upon the sun or even to tell the stars in the quivering sky. Troopers alone passed her when she ventured from the lonely house. Yet venture she must, for the dead seemed to walk the empty rooms; and often in the silence she heard her friend’s voice reproaching her.