She held her mistress in her arms and began to feed her as a little child. The abbé watched approvingly. He did not know why her husband had not been to the house. The Captain’s duty as a soldier had kept him from the city, he thought. And so he spoke of Strasburg’s sufferings in a low and gentle voice soothing as a lullaby.
“Ah, we should give thanks to God that we have even the cellars of our house, my child. There are others who have not straw to cover them. But we have taught France her duty, and France will remember. The brave General, I do not know how to find words to speak of him. Day and night, day and night he refuses to listen to the cowards. We are a city of fire and dust, and yet we remain a city. We have little food to eat, yet God feeds our hearts. And we shall resist until the end, though there be not one stone upon another. Yesterday, they tell me, six hundred shells fell upon bastion eleven. Six hundred shells! Think of it! These Germans are devils—the house of God even is not sacred to them. But they are facing a brave people, my child. We know how to suffer. Even the women do not complain. Ah! God be thanked for the brave women who give us their prayers to-day.”
Beatrix seemed to listen to him, but found no interest in his words. She was glad when he left her to sleep again, but no sleep rewarded her busy brain. Line by line her own story came back to her. She was alone, then! Edmond had left her forever. She would never know his kiss again. He deemed her unfaithful to his country. The punishment of her folly seemed bitter beyond words. She felt as some outcast, lacking country, friends, and knowing not so much as one in all the world who would speak a word of love to her.
Guillaumette watched at her bedside that afternoon and told her many things in fragments of reluctant gossip. She had been very ill after “Monsieur” left the house. Few buildings remained unharmed in the Place Kleber. In the northern suburbs of the city the people lived in their cellars. This room was one of the old vaults under the presbytery of the abbé’s church in the Rue Nationale. Richard Watts had come to their house when she was ill, and had insisted upon her removal. The abbé, who slept in the sacristy of his church, and had loved “Madame” as one of his own children, could not do enough for her. There were many in Strasburg to condole with Madame Hélène’s daughter even at such a time. General Uhrich himself had called at the house. No one knew anything of the story, except that she was very ill, and that the abbé had taken her there for safety. They had done all they could to make the place comfortable—but there was no choice. Upstairs the iron death was everywhere. Children had been killed at their mothers’ breasts. The great library of Strasburg burned still, as some vast flambeau bidding the Germans to look upon the unyielding heart of the city. There was a party that wished to yield, but the General would not listen to it. Monsieur Watts said that the General was a madman who had been weaned on pâté de foie gras. The American, Dr. Forbes—ah, how clever he was! He would return at sunset, and bring Monsieur Watts with him. They came together always.
Beatrix heard the gossip greedily. Ten days had passed, then, since Edmond left her. She trembled to think what those ten days might have meant to Brandon. Richard Watts’s anxiety to see her she could construe only as some desire that she should have news of her friend. Whether it were ill or good news she dare not ask. In one way a vague sense of relief succeeded the remembrance that Edmond knew her secret. She did not believe, in her gentler moods, that his love for her could not brook so womanly a folly as that of which he found her guilty. He would come to reason when he had reflected upon all that she had told him.
Richard Watts presented himself at the house at five o’clock, and when they brought his message she asked eagerly that she might see him. It was good to look upon that burly figure; good to hear that cheery English voice congratulating her. And he had so much to tell her.
“And so the little passenger is getting well again. Bravo, bravo! I shall have rare news for old Anne Brown to-night. Eh, young lady, you will send your love to old Anne Brown?”
He had the little hand in his for a moment and pressed the burning fingers.
“You are kind to come,” she said.