In the large hall of a farm to which I had gone in search of provisions the farmer's wife, a matron of over fifty summers, was depicting the horrors of the German occupation to four gunners.
She broke off as I came in.
"Some milk and eggs? You want to buy them? No! I won't sell them, but I'll give you them.... Please wait a moment."
And she resumed her story.
"Well, as I was saying, it was just like that ... in front of their father. They trussed him up with his back to the wardrobe so that he couldn't help seeing everything. Five or six of them there were, and one officer. They violated both girls—only eighteen and twenty, and such nice, honest girls too!... Yes—all six of them, one after the other! The poor things screamed all the time!... Oh, those aren't men!... They're just beasts!..."
And lowering her voice a little, but without embarrassment, she continued:
"More than one woman went through the same thing. I did ... yes!... And yet I'm no young girl.... I've a son who is a soldier like you.... Oh, God, it's awful!... It happened one evening, at about this time ... four of them had arrived here to sleep. How was I to defend myself?... The best thing was to say nothing. There have been women who have tried to defend themselves and who have been simply ripped up ... that's all! My husband was out, getting in their things. I thought to myself, 'If he comes in, what will happen?... He'll kill some of them....'"
"Yes, I would, too! I'd have killed them!" interrupted a voice from the darkness at the end of the room.
I had not seen the man as he sat smoking his pipe in a corner of the hearth.