We are going away too, for it is wiser. In the streets there are a very few wayfarers who are running to take shelter, running with their backs hunched up, although nothing is falling yet, like people without umbrellas surprised by a shower. One of them, who nevertheless does not mind stopping, points out to us the last hotel still remaining open, a "perfectly safe" hotel, he says, over there in a quarter of the town where no shell has ever fallen.
God forbid that I should dream of laughing at them, or fail to admire as much as it deserves their persistent and calm heroism in remaining here, in defiance of everything, in their beloved town, which is suffering more and more mutilations. But who would not be amused at that instinct which causes the majority of mankind to hunch their backs against hail of whatever description? And then, is it because the air is fresh and soft and it is good to be alive that after the unspeakable heartache at the sight of the cathedral and the passion verging on tears, a calm of reaction sets in and in that moment everything amuses me?
At the end of a quiet street, where the noise of the cannonade is muffled, in the distance, we find the hotel which was recommended to us.
"Rooms," says the host, very pleasantly, standing on his doorstep, "oh, as many as you like, the whole hotel if you wish, for you will understand that in times such as these travellers—— And yet as far as shells go you have nothing to fear here."
An appalling din interrupts his sentence. All the windows in the front of the house are shivered to fragments, together with tiles, plaster, branches of trees. In his haste to run away and hide he misses the step on the threshold and falls down flat on his face. A dog who was coming along jumps upon him, full of importance, recalling him to order with a fierce bark. A cat, sprung from I know not where, flies through space like an aerolith, uses my shoulder for a jumping-off place, and is swallowed up by the mouth of a cellar. But words are too tedious for that series of catastrophes, which lasts scarcely as long as two lightning flashes. And they continue to bombard us with admirable regularity, as if timing themselves with a metronome; the wall of the house is already riddled with scars.
It is very wrong, I admit, to take these things as a jest, and indeed with me that impression is only superficial, physical, I might say; that which endures in the depth of my soul is indignation, anguish, pity. But at this entry which the Germans made into our hotel, that peaceful spot, with flourish of their great orchestra, in the presence of so many surprises, how retain one's dignity? There is a fair number of little shells, it seems, but no heavy shells; they travel with their long whistling sound, and burst with a harsh din.
"Into the cellar, gentlemen," cries the innkeeper, who has picked himself up unhurt. Apparently there is nothing else to be done. I should have come to that conclusion myself. So I turn round to order in my three soldiers too, who had remained outside to look at a hole made by shrapnel in the body of the car. But upon my word I believe they are laughing, the heartless wretches; and then I can restrain myself no longer, I burst out laughing too.
Yes, it is very wrong of us, for presently there will be bloodshed and death. But how resist the humour of it all: the good man fallen flat on his face, the self-importance of the dog, who thought he must put a stop to the situation, and especially the cat, the cat swallowed up by an air-hole after showing us as a supreme exhibition of flight its little hindquarters with its tail in the air.