“I was upstairs seeing to the calorifère of Madame, who is in the chapel. I thought you were gone to the village!”
Her master pushed past. “Here are officers come to billet. Are the rooms ready?”
He had, of course, assumed that none but officers would dream of coming to the château of Hondebecq.
Madeleine, by the light of Placide’s candle, soon knew better. The Australian who had spoken was a Colonel, the other two and the French interpreter were privates. As they trooped into the passage, the Colonel called over his shoulder, “Come on, boys!”
From the kitchen garden, where they had sat silent and unnoticed spectators of the scene, there emerged a Lewis-gun section and orderlies. Beyond them transport was dimly visible: mules silent as their drivers, standing as if cut in stone.
“Madeleine,” called the Baron, “explain to these gentlemen that all my servants have run off, but that Placide will serve supper as soon as may be!”
The Colonel, however, was busy with his machine gunners. The “cubby hutch,” as he called Leon’s potting shed, half-way up the drive would do for one position well, but he wished to command the garden and meadow beyond, and the fields skirting the village on that side. Madeleine understood perfectly. “There is the cellar skylight, level with the ground.”
The Colonel went to look. “It fits like the tail of Barnes’ donkey!” was his only comment.
Before he would sit down to his meal he asked: “Do I get the old man right, that his wife is here still?”