Suddenly the gray eyes of Thusis filled with tears of fury and disappointment.
"Oh, Michael! Michael!" she faltered, "what shall we do now! We had them all in the trap! We were ready to spring it to-night! Oh, Michael! Michael! M-my heart is b-broken——"
She walked blindly into my arms—she didn't know what she was about, I suppose. I petted and soothed her; she hid her face on my breast.
"Darling," I said, "I can't bear to see you suffer. I suppose that you and Clelia and Josephine and Raoul had some scheme cooked up to kidnap that bunch of huns at the house and get them over the frontier into France. Didn't you, dear?"
"Y-yes. And just l-look what's happened! Look at this act of God! Why has God let it rain? Why has He let loose this avalanche at such a moment!—at such an agonizing moment when we had all the rats trapped! And our own agents on the frontier to let us through! ... Doesn't God realize that all civilization—all Christendom is tottering? Doesn't He know what hell threatens it? Why has He done this thing to us! Can He not see France bled white!—England reeling!—Italy agasp!—America only half ready!—Naxos prostrate under the Greek tyrant's usurping heel!—Tenedos thrown to the Turk! I—I have begun to lose my faith in God!" she cried violently; "the old gods were less cruel—less indifferent. And at least they displayed enough interest to take sides!"
I continued to pet and comfort and soothe her as I would a half hysterical child.
"God is on duty," I said. "Who are we to divine His strategy? Why take even General Foch. His own officers can't penetrate his purpose; much less can the huns. But he drives the spirits of evil before him; he hustles the hellish legions toward destruction in his own way. The maddened swine are stampeding, Thusis! God's ocean waits."
"Y-yes. I—shall pull myself together.... I'm ashamed."
"No, you're all right, Thusis. Take heart. And, if there's any comfort in knowing I'm with you, always, loyally, through life to death——"
I thought, against my breast, there was the slightest pressure in response, but concluded that Thusis had merely braced herself to get away and stand on her own legs. Which she now did, resolutely, but keeping her face averted.