During the day he finds excuses to call at the farm-house and engage her in conversation. At length he knocks at her door at night. It is late, the camp is quiet, nobody is in sight anywhere. Before knowing who knocked Mona has opened the door. The man makes an effort to enter, but she refuses to admit him. He pleads, coaxes, threatens and finally tries to force his way into the house.
“Don’t be a fool, girl. Let me in,” he whispers.
She struggles to shut the door in his face. Her strength is great, but his is greater, and he has almost conquered her resistance when the figure of another man comes from behind.
It is Oskar. With both hands he takes the blackguard by the throat, drags him from the door and flings him five yards back into the road, where he falls heavily and lies for a moment. Then he gets up and shambles off, saying nothing, and at the next instant Oskar himself, without a word to Mona, turns away.
It is midsummer. The insular horse-racing has begun—an event in which the prisoners are keenly interested, but of which they are supposed to know nothing. Since the changing of the guard the morale of the camp has gone down headlong. Drink has been getting in—nobody knows how. It is first discovered in the First Compound, commonly called the millionaire’s quarter.
Suspecting an illicit traffic the officers raid a tent occupied by a German baron, and find half a dozen men about a table, with champagne, cigars, brandy and every luxury of a fashionable night club. A searching inquiry is made by the Commandant. It has no result. The captain of the guard, who is zealous in helping, can offer no explanation.
Later it is discovered that still worse corruption is going on in the Second Compound. The sailors are quarrelling, fighting and rioting under the influence of raw spirits, generally rum, probably much above proof. Where does their money come from? And how does the drink get into the camp? For their work in the workshops and on the land the prisoners are paid, but their small earnings (less a tax to the camp and a small sum for “fag-money”) go into the camp bank, to be distributed when the war is over. Once more an inquiry is fruitless. The men refuse to speak, and the captain of the guard is bewildered.
One morning, on rising, Mona sees Oskar Heine in the avenue talking through the barbed-wire fence to a group of sailors in the Second Compound. The men are behaving like infuriated animals, clenching and shaking their fists as if vowing vengeance. A moment afterwards she sees the captain, with a quick step, as if coming from the First Compound, cross the avenue, disperse the men by a fierce command, and then turn hotly on Oskar. Mona is too far away to hear what is being said, but she sees that Oskar, without answering, walks slowly away.
An hour afterwards, when she is at work in the dairy, she hears harsh cries from the Second Compound. Going to the door she sees a shocking scene. The infuriated prisoners, whom she had seen talking to Oskar, augmented by at least a hundred others, are hunting a man as if with the intention of lynching him. They are shouting and gesticulating, and the man is screaming. They have torn his coat off, and the upper part of his body is almost naked. He is running to and fro as if trying to escape from his pursuers, and they are beating him as he flies and kicking him when he falls. The soldiers on guard at the gate of the compound are racing to the man’s relief and threatening with their rifles, but the rifles are being wrenched out of their hands and turned against them. The clamour is fearful. The whole compound is in wild disorder.
“The thief! The cheat! Search him! Strip him!”