II—"GOOD-BYE, STEPHANIA—GUARD THE LINE WELL!"
"Good-bye, Stephania," he had said. "Be of good cheer whilst I am away, and guard the line well. It is sad to leave you here all alone. Sad to be obliged to leave one's native country and abandon it to unknown dangers. How much better I should have liked to have defended Lithuania, I, a Lithuanian bred and born, than to have been drafted into a regiment bound for the Caucasus. As if the Government could not trust us in our own country! However, Stephania, you are left, and you are doing a man's duty. It makes me happy, in the midst of my misery, to think that you are there to look after the home and the crossing and the rails. Guard them well, Stephania, and rest assured that, in my absence, I shall constantly pray to the Virgin to watch over you."
Her reflections were interrupted by a shriek from the locomotive of the expected train, which was made up partly of compartments packed with soldiers, partly of wagons filled with the most heterogeneous collection of things she had ever seen in her life—pieces of machinery piled one on the top of the other, heaps of metal articles of every imaginable description, and every scrap of copper or lead, apparently, which Shavli contained. A waving of hands from the soldiers, a friendly yell from a hundred throats, and the train had sped on its way.
Stephania Ychas had no time now to waste over daydreaming. Hurrying into her cottage, she went straight to the telephone and rang up the commander of the station farther up the line. After ringing in vain for fully a minute, she got the connection and made her report.
"Train number three hundred and forty-six passed North Shavli crossing a minute ago," she said. "A mixed train, men and materials. Any news?"
"Shavli reports that things are getting warm," replied a voice. "I should not be surprised to hear that we have to leave before the day's out. You'd better 'phone to headquarters."
She lost not a moment in carrying out the suggestion.
"Halloa, halloa! Is that Shavli?"