Germany, with her horde of spies everywhere in Belgium, France, and England, and her closely guarded military and naval secrets had deceived Europe. She was fully prepared—and her Emperor intended to make war, and to crush civilisation beneath the despotic heel of Prussian militarism. The cross of Christ was to be overthrown by the brutal agnosticism of Nietzsche, the blasphemous “philosopher” who died in a madhouse.
Edmond Valentin held his breath, and replacing the paper again upon the table, while the buzz of dispute and argument was still in his ears, stared straight before him into the busy, glaring thoroughfare.
War! War! WAR!
At length he rose, and making his way blindly to the Bourse, only a few steps away, he boarded one of the open-air trains, and ascended the steep, winding streets, the narrow Marche aux Herbes, and the Rue de la Madeline, until he reached the broad Rue de la Régence, which led straight up to the great façade of the domed Palais de Justice. Half-way up the street he alighted and, entering a block of offices, ascended to his bureau.
The city was agog with excitement. In that hot, blazing noontide, everyone seemed outside discussing the grave peril in which Belgium was now placed by daring to stem the overwhelming tide of Teutons.
“If they come they will not hurt us,” a man in the tram had laughed. “They will simply march through Belgium—that is all. What on earth have we to fear?”
Edmond had overheard those words. They represented the opinion of the populace, who had been frightened by the bogey of threatened war so many times, until now they had grown to regard the regularly rising cloud over Europe as part of the German policy, the brag and swagger of the great War Lord.
Edmond was alone. His one clerk was still away at his déjeuner as usual, from noon till two o’clock. From the open window of the small, dingy room he watched the animated scene below—watched like a man in a dream.
At the moment he was not thinking of the threatened war, but of the man Arnaud Rigaux.
An imprecation escaped his set teeth, as his face assumed a dark, threatening expression, his strong hands clenched, as they always did when certain thoughts arose.