For it took a war to distinguish this little woman from the crowd. Outside her order she was unknown before the Germans came to France. But it did not matter to her. She just went placidly and smilingly on her way—"doing the Lord's work," as she told me. Then the day arrived when the Germans came, and this little round apple dumpling woman blew up. That is just the way it was. I could tell it from the way her brown eyes flashed when she told the tale to me. She was angry through and through just from the telling. She just exploded when the Germans entered her front door. And then her name was written indelibly on the scroll of fame as one of the great heroines of the war.
The Germans wanted bread, did they?—such was the way the story began—well, what did they mean by coming to her for it? They burned the baker's shop, didn't they, on the way through the town? Well, how did they expect her to furnish them bread? Her bread was for her people. Yes, she had a good supply of it. But the Germans could find their own bread.
The German officer pointed a revolver at her head. She reached out her hand and struck it from his grasp. Then she waved a plump finger under his nose. Her voice was no longer low and mellow. It was commanding and austere. How dared he point a revolver at her—a "religieuse," a nun? He could get right out of her house, too,—and get out quick.
The officer's heavy jaw dropped in astonishment. He backed his way along the narrow hall, not stopping to pick up his weapon, and kicking backward the file of soldiers that crowded behind him. At the door Sister Julie put a detaining hand on his shoulder.
"You are an officer," she said—the man understood French perfectly. "Well, while your soldiers are setting fire to the town, you just tell them to keep out of this end of the street. This is my house; it is for me and the five Sisters with me. Now we have made it a hospital. You barbarians just keep out of here with your burning."
Barbarians! The officer raised his fist to strike. Something that was not of heaven made Sister Julie's eyes deadly black. The man lowered his fist, quailing. "The devil!" he said. Yes, barbarians! She almost shouted the word at him—and it was quite understood that his men were not to burn the hospital or the houses adjoining.
The crowd cleared out of the house rapidly and the breadth of Sister Julie's form filled the doorway. It was night and the burning was progressing rapidly, the Germans methodically firing every house. Some soldiers came to the house next to the hospital, and broke open the door. Sister Julie left her position in the hospital doorway and advanced upon them.
"Go away from here," she ordered. "Don't you dare set that house afire. It is next to the hospital. If it burns the hospital will burn, too. So go away—your officers have said that you are not to burn this end of the street."
The soldiers gazed at her stupidly. She advanced upon them, waving her arms. Several, after staring a moment, suddenly made the sign of the cross, and the entire party disappeared down the street to continue their destruction elsewhere.
The little nun then left her post at the door. She went to see that her food supplies were safe. She had a conference with the other Sisters, and visited the beds of the thirteen wounded that the house already contained. Six of the wounded were of the band of seventy-five chasseurs who had held the Gerbéviller bridge against the Germans—twelve thousand Germans for eight hours—until their ammunition gave out. The others were civilians who were shot when the Germans finally entered the town.