A Hilltop on the Marne, Mildred Aldrich [libby ebook reader txt] 📗

how I had "come through." Perhaps this was the time. I went to the foot of the stairs and called up to the chef major. He came to the door and I explained, asking him if, we being without a post office, he could get a letter through, and what kind of a letter I could write, as I knew the censorship was severe.

"My dear lady," he replied, "go and write your letter, write anything you like, and when I come down I will take charge of it and guarantee that it shall go through, uncensored, no matter what it contains."

So I wrote to tell Captain Simpson that all was well at Huiry, that we had escaped, and were still grateful for all the trouble he had taken. When the officer came down I gave it to him, unsealed.

"Seal it, seal it," he said, and when I had done so, he wrote, "Read and approved" on the envelope, and gave it to his orderly, and was ready to say "Good bye."

"Don't look so serious about it," he laughed, as we shook hands. "Some of us will get killed, but what of that? I wanted this war. I prayed for it. I should have been sad enough if I had died before it came. I have left a wife and children whom I adore, but I am ready to lay down my life cheerfully for the victory of which I am so sure. Cheer up. I think my hour has not yet come. I had three horses killed under me in Belgium. At Charleroi a bomb exploded in a staircase as I was coming down. I jumped not a scratch to show. Things like that make a man feel immune but Who knows?"

I did my best to smile, as I said, "I don't wish you courage you have that, but good luck."

"Thank you," he replied, "you've had that"; and away he marched, and that was the last I saw of him.

I had a strange sensation about these men who had in so few days passed so rapidly in and out of my life, and in a moment seemed like old friends.

There was a bustle of preparation all about us. Such a harnessing of horses, such a rolling up of half dried shirts, but it was all orderly and systematic. Over it all hung a smell of soup kettles the preparations for the midday meal, and a buzz of many voices as the men sat about eating out of their tin dishes. I did wish I could see only the picturesque side of it.

It was two o'clock sharp when the regiment began to move. No bands played. No drum beat. They just marched, marched, marched along the road to Meaux, and silence fell again on the hillside.

Off to the northeast the cannon still boomed, it is still booming now as I write, and it is after nine o'clock. There has been no sign of Amelie all day as I have sat here writing all this to you. I have tried to make it as clear a statement of facts as I could. I am afraid that I have been more disturbed in putting it down than I was in living it. Except on Saturday and Sunday I was always busy, a little useful, and that helped. I don't know when I shall be able to get this off to you. But at least it is ready, and I shall take the first opportunity I get to cable to you, as I am afraid before this you have worried, unless your geography is faulty, and the American papers are as reticent as ours.


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Publication Date: 05-21-2008

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