do in
arranging for the dinner.

When they met again toward evening they began to laugh at seeing each
other as spick and span and smart as on the day of a grand review. The
commandant's hair did not look so gray as it was in the morning, and the
captain had shaved, leaving only his mustache, which made him look as if
he had a streak of fire under his nose.

In spite of the rain, they left the window open, and one of them went to
listen from time to time; and at a quarter past six the baron said he
heard a rumbling in the distance. They all rushed down, and presently the
wagon drove up at a gallop with its four horses steaming and blowing, and
splashed with mud to their girths. Five women dismounted, five handsome
girls whom a comrade of the captain, to whom Le Devoir had presented his
card, had selected with care.

They had not required much pressing, as they had got to know the
Prussians in the three months during which they had had to do with them,
and so they resigned themselves to the men as they did to the state of
affairs.

They went at once into the dining-room, which looked still more dismal in
its dilapidated condition when it was lighted up; while the table covered
with choice dishes, the beautiful china and glass, and the plate, which
had been found in the hole in the wall where its owner had hidden it,
gave it the appearance of a bandits' inn, where they were supping after
committing a robbery in the place. The captain was radiant, and put his
arm round the women as if he were familiar with them; and when the three
young men wanted to appropriate one each, he opposed them
authoritatively, reserving to himself the right to apportion them justly,
according to their several ranks, so as not to offend the higher powers.
Therefore, to avoid all discussion, jarring, and suspicion of partiality,
he placed them all in a row according to height, and addressing the
tallest, he said in a voice of command:

"What is your name?" "Pamela," she replied, raising her voice. And then
he said: "Number One, called Pamela, is adjudged to the commandant."
Then, having kissed Blondina, the second, as a sign of proprietorship, he
proffered stout Amanda to Lieutenant Otto; Eva, "the Tomato," to
Sub-lieutenant Fritz, and Rachel, the shortest of them all, a very young,
dark girl, with eyes as black as ink, a Jewess, whose snub nose proved
the rule which allots hooked noses to all her race, to the youngest
officer, frail Count W