should like to meet them; and she answered: "'One is your hostess, the
Comtesse de Rechamp, who is ill in bed'--for my poor daughter-in-law
was lying in bed paralyzed with rheumatism--'and the other her
mother-in-law, a very old lady who never leaves her room.'"

"But aren't there any men in the family?" he had then asked; and she had
said: "Oh yes--two. The Comte de Rechamp and his son."

"And where are they?"

"In England. Monsieur de Rechamp went a month ago to take his son on a
trip."

The officer said: "I was told they were here to-day"; and Mlle. Malo
replied: "You had better have the house searched and satisfy yourself."

He laughed and said: "The idea _had_ occurred to me." She laughed also,
and sitting down at the piano struck a few chords. Captain Chariot, who
had his foot on the threshold, turned back--Simone had described the
scene to her grandmother afterward. "Some of the brutes, it seems, are
musical," the old lady explained; "and this was one of them. While he
was listening, some soldiers appeared in the court carrying another who
seemed to be wounded. It turned out afterward that he'd been climbing a
garden wall after fruit, and cut himself on the broken glass at the top;
but the blood was enough--they raised the usual dreadful outcry about
an ambush, and a lieutenant clattered into the room where Mlle. Malo
sat playing Stravinsky." The old lady paused for her effect, and I was
conscious of giving her all she wanted.

"Well--?"

"Will you believe it? It seems she looked at her watch-bracelet and said:
'Do you gentlemen dress for dinner? _I_ do--but we've still time for a
little Moussorgsky'--or whatever wild names they call themselves--'if
you'll make those people outside hold their tongues.' Our captain looked
at her again, laughed, gave an order that sent the lieutenant right
about, and sat down beside her at the piano. Imagine my stupour, dear
sir: the drawing-room is directly under this room, and in a moment I
heard two voices coming up to me. Well, I won't conceal from you that
his was the finest. But then I always adored a barytone." She folded her
shrivelled hands among their laces. "After that, the Germans were
_tres bien--tres bien_. They stayed two days, and there was nothing to
complain of. Indeed, when the second detachment came, a week later, they
never even entered the gates. Orders had been left that they should be
quartered elsewhere. Of course we were lucky in happening on a man