n hills to a
calm, lazy little village, Haute Fontaine. There we took a wrong turning
and found ourselves in a blackberry lane. It was the hottest,
pleasantest of days, and forgetting all about the more serious
things--we could not even hear the guns--we filled up with the softest,
ripest of fruit. Three of us rode together, N'Soon, Grimers, and myself.
I don't know how we found our way. We just wandered on through sleepy,
cobbled villages, along the top of ridges with great misty views and by
quiet streams. Just beyond a village stuck on to the side of a hill, we
came to a river, and through the willows we saw a little church. It was
just like the Happy Valley that's over the fields from Burford.

We all sang anything we could remember as we rattled along. The bits of
columns that we passed did not damp us, for they consisted only of
transport, and transport can never be tragic--even in a retreat. The
most it can do is to depress you with a sense of unceasing monotonous
effort.

About three o'clock we came to a few houses--Bethancourt. There was an
omelette, coffee, and pears for us at the inn. The people were
frightened.

Why are the English retreating? Are they defeated?

No, it is only a strategical movement.

Will the dirty Germans pass by here? We had better pack up
our traps and fly.

We were silent for a moment, then I am afraid I lied blandly.

Oh no, this is as far as we go.

But I had reckoned without my host, a lean, wiry old fellow, a bit stiff
about the knees. First of all he proudly showed me his soldier's
book--three campaigns in Algeria. A crowd of smelly women pressed round
us--luckily we had finished our meal--while with the help of a few
knives and plates he explained exactly what a strategical movement was,
and demonstrated to the satisfaction of everybody except ourselves that
the valley we were in was obviously the place "pour reculer le mieux."

We had been told that our H.O. were going to be at a place called
Bethisy St Martin, so on we went. A couple of miles from Bethisy we came
upon a billeting party of officers sitting in the shade of a big tree by
the side of the road. Had we heard that the Germans were at Compiegne,
ten miles or so over the hill? No, we hadn't. Was it safe to go on into
Bethisy? None of us had an idea. We stopped and questioned a "civvy"
push-cyclist. He had just come from Bethisy and had seen no Germans. The
officers started arguing w