a right to know, now that I was on the point of becoming
one of the actors in the tragedy in progress a few leagues off. But
directly I came up to these officers I felt my assurance fail me. They
looked disturbed and anxious. There was none of that merry animation
that had reigned in the interior and that I had expected to find
everywhere.

And then a strange and ridiculous fear came over me; the fear of being
looked upon as an intruder by these well-informed men who knew
everything. I imagined that they would spurn me with scorn, or that I
should cause them pain by forcing them to tell me truths people do not
like to repeat. It also occurred to me that I was too insignificant a
person to confront men so high in office, and that I should appear
importunate if I disturbed their reflections. But I was now quite sure
that the official announcements had not told us all. Without having
heard one word, I felt that things were not going so well as we had
hoped, as every day in our little town in the west we tried
passionately to divine the truth, devouring the few newspapers that
reached us.

A pang shot through me. I now felt alone and lost amongst these men
who seemed strangers to me. Crossing the rails, I got back to our
train, drawn up at some distance from the platforms. The sun was on
the horizon. In the red sky two monoplanes passed over our heads at no
great height. The noise of their engines made everybody look up. They
were flying north. And I felt a desire to rush upwards and overtake
one of them and take my seat close to the pilot, behind the propeller
which was spinning round and sending the wind of its giddy speed into
his face. I longed to be able to lift myself into the air above the
battlefields, and there, suspended in space, try to make out the
movements of the clashing nations.

I resolved to have a talk with the engine-driver of a train returning
to Paris empty. He told me in a few words that the French army was
retreating rapidly, that it had already recrossed the Belgian
frontier, and that at that moment it was fighting on French soil. He
told me this simply, with a touch of sadness in his voice, shaking his
head gently. He added no comments of his own, and I did not feel equal
to any reply. Full of foreboding, I returned to my train and
Wattrelot. He had heard what the engine-driver had told me, and he
said not a word, but looked out into the distance at the fiery sky. We
sat down side by side and s