was good wine to drink from
the cold vaults of the Hotel de Ville, and with the scent of rose and
hope for victory in spite of all disasters--the German offensive had
been checked and the Americans were now coming over in a tide--it was a
cheerful luncheon-party. The old general, black-visaged, bullet-headed,
with a bristly mustache like a French bull--terrier, sat utterly silent,
eating steadily and fiercely. But the French commandant de place, as
handsome as Athos, as gay as D'Artagnan, raised his glass to England
and France, to the gallant Allies, and to all fair women. He became
reminiscent of his days as a sous-lieutenant. He remembered a girl
called Marguerite--she was exquisite; and another called Yvonne--he had
adored her. O life! O youth!... He had been a careless young devil, with
laughter in his heart....

XVIII

I suppose it was three months later when I saw the first crowds coming
back to their homes in Amiens. The tide had turned and the enemy was
in hard retreat. Amiens was safe again! They had never had any doubt
of this homecoming after that day nearly three months before, when,
in spite of the enemy's being so close, Foch said, in his calm way, "I
guarantee Amiens." They believed what Marshal Foch said. He always knew.
So now they were coming back again with their little bundles and their
babies and small children holding their hands or skirts, according as
they had received permits from the French authorities. They were the
lucky ones whose houses still existed. They were conscious of their own
good fortune and came chattering very cheerfully from the station up the
Street of the Three Pebbles, on their way to their streets. But every
now and then they gave a cry of surprise and dismay at the damage done
to other people's houses.

"O la la! Regardez ca! c'est affreux!"

There was the butcher's shop, destroyed; and the house of poor little
Madeleine; and old Christopher's workshop; and the milliner's place,
where they used to buy their Sunday hats; and that frightful gap where
the Arcade had been. Truly, poor Amiens had suffered martyrdom; though,
thank God, the cathedral still stood in glory, hardly touched, with only
one little shellhole through the roof.

Terrible was the damage up the rue de Beauvais and the streets that went
out of it. To one rubbish heap which had been a corner house two girls
came back. Perhaps the French authorities had not had that one on their
list. The girls ca