on them, and soon
a young man who could speak English came in to act as interpreter.

He began to question us, but we soon turned the conversation by
questioning him. We asked him if there was any danger of our being
interned? He told us we could be interned if we liked, but we
hastened to assure him we should not like it.

Then he said we could stay in Holland and work, but again we
declined. We wanted to go to England, we said.

He tried to dissuade us. Why go to England? That would mean going
back into the army. Holland was the best and safest place!

We insisted that we wanted to go to England, and he warned us that if
we wanted to change our minds we must do it now; because we couldn't
change after we had "signed the paper." We were still sure we wanted
to go!

The gendarme then went upstairs and came down in his uniform and took
us out with him. We didn't know where he was taking us, but supposed
it was to some place to make arrangements for our passage to England.
When we came out of the house we found some women gathered there
waiting for us, and a very poorly dressed woman, with a fine face,
stepped up and gave us a small sum of money, which she had evidently
collected for us. We thanked her warmly, and with sincere gratitude.
Then we set out across country about four miles to Borger, where we
were taken to the Burgomaster's house.

The Burgomaster's house was one of the best in the little town, and
when we went in, we found there a young man, evidently calling on the
daughter of the house, and he could speak English.

We were taken downtown to the Burgomaster's office, and official
papers were made out, and we signed them. This was what the
gendarme's interpreter had been telling us, about not being able to
change our minds after we had signed the paper!

The Burgomaster evidently told the gendarme to take us to the hotel
and have us fed, and by this time, after our walk, we were quite
ready for something. When we offered them money for our meal--which
was a good one--it was politely refused.

We were then taken to the home of one of the Borgen gendarmes where
we stayed for the night. His name was H. Letema. We ate with the
family and were treated with great kindness. The white bread and
honey which we had for tea were a great treat to us. One of the other
gendarmes gave Ted a pair of socks, and he was able to discard the
strips of underwear. We had a bed made of straw, with good blankets,
and it s