d of a whole hierarchy of
angels who called themselves ship's officers.

There is no difficulty about our transport. But we must be at the docks
by half-past two.

We have an hour before us; so we drive back to the station to see if,
after all, we can find that luggage. Not that we in the least expected
to find it, for we had been told that it had gone on by the train to
Boulogne.

Now the British Red Cross lady declared many times that but for me and
my mastery of the French language she would never have got out of
Dunkirk. And it was true that I looked on her more as a sacred charge
than as a valuable ally in the struggle with French sentries, porters
and officials. As for the _cocher_, I didn't consider him valuable at
all, even as the driver of an ancient _fiacre_. And yet it was the lady
and the _cocher_ who found the luggage. It seems that the station hall
is open between trains, and they had simply gone into the hall and seen
it there, withdrawn bashfully into a corner. The _cocher's_ face as he
announces his discovery makes the War seem a monstrous illusion. It is
incredible that anything so joyous should exist in a country under
German invasion.

We drive again to the _Victoria_ in her dock. The stewards run about and
do things for us. They give us lunch. They give us tea. And the other
officers come in and make large, simple jokes about bombs and mines and
submarines. We have the ship all to ourselves except for a few British
soldiers, recruits sent out to Antwerp too soon and sent back again for
more training.

They looked, poor boys, far sadder than the Belgian Army.

And I walk the decks; I walk the decks till we get to Dover. My sacred
charge appears and disappears. Every now and then I see her engaged in
earnest conversation with the ship's officers; and I wonder whether she
is telling them that she has not really left her post and that she is
sure she has done right. I am no longer concerned about my own post, for
I feel so sure that I am going back to it.

To-morrow I shall get the money from our Committee; and on Thursday I
shall go back.

And yet--and yet--I must have had a premonition. We are approaching
England. I can see the white cliffs.

And I hate the white cliffs. I hate them with a sudden and mysterious
hatred.

More especially I hate the cliffs of Dover. For it is there that we must
land. I should not have thought it possible to hate the white coast of
my own country when she is