looked off. It had moved east--behind the
hill between me and Meaux. All I could see was the smoke which hung
over it. Still it seemed nearer than it had the day before. I had just
about room enough in my mind for one idea--"The Germans wish to cross
the Marne at Meaux, on the direct route into Paris. They are getting
there. In that case to-day will settle our fate. If they reach the
Marne, that battery at Coutevroult will come into action,"--that was
what Captain Edwards had said,--"and I shall be in a direct line between
the two armies."

Amelie got breakfast as if there were no cannon, so I took my coffee,
and said nothing. As soon as it was cleared away, I went up into the
attic, and quietly packed a tiny square hat-trunk. I was thankful that
this year's clothes take up so little room. I put in changes of
underwear, stockings, slippers, an extra pair of low-heeled shoes,
plenty of handkerchiefs,--just the essentials in the way of toilette
stuff,--a few bandages and such emergency things, and had room for two
dresses. When it was packed and locked, it was so light that I could
easily carry it by its handle on top. I put my long black military
cape, which I could carry over my shoulder, on it, with hat and veil and
gloves. Then I went down stairs and shortened the skirt of my best
walking-suit, an/d hung it and its jacket handy. I was ready to
fly,--if I had to,--and in case of that emergency nothing to do for
myself.

I had got all this done systematically when my little French friend--I
call her Mile. Henriette now--came to the door to say that she simply
"could not stand another day of it." She had put, she said, all the
ready money they had inside her corset, and a little box which contained
all her dead father's decorations also, and she was ready to go. She
took out the box and showed the pretty jeweled things,--his cross of
the Legion d'Honneur, his Papal decoration, and several foreign
orders,--her father, it seems, was an officer in the army, a great
friend of the Orleans family, and grandson of an officer of Louis XVI's
Imperial Guard. She begged me to join them in an effort to escape to
the south. I told her frankly that it seemed to me impossible, and I
felt it safer to wait until the English officers at Coutevroult notified
us that it was necessary. It would be as easy then as now--and I was
sure that it was safer to wait for their advice than to adventure it for
ourselves. Besides, I