ve, but a desirable opportunity arose for
them to get safely across the continent and into France.

The journey was a long and tiresome one, as they had to cross the
northern countries of Finland, Sweden and Norway until finally they were
able to reach Holland, and thence journey to England and France. But it
was not possible to make the trip in any other way, since all of
southern Europe was engaged in active fighting.

However, the Red Cross girls did not travel alone. Sonya Valesky went
with them. At General Alexis' request the Czar had pardoned her, but she
was an exile from Russia forever, never to return at any future time.

Fortunately for the imprisoned woman, her reprieve had come before her
sentence had time to be carried out. She was brought directly from the
prison, where Nona had once visited her, to the lodgings where the
American girls were making ready to depart.

If Sonya regretted the terms of her pardon, she showed no signs of
sorrow. But she was strangely quiet then and during the long, cold trip
across the continent. In a measure she seemed to have been crushed by
the weeks of solitary confinement in the Russian jail with the prospect
of Siberia ever before her. Often she would sit for hours with her hands
crossed in her lap and her eyes staring out the window, without seeming
to see anything in the landscape. One could scarcely imagine her as a
woman who had devoted her life to traveling from one land to another,
trying to persuade men and women to believe in universal peace.

Yet she was sincerely grateful and appreciative of any attention of
affection from the three American girls who were her companions. And
after a short time Barbara and Mildred were almost as completely under
the spell of this grave woman's charm, as Nona had grown to be.
Moreover, the girls felt that she had not yet recovered from her
illness, because of the hardships following it. After a few weeks or
months in the beloved "Farmhouse with the Blue Front Door" perhaps she
would become more cheerful.

For it was toward the chateau country of France that the three American
girls were again traveling. The little house where they had once lived
for a winter had been Captain Castaigne's wedding gift to Eugenia. Since
Eugenia was away nursing in a hospital she had offered her home to her
friends. Madame Castaigne had also insisted that they come to her at the
chateau; nevertheless, the girls had chosen the farmhouse.

The Co