thirty-two. He might of course enlist in the army. But
though very patriotic, his allegiance lay first at the feet of Vivie
Warren. If he entered the army, he might be sent anywhere but to the
Belgian frontier; and even if he got near Belgium he could not dart
off to rescue Vivie without becoming a deserter. So he came speedily
to the conclusion that the most promising career he could adopt,
having regard to his position in life and lack of resources, was to
volunteer for foreign service under the Y.M.C.A., and express the
strongest possible wish to be employed as near Belgium as was
practicable. So that by the end of September, 1914, Bertie was
serving out cocoa and biscuits, writing paper and cigarettes, hot
coffee and sausages and cups of bovril to exhausted or resting
soldiers in the huts of the Y.M.C.A., near Ypres. Alternating with
these services, he was, like other Y.M.C.A. men in the same district
and at the same time, acting as stretcher bearer to bring in the
wounded, as amateur chaplain with the dying, as amateur surgeon with
the wounded, as secretary to some distraught officer in high command
whose clerks had all been killed; and in any other capacity if
called upon. But always with the stedfast hope and purpose that he
might somehow reach and rescue Vivie Warren.

CHAPTER XVII

THE GERMANS IN BRUSSELS: 1915-1916

In the early spring of 1915, Vivie, anxious not to see her mother in
utter penury, and despairing of any effective assistance from the
Americans (very much prejudiced against her for the reasons already
mentioned), took her mother's German and Belgian securities of a
face value amounting to about L18,000 and sold them at her Belgian
bank for a hundred thousand francs (L4,000) in Belgian or German
bank notes. She consulted no one, except her mother. Who was there
to consult? She did not like to confide too much to Colonel von
Giesselin, a little too prone in any case to "protect" them. But as
she argued with Mrs. Warren, what else were they to do in their
cruel situation? If the Allies were eventually victorious, Mrs.
Warren could return to England. There at least she had in safe
investments L40,000, ample for the remainder of their lives. If
Germany lost the War, the German securities nominally worth two
hundred thousand marks might become simply waste paper; even now
they were only computed by the bank at a purchase value of about one
fifth what they had stood at before the War. If Ge