s, so Vivie was free to attend to her
own affairs.

Enormous quantities of German plunder were streaming out of Belgium
by train, by motor, in military lorries, in carts and waggons.
Nearly all this belonged to the officers, and the already-rebellious
soldiers broke out in protestations. "Why should they who had done
all the fighting have none of the loot?" So they won over the
Belgian engine-drivers--delighted to see this quarrel between the
hyenas--and held up the trains in the suburban stations north of
Brussels. There were pitched battles which ended always in the
soldiers' victory.

The soldiers then would hold auctions and markets of the plunder
captured in the trains and lorries. They were in a hurry to get a
little money to take back with them to Germany. Vivie, who had laid
her plans now as to what to do after the German evacuation of
Brussels, attended these auctions. She was nearly always civilly
treated, because so many German soldiers had known her as a friend
in hospital and told other soldiers. At one such sale she bought a
serviceable motor-car for 750 francs; at another drums of petrol.

She had provided herself with funds by going to her mother's bank
and reopening the question of the deposited jewels and plate. Now
that the victory of the Allies seemed certain, the bank manager was
more inclined to make things easy for her. He had the jewels and
plate valued--roughly--at L3,000; and although he would not
surrender them till the will could be proved and she could show
letters of administration, he consented on behalf of the bank to
make her a loan of 30,000 francs.

On November 10th, a German soldier who followed Vivien about with
humble fidelity since she had cured him of a bad whitlow--and also
because, as he said, it was a joy to speak English once more--for he
had been a waiter at the Savoy Hotel--came to her in the Boulevard
d'Anspach and said "The Red flag, lady, he fly from Kommandantur.
With us I think it is Kaput." This was what Vivien had been waiting
for. Asking the man to follow her, she first stopped outside a shop
of military equipment, and after a brief inspection of its goods
entered and purchased a short, not too flexible riding-whip, with a
heavy handle. Then as the trams were densely crowded, she walked at
a rapid pace--glancing round ever and again to see that her German
soldier was following--up the Boulevard du Jardin Botanique and
along the Rue Royale until she came to the