, and behind them cavalrymen, battalions of infantry, many
battalions coming from everywhere. The helmeted men seemed furious; they
accused the villagers of having fired at them. In the square they had
struck the mayor and villagers who had come forward to meet them. The
priest, bending over some of the dying, had also been trodden under
foot. . . . All prisoners! The Germans were talking of shooting them.

The old dame's words were cut short by the rumble of approaching
automobiles.

"Open the gates," commanded the owner to the Warden. The massive iron
grill work swung open, and was never again closed. All property rights
were at an end.

An enormous automobile, covered with dust and filled with men, stopped
at the entrance. Behind them sounded the horns of other vehicles that
were putting on the brakes. Desnoyers saw soldiers leaping out, all
wearing the greenish-gray uniform with a sheath of the same tone
covering the pointed casque. The one who marched at their head put his
revolver to the millionaire's forehead.

"Where are the sharpshooters?" he asked.

He was pale with the pallor of wrath, vengeance and fear. His face
was trembling under the influence of his triple emotion. Don Marcelo
explained slowly, contemplating at a short distance from his eyes the
black circle of the threatening tube. He had not seen any sharpshooters.
The only inhabitants of the castle were the Warden with his family and
himself, the owner of the castle.

The officer surveyed the edifice and then examined Desnoyers
with evident astonishment as though he thought his appearance too
unpretentious for a proprietor. He had taken him for a simple employee,
and his respect for social rank made him lower his revolver.

He did not, however, alter his haughty attitude. He pressed Don Marcelo
into the service as a guide, making him search ahead of him while forty
soldiers grouped themselves at his back. They advanced in two files to
the shelter of the trees which bordered the central avenue, with their
guns ready to shoot, and looking uneasily at the castle windows as
though expecting to receive from them hidden shots. Desnoyers marched
tranquilly through the centre, and the official, who had been imitating
the precautions of his men, finally joined him when he was crossing the
drawbridge.

The armed men scattered through the rooms in search of the enemy.
They ran their bayonets through beds and divans. Some, with automatic
destructiveness