te statues of the goddesses very vague and
tremulous in the shadow world above banks of invisible flowers which
drenched the still air with sweet perfumes. The narrow streets were
black tunnels into which Parisians plunged with an exquisite frisson of
romantic fear. High walls of darkness closed about them, and they
gazed up to the floor of heaven from enormous gulfs. A man on a
balcony au cinquieme was smoking a cigarette, and as he drew the
light made a little beacon-flame, illumining his face before dying out
and leaving a blank wall of darkness. Men and women took hands
like little children playing a game of bogey-man. Lovers kissed each
other in this great hiding-place of Paris, where no prying eyes could
see. Women's laughter, whispers, swift scampers of feet, squeals of
dismay made the city murmurous. La Ville Lumiere was extinguished
and became an unlighted sepulchre thronged with ghosts. But the
Zeppelins had not come, and in the morning Paris laughed at last
night's jest and said, "C'est idiot!"

But one night--a night in March--people who had stayed up late by
their firesides, talking of their sons at the front or dozing over the
Temps, heard a queer music in the streets below, like the horns of
elf-land blowing. It came closer and louder, with a strange sing-song
note in which there was something ominous.

"What is that?" said a man sitting up in an easy-chair and looking
towards a window near the Boulevard St. Germain.

The woman opposite stretched herself a little wearily. "Some drunken
soldier with a bugle. . . . Good gracious, it is one o'clock and we are
not in bed!"

The man had risen from his chair and flung the window open.

"Listen! ... They were to blow the bugles when the Zeppelins came...
Perhaps..."

There were other noises rising from the streets of Paris. Whistles
were blowing, very faintly, in far places. Firemen's bells were ringing,
persistently.

"L'alerte!" said the man. "The Zeppelins are coming!"

The lamp at the street corner was suddenly extinguished, leaving
absolute darkness.

"Fermez vos rideaux!" shouted a hoarse voice.

Footsteps went hurriedly down the pavement and then were silent.

"It is nothing!" said the woman; "a false alarm!" "Listen!"

Paris was very quiet now. The bugle-notes were as faint as far-off
bells against the wind. But there was no wind, and the air was still. It
was still except for a peculiar vibration, a low humming note, like a
great bee boo