Defenders of Democracy Part 40

"And you," he said, almost gently, "have not you profited by the reflections of your three days of grace? Are you as stubborn as this mule of a brother, this foolish lad who spouts even poorer French than I address to you?"

Francois shot a quick, appealing glance at his big brother's face.

There were tiny rivulets of slaver at the corners of Louis's mouth.

"Louis!" he cried out sharply.

Louis lifted his sagging shoulders. "I have nothing to say," he said thickly, and with the set of his jaws Francois breathed deeply of relief.

"So!" said the general, shrugging his shoulders. "I am sorry. You are young to die, you two. To die on the field of battle,--ah, that is n.o.ble! To die with one's back to a wall, blindfolded, and to be covered with earth so loosely that starving dogs may scratch away to feast--But, no more. You have decided. You have had many hours in which to consider the alternative. You will be shot at daybreak."

The slight figure of Francois straightened, his chin went up. His thin, dirt-covered hands were tightly clenched.

"For France!" he murmured, lifting his eyes above the head of the Prussian.

A vast shudder swept over the figure of Louis, a hoa.r.s.e gasp broke through his lips. The commander leaned forward, fixing him with compelling eyes.

"For France!" cried Francois again, and once more Louis lifted his head to quaver:

"For France!"

"Take them away," said the commander. "But stay! How old are you?" He addressed Francois.

"I am nineteen."

"And you?"

Louis's lips moved but no sound issued.

"My brother is twenty-one," said Francois, staring hard at Louis.

"He has a sweetheart who will grieve bitterly if he does not return for her caresses, eh? I thought so. Oh, you French! But she will soon recover. She will find another,--like that! So!"

He snapped his fingers. "She will not wait long, my good Louis.

Take them away!"

Louis's face was livid. His chin trembled, his lips fell apart slackly; he lowered his eyes after an instant's contact with the staunch gaze of his brother.

"You have until sunrise to change your minds," said the Prussian, turning on his heel.

"Sunrise," muttered Louis, his head twitching.

They were led from the walled-in garden and across the cobblestones of the little street that terminated in a cul de sac just above.

Over the way stood the shattered remnants of a building that once had been pointed to with pride by the simple villagers as the finest shop in town. The day was hot. Worn-out German troopers sprawled in the shade of the walls, sound asleep, their mouths ajar,--beardless boys, most of them.

"Poor devils," said Francois, as he pa.s.sed among them. He too was very young.

They were shoved through the wrecked doorway into the mortar-strewn ruin, and, stumbling over ma.s.ses of debris, came to the stone steps that led to the cellar below. Louis drew back with a groan. He had spent centuries in that foul pit.

"Not there--again!" he moaned. He was whimpering feebly as he picked himself up at the bottom of the steps a moment later.

"Dogs!" cried Francois, glaring upward and shaking his fist at the heads projecting into the turquoise aperture above. Far on high, where the roof had been, gleamed the brilliant sky. "Our general will make you pay one of these days,--our GREAT general!"

Then he threw his arms about his brother's shoulders and--cried a little too,--no in fear but in sympathy.

The trap door dropped into place, a heavy object fell upon it with a thud, and they were in inky darkness. There was no sound save the sobs of the two boys, and later the steady tread of a man who paced the floor overhead,--a man who carried a gun.

They had not seen, but they knew that a dead man lay over in the corner near a window chocked by a hundred tons of brick and mortar.

He had died some time during the second century of their joint occupance of the black and must hole. On the 28th he had come in with them, wounded. It was now the 31st, and he was dead, having lived to the age of nine score years and ten! When they spoke to their guards at the beginning of the third century, saying that their companion was dead and should be carried away, the Germans replied:

"There is time enough for that," and laughed,--for the Germans could count the time by hours out there in the suns.h.i.+ne. But that is not why they laughed.

A hidden French battery in the wooded, rocky hills off to the west had for days kept up a deadly, unerring fire upon the German positions. s.h.i.+ft as he would, the commander could not escape the sh.e.l.ls from those unseen, undiscovered guns. They followed him with uncanny precision. His own batteries had searched in vain, with thousands of shrieking sh.e.l.ls, for the gadfly gunners. They could find him, but he could not find them. For every sh.e.l.l he wasted, they returned one that counted.

Three French scouts fell into his hands on the night of the 28th.

Two of them were still alive. He had them up before him at once.

"On one condition will I spare your lives," said he. And that condition had been pounded into their ears with unceasing violence, day and night, by officers high and low, since the hour of their capture. It was a very simple condition, declared the Germans.

Only a stubborn fool would fail to take advantage of the opportunity offered. The exact position of that mysterious battery,--that was all the general demanded in return for his goodness in sparing their lives. He asked no more of them than a few, truthful words.

They had steadfastly refused to betray their countrymen.

Francois could not see his brother, but now and then he put out a timid hand to touch the shaking figure. He could not understand.

Why was it not the other way about? Who was he to offer consolation to the big and strong?

"Courage," he would say, and then stare hard ahead into the blackness.

"You are great and strong," he would add. "It is I who am weak and little, Louis. I am the little brother."

"You have not so much to live for as I," Louis would mutter, over and over again.

Their hour drew near. "Eat this," persuaded Francois, pressing upon Louis the hunk of bread their captors had tossed down to them.

"Eat? G.o.d! How can I eat?"

"Then drink. It is not cold, but--"

"Let me alone! Keep away from me! G.o.d in heaven, why do they leave that Jean Picard down here with us--"

"You have seen hundreds of dead men, Louis. All of them were heroes. All of them were brave. It was glorious to die as they died. Why should we be afraid of death?"

"But they died like men, not like rats. They died smiling. They had no time to think."

And then he fell to moaning. His teeth rattled. He turned upon his face and for many minutes beat upon the stone steps with his clenched hands, choking out appeals to his Maker.

Francois stood. His hot, unblinking eyes tried to pierce the darkness.

Tears of shame and pity for this big brother burnt their way out and ran down his cheeks. He was wondering. He was striving to put away the horrid doubt that was searing his soul: the doubt of Louis!

The dreary age wore on. Louis slept! The little brother sat with his chin in his hands, his heart cold, his eyes closed. He prayed.

Then came the sound of the heavy object being dragged away from the door at the top of the steps. They both sprang to their feet.

An oblong patch of drab, gray light appeared overhead. Sunrise!