Amelie had taken the road across the fields.  It is rough walking, but she doesn’t mind.  I had stopped to tie a fresh ribbon about my cap,—­a tri-color,—­and was about five minutes behind her.  I was about halfway down the hill when I saw Amelie coming back, running, stumbling, waving her milk-can and shouting, “Madame—­un anglais, un anglais.”  And sure enough, coming on behind her, his face wreathed in smiles, was an English bicycle scout, wheeling his machine.  As soon as he saw me, he waved his cap, and Amelie breathlessly explained that she had said, “Dame americaine” and he had dismounted and followed her at once.

We went together to meet him.  As soon as he was near enough, he called out, “Good-morning.  Everything is all right.  Germans been as near you as they will ever get.  Close shave.”

“Where are they?” I asked as we met.

“Retreating to the northeast—­on the Ourcq.”

I could have kissed him.  Amelie did.  She simply threw both arms round his neck and smacked him on both cheeks, and he said, “Thank you, ma’am,” quite prettily; and, like the nice clean English boy he was, he blushed.

“You can be perfectly calm,” he said.  “Look behind you.”

I looked, and there along the top of my hill I saw a long line of bicyclists in khaki.

“What are you doing here?” I asked, a little alarmed.  For a moment I thought that if the English had returned, something was going to happen right here.

“English scouts,” he replied.  “Colonel Snow’s division, clearing the way for the advance.  You’ve a whole corps of fresh French troops coming out from Paris on one side of you, and the English troops are on their way to Meaux.”

“But the bridges are down,” I said.

“The pontoons are across.  Everything is ready for the advance.  I think we’ve got ’em.”  And he laughed as if it were all a game of cricket.

By this time we were in the road.  I sent Amelie on for the milk.  He wheeled his machine up the hill beside me.  He asked me if there was anything they could do for me before they moved on.  I told him there was nothing unless he could drive out the Uhlans who were hidden near us.

He looked a little surprised, asked a few questions—­how long they had been there? where they were? how many? and if I had seen them? and I explained.

“Well,” he said, “I’ll speak to the colonel about it.  Don’t you worry.  If he has time he may get over to see you, but we are moving pretty fast.”

By this time we were at the gate.  He stood leaning on his wheel a moment, looking over the hedge.

“Live here with your daughter?” he asked.

I told him that I lived here alone with myself.

“Wasn’t that your daughter I met?”