He began to question us, but we soon turned the conversation by questioning him.  We asked him if there was any danger of our being interned?  He told us we could be interned if we liked, but we hastened to assure him we should not like it.

Then he said we could stay in Holland and work, but again we declined.  We wanted to go to England, we said.

He tried to dissuade us.  Why go to England?  That would mean going back into the army.  Holland was the best and safest place!

We insisted that we wanted to go to England, and he warned us that if we wanted to change our minds we must do it now; because we couldn’t change after we had “signed the paper.”  We were still sure we wanted to go!

The gendarme then went upstairs and came down in his uniform and took us out with him.  We didn’t know where he was taking us, but supposed it was to some place to make arrangements for our passage to England.  When we came out of the house we found some women gathered there waiting for us, and a very poorly dressed woman, with a fine face, stepped up and gave us a small sum of money, which she had evidently collected for us.  We thanked her warmly, and with sincere gratitude.  Then we set out across country about four miles to Borger, where we were taken to the Burgomaster’s house.

The Burgomaster’s house was one of the best in the little town, and when we went in, we found there a young man, evidently calling on the daughter of the house, and he could speak English.

We were taken downtown to the Burgomaster’s office, and official papers were made out, and we signed them.  This was what the gendarme’s interpreter had been telling us, about not being able to change our minds after we had signed the paper!

The Burgomaster evidently told the gendarme to take us to the hotel and have us fed, and by this time, after our walk, we were quite ready for something.  When we offered them money for our meal—­which was a good one—­it was politely refused.

We were then taken to the home of one of the Borgen gendarmes where we stayed for the night.  His name was H. Letema.  We ate with the family and were treated with great kindness.  The white bread and honey which we had for tea were a great treat to us.  One of the other gendarmes gave Ted a pair of socks, and he was able to discard the strips of underwear.  We had a bed made of straw, with good blankets, and it seemed like luxury to us.

The next morning Mr. Letema gave us each a postal-card addressed to himself, and asked us to write back telling him when we had safely reached England.  Then another gendarme walked with us to Assen, which seemed to be a sort of police headquarters.  We stayed there all day.

In the afternoon a Belgian girl came to see us, and although I tried hard to understand what she said, she talked so fast I could not follow her, although I knew a little French.  She brought us some cigars, and we could see she wanted to show us her friendliness.  When she went away, I deeply regretted my ignorance of the French language.  But the Belgian girl came back in a little while, accompanied by a Holland woman who could speak English, and then we found out about her.