The woman was pleading desperately, raising her hands appealingly, her sobs interrupting her story which she was uselessly trying to tell the soldiers, incapable of understanding her.  The petty officer convoying the band spoke in German with the Commandant while the woman besought the intervention of Desnoyers.  When she recognized the owner of the castle, she suddenly regained her serenity, believing that he could intercede for her.

That husky young boy was her son.  They had all been hiding since the day before in the cellar of their burned house.  Hunger and the danger of death from asphyxiation had forced them finally to venture forth.  As soon as the Germans had seen her son, they had beaten him and were going to shoot him as they were shooting all the young men.  They believed that the lad was twenty years old, the age of a soldier, and in order that he might not join the French army, they were going to kill him.

“It’s a lie!” shrieked the mother.  “He is not more than eighteen . . . not eighteen . . . a little less—­he’s only seventeen.”

She turned to those who were following behind, in order to implore their testimony—­sad women, equally dirty, their ragged garments smelling of fire, poverty and death.  All assented, adding their outcries to those of the mother.  Some even went so far as to say that the overgrown boy was only sixteen . . . fifteen!  And to this feminine chorus was added the wailing of the little ones looking at their brother with eyes distended with terror.

The Commandant examined the prisoner while he listened to the official.  An employee of the township had said carelessly that the child was about twenty, never dreaming that with this inaccuracy he was causing his death.

“It was a lie!” repeated the mother guessing instinctively what they were saying.  “That man made a mistake.  My boy is robust and, therefore, looks older than he is, but he is not twenty. . . .  The gentleman from the castle who knows him can tell you so.  Is it not so, Monsieur Desnoyers?”

Since, in her maternal desperation, she had appealed to his protection, Don Marcelo believed that he ought to intervene, and so he spoke to the Commandant.  He knew this youth very well (he did not ever remember having seen him before) and believed that he really was under twenty.

“And even if he were of age,” he added, “is that a crime to shoot a man for?”

Blumhardt did not reply.  Since he had recovered his functions of command, he ignored absolutely Don Marcelo’s existence.  He was about to say something, to give an order, but hesitated.  It might be better to consult His Excellency . . . and seeing that he was going toward the castle, Desnoyers marched by his side.

“Commandant, this cannot be,” he commenced saying.  “This lacks common sense.  To shoot a man on the suspicion that he may be twenty years old!”

But the Commandant remained silent and continued on his way.  As they crossed the bridge, they heard the sound of the piano—­a good omen, Desnoyers thought.  The aesthete who had so touched him with his impassioned voice, was going to say the saving word.