Vivie and her mother found the banks closed and likewise the railway station.  They now had but one thought:  to get back as quickly as possible to Villa Beau-sejour, and fortunately for their dry-mouthed impatience their farmer friend was of the same mind.  Along the Tervueren road they met numbers of peasant refugees in carts and on foot, driving cattle, geese or pigs towards the capital; urging on the tugging dogs with small carts and barrows loaded with personal effects, trade-goods, farm produce, or crying children.  All of them had a distraught, haggard appearance and were constantly looking behind them.  From the east, indeed, came the distant sounds of explosions and intermittent rifle firing.  Mrs. Warren was blanched with fear, her cheeks a dull peach colour.  She questioned the people in French and Flemish, but they only answered vaguely in raucous voices:  “Les Allemands!” “De Duitscher.”

One old woman, however, had flung herself down by the roadside, while her patient dog lay between the shafts of the little cart till she should be pleased to go on.  She was more communicative and told Mrs. Warren a tale too horrible to be believed, about husband, son, son-in-law all killed, daughter violated and killed too, cottage in flames, livestock driven off.  Recovering from her exhaustion she rose and shook herself.  “I’ve no business to be here.  I should be with them.  I was just packing this cart for the market when it happened.  Why did I go away?  Oh for shame!  I’ll go back—­to them...”  And forthwith she turned the dog round and trudged the same way they were going.

At last they came opposite the courtyard of the Villa and saw the lawn and gravel sweep full of helmeted soldiers in green-grey uniform, their bodies hung with equipment—­bags, great-coats, rolled-up blankets, trench spades, cartridge bandoliers.  Vivie jumped down quickly, said to her mother in a low firm voice:  “Leave everything to me.  Say as little as possible.”  Then to the farmer:  “Nous vous remercions infiniment.  Vous aurez mille choses a faire chez vous, je n’en doute.  Nous reglerons notre compte tout-a l’heure....  Pour le moment, adieu.”  She clutched the handbags of valuables, slung them somehow on her left arm, while with her other she piloted the nearly swooning Mrs. Warren into the court.

They were at once stopped by a non-commissioned officer who asked them in abrupt, scarcely understandable German what they wanted.  Vivie guessing his meaning said in English—­she scarcely knew any German:  “This is our house.  We have been absent in Brussels.  We want to see the officer in command.”  The soldier knew no English, but likewise guessed at their meaning.  He ordered them to wait where they were.  Presently he came out of the Villa and said the Herr Oberst would see them.  Vivie led her mother into the gay little hall—­how pleasant and cool it had looked in the early morning!  It was now full of surly-looking soldiers.  Without hesitating she took a chair from one soldier and placed her mother in it.  “You rest there a moment, dearest, while I go in and see the officer in command.”  The corporal she had first spoken with beckoned her into the pretty sitting-room at the back where they had had their early breakfast that morning.