“But all that’s off now.  I fancy that the next governor of Paris, if it should have a governor, will be a Frenchman.  But the day is advancing, Weber; what do you think we ought to do?”

“I’ve been thinking of your friend Lannes.  I’ve an idea that he’ll come for you, if he finds an interval in his duties.”

“But how could he possibly find me?  Why, it’s the old needle in the haystack business.”

“He couldn’t unless we made some sort of signal.”

“There’s no signal that I can make.”

“But there’s one that I can.  Look, Mr. Scott.”

He unbuttoned his long French coat, and took from his breast a roll of red, white and blue.  He opened it and disclosed a French flag about four feet long.

“If that were put in a conspicuous place,” he said, “an aviator with glasses could see it a long way, and he would come to find out what it meant.”

“The top of a tree is the place for it!” exclaimed John.  “Now if you only had around here a real tree, or two, in place of what we call saplings in my country, we might do some fine signaling with the flag.”

“We’ll try it, but I think we should go a considerable distance from the cottage.  If Germans instead of French should come then we’d have a better chance of escaping among the hedges and vineyards.”

John agreed with him and they quickly made ready, each taking his automatic and knapsack, and leaving the fire to die of itself on the hearth.

“I’m telling that cottage good-bye with regret,” said John, as they walked away.  “I spent some normal and peaceful hours there last night and it’s a neat little place.  I hope its owners will be able to come back to it.  As soon as I open the stable door, in order that the horse may go where he will, I’ll be ready.”

He gave the big animal a friendly pat as he left and Marne gazed after him with envious sorrowful eyes.

They walked a full mile, keeping close to the Marne, where the trees and bushes were thickest, and listened meanwhile to the fourth day’s swelling roar of the battle.  Its long continuance had made it even more depressing and terrifying than in its earlier stages.  To John’s mind, at least, it took on the form of a cataclysm, of some huge paroxysm of the earth.  He ate to it, he slept to it, he woke to it, and now he was walking to it.  The illusion was deepened by the fact that no human being save Weber was visible to him.  The country between the two monstrous battle lines was silent and deserted.

“Apparently,” said Weber, “we’re in no danger of human interference as we walk here.”

“Not unless a shell coming from a point fifteen miles or so beyond the hills should drop on us, or we should be pierced by an arrow from one of our Frenchmen in the clouds.  But so far as I can see there’s nothing above us, although I can make out one or two aeroplanes far toward the east.”

“The air is heavy and cloudy and that’s against them, but they’ll be out before long.  You’ll see.  I think, Mr. Scott, that we’ll find a good tree in that little grove of beeches there.”