In a few moments they were all seated in the boat, with their few belongings carefully balanced, and Jacqueline safely reposing in Pierrette’s lap.  The boatman pushed them away from the pier.  “Au revoir,” called Mother Meraut as the boat slid into the stream.  “We will come back again when the Germans are gone, and in some way I shall have a chance to send your boat to you, I know.  Meanwhile we will take good care of it.”

“There will be few pleasure-seekers on the Vesle this summer,” answered the boat-man, “and the Ark will be safer with you than rotting at the pier, let alone the chance of its being blown up by a shell.  I’m glad you’ve got her, and glad you are going away from Rheims.  It will be easy pulling, for you’re going down-stream, and about all you’ll have to do is to keep her headed right.  Au revoir, and good luck.”  He stood on the pier looking after them and waving his hat until they were well out in the middle of the stream.

Father Meraut had the oars, and, as his arms had not been injured, he was able to guide the boat without fatigue, and soon the current had carried them through the City and out into the open country which lay beyond.  Mother Meraut sat in the prow, looking back toward the Cathedral she had so loved, until the blackened towers were hidden from view by trees along the riverbank.  They had started early in order to be well out of Rheims before the daily bombardment should begin.

Spring was already in the air, and as they drifted along they heard the skylarks singing in the fields.  The trees were turning green, and there were blossoms on the apple trees.  The wild flowers along the riverbank were already humming with bees, and the whole scene seemed so peaceful and quiet after all they had endured in Rheims, that even the shell-holes left in the fields which had been fought over in the autumn and the crosses marking the graves of fallen soldiers did not sadden them.

Mother Meraut sat for a long time silent, then heaved a deep sigh of relief.  “I feel like Lot’s wife looking back upon Sodom and Gomorrah,” she said.  Suddenly her eyes filled with tears and she kissed her finger-tips and blew the kiss toward Rheims.  “Farewell, my beautiful City!” she cried.  “It is not for your sins we must leave you!  And some happy day we shall return.”

There was a report, and a puff of smoke far away over the City, then the sound of a distant explosion.  The daily bombardment had begun!

“Your friends are firing a farewell salute,” said Father Meraut.

All the morning they slipped quietly along between greening banks, carried by the current farther and farther down-stream.  At noon they drew the boat ashore beneath some willow trees, where they ate their lunch, and then spent an hour in such rest as they had not had for many weary months.

It was then, and not until then, that Father Meraut ventured to .ask his wife her plans.  “My dear,” he said, as he stretched himself out in a sunny spot and put his head in Pierrette’s lap, “I have great confidence in you, and will follow you willingly anywhere, but I should really like to know where we are going.”