Where the Sabots Clatter Again | Page 8

I am authorized to make an unusual present.
For we have a few rolls of wall paper which we have been holding for
someone who takes a special pride in her interior. It would cover the
cracked and damp walls of Madame Cat and would add much cheer to
her little room, besides keeping out the wind. Their faces are radiant at
the suggestion. The daughter will come to the poste tomorrow for it.
Can they hang it themselves? "Ah, c'est facile, Mademoiselle!" and the
mother gives me her recipé for a wonderful glue that will hold for years.
They accompany me to the street.
"You will come again soon, Mademoiselle, and see it for yourself?"
I promise eagerly.
Across the street lives Monsieur Martin. He comes from his house to
greet me and holds open the gate, a tall farmer in corduroys with gentle,
genial face. His wife had died during the cruel flight from the invader,
and he and his three sons have come back to the remains of their old
home. He apologizes for it, though I find it immaculate. Shining
casseroles hang by the hearth, the three beds are carefully made, and on
the fire something savory is cooking in a cocotte.
"It needs a woman's touch," he says smiling. "We are four men and we
do what we can, but--" he finishes with a gesture of the helpless male
entangled in that most clinging, exasperating web of all--cooking and

dish-washing! "Ca n'en finit plus, Mademoiselle," he exclaims in
humorous misery. "One has no sooner finished, when one must begin
again. Bah! It is woman's work," with a lordly touch of imperiousness.
It is the ancient voice of Man.
The next house is dark. No one answers my knock, and I lift the latch
and go in. The windows, being broken, are all boarded up to keep out
the dreaded drafts. It is a moment before I can see, though a quavering
voice that is neither man's nor woman's bids me enter. Gradually my
eyes make out two wise old faces of ivory in the obscurity by the hearth.
They are old, old--nobody knows how old they are.
"Entrez, Madame," and the old woman rises with difficulty, leaning on
her cane, and draws forward a chair.
"Bonjour, Madame," in far-away tones from the aged husband, too
feeble to move alone. I linger for some time with these two dear
souls--for they are scarcely more than souls. We talk of bygone, happy
days, of the war, and of their present needs--so few! Then I tell them I
am American.
"American?" says the old man, peering into my face, "that
means--friend."
"Yes," I reply, "that means--friend."
Then I come to a wooden barraque, a hive buzzing with children. They
are clambering at the windows and playing in the dirt before the door,
all clad in a many-colored collection of scraps which an ingenious
mother has pieced together. A little boy, wearing the blue callot of a
poilu on the back of his head, sits on the doorsill. He smiles and stands
up, and tells me his mother is inside. Within I find the mother seated in
a room of good-natured disorder, nursing her latest born. Her lavish
smile of welcome lights her broad sunburned face framed in tawny
braids, and she indicates a bench for me with the ease and authority of a
long practiced hostess. She sits there with the infant at her ample breast,
and on her face is written unquestioning satisfaction with her part in
life. A swift laughing tale I hear, of little frocks outgrown and of sabots

worn through, and no place to buy anything, and little Jean so thin and
nervous, "but no wonder, Mademoiselle, for he was born during the
evacuation, and only Cécile to take care of me, and she just sixteen
years old, and I had to be carried in a wheelbarrow." I picture the flight,
the father away at the front, the mother unable to walk, yet marshalling
her little ones, comforting, cajoling, scolding, and feeding them
through it all. The baby finishes with a little contented sigh and the
proud mother exhibits him. "It's a boy, Mademoiselle," as exuberantly
as though it were her first instead of her ninth. "C'est un petit garçon de
l'Armistice" with a happy blush.
"Ah, let us hope that he will always be a little child of peace." But in
another moment she is playing with him, chucking him under the chin.
"Tiens, mon coco! Viens, mon petit soldat--you must grow up strong
and big, for you are another little soldier for France."
Little Vauchelles, far away in the hills of the fertile Oise, I think of you.
I hope I may again visit you. And I wonder. What ripples from the
seething capitals