There
he found the hay lorries drawn out from the barn with the dreadful bombs
still packed upon them. A couple of score of aviators held the yard, and
outside a few peasants stood in a little group and stared, ignorant as
yet of what had happened. Against the stone wall of the farm-yard five
bodies were lying neatly side by side, and Pestovitch had an expression
of surprise on his face and the king was chiefly identifiable by his
long white hands and his blonde moustache. The wounded aeronaut had been
carried down to the inn. And after the ex-king had given directions in
what manner the bombs were to be taken to the new special laboratories
above Zurich, where they could be unpacked in an atmosphere of chlorine,
he turned to these five still shapes.
Their five pairs of feet stuck out with a curious stiff unanimity....
'What else was there to do?' he said in answer to some internal protest.
'I wonder, Firmin, if there are any more of them?'
'Bombs, sir?' asked Firmin.
'No, such kings....
'The pitiful folly of it!' said the ex-king, following his thoughts.
'Firmin,' as an ex-professor of International Politics, I think it falls
to you to bury them. There? . . . No, don't put them near the well.
People will have to drink from that well.
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