"Where do you come from?" I asked. "What are you doing here?"
"We come from that farm, where we have been for two days caring for
two of our wounded. We didn't see any French soldier or officer. We
don't know what to do. We want to go to the village down there," they
pointed out a hamlet two or three kilometers off, "where we left a
doctor and one hundred and fifty-three wounded."
"Very good," I said, "follow me."
Obediently the two orderlies marched behind me to the village they had
pointed out. It was situated on the national highway to Soissons. In
this place were a hundred and fifty or two hundred Germans, quartered
in four or five houses under the guard of a company of Zouaves who had
just arrived a half hour previously. The German major, informed of my
arrival, stood in front of the main building. He wore gold-rimmed
spectacles, his face was the type the Alsatian Hansi loves to show in
his books. He spoke very good French and even pretended that he did
not want to answer the questions I asked him in his own language.
"Show me your wounded," I ordered.
He immediately conducted me everywhere, explaining the nature of each
wound. Some were suffering and groaning; others, seeing the uniform of
a French officer, tried to raise themselves up and salute.
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