It was not until she had had some coffee that Henri followed up his
line of thought.
"So--the fiance did not approve? It is not difficult to understand.
There is always danger, for there are German aeroplanes even in remote
places. And you are very young. You still wish to establish yourself,
mademoiselle?"
"Of course!"
"Would it be a comfort to cable your safe arrival in France to the
fiance?" When he saw her face he smiled. And if it was a rather heroic
smile it was none the less friendly. "I see. What shall I say? Or
will you write it?"
So Sara Lee, vastly cheered by two cups of coffee, an egg, and a very
considerable portion of bread and butter, wrote her cable. It was to
be brief, for cables cost money. It said, "Safe. Well. Love." And
Henri, who seemed to have strange and ominous powers, sent it almost
immediately. Total cost, as reported to Sara Lee, two francs. He took
the money she offered him gravely.
"We shall cable quite often," he said. "He will be anxious. And I
think he has a right to know."
The "we" was entirely unconscious.
"And now," he said, when he had gravely allowed Sara Lee to pay her half
of the breakfast, "we must arrange to get you out of Calais. And that,
mademoiselle, may take time."
It took time. Sara Lee, growing accustomed now to little rooms entirely
filled with men and typewriters, went from one office to another, walking
along the narrow pavements with Henri, through streets filled with
soldiers. Once they drew aside to let pass a procession of Belgian
refugees, those who had held to their village homes until bombardment
had destroyed them--stout peasant women in short skirts and with huge
bundles, old men, a few young ones, many children. The terror of the
early flight was not theirs, but there was in all of them a sort of
sodden hopelessness that cut Sara Lee to the heart. In an irregular
column they walked along, staring ahead but seeing nothing. Even the
children looked old and tired.
Sara Lee's eyes filled with tears.
"My people," said Henri. "Simple country folk, and going to England,
where they will grieve for the things that are gone--their fields and
their sons. The old ones will die, quickly, of homesickness. It is
difficult to transplant an old tree."
The final formalities seemed to offer certain difficulties. Henri, who
liked to do things quickly and like a prince, flushed with irritation.
He drew himself up rather haughtily in reply to one question, and glanced
uneasily at the girl. But it was all as intelligible as Sanskrit to her.