At the Sign of the Sword: A Story of Love and War in Belgium

Often she would step out upon the balcony which led from her own room and gave such a wonderful panorama of river and woods, and there she would listen attentively.

Sometimes she fancied she could hear the far-distant booming of the guns. And yet the world about her, warm and sunlit, without a cloud in the brilliant summer sky, seemed so very peaceful. The birds sang merrily, and the peasants, undisturbed after the first days of war, were now garnering in the yellow corn.

The first panic of war had passed, and the dull-eyed Walloons, who composed the major part of the population in that district, clattered along in their wooden sabots and declared that the enemy were going straight on towards Brussels. They would never come near them.

They were unaware as yet of the frightful deeds being done beyond Liège in those warm summer days, acts of merciless savagery and every refinement of cruelty which degenerate minds, filled with the blood-lust of war, could conceive. They knew not of the dastardly practice, made by the Kaiser’s “cultured” troops, of placing before them innocent women and children to act as a living screen, in the hope that the Allies would not, from motives of humanity, fire upon them.

The whole world was being thrilled and shocked by the unspeakable acts of these blonde beasts who, at the behest of their arrogant Kaiser, had simply become hordes of savages, and whose atrocious acts could only be compared with those of the troops of African wilds. But in Belgium little was known of it all, save in the devastated villages themselves, and by Monsieur Carton de Wiart, the Minister of Justice in Brussels, who was preparing an official report to present to the Powers.

The hideous atrocities perpetrated during that bloody fortnight, from August 6th to the 20th, during which the country north of Liège was being swept by fire and sword, were being hidden from the gallant little nation.

In the great high-up Château de Sévérac they only knew of them by rumour, and whenever Aimée told what she had heard over the telephone to her father sitting there so grave and morose, he always shook his head and declared that they were only wild rumours.

“The German soldiers are civilised. They do not shoot women, my dear girl,” he would always declare. The true stories of the Kaiser’s “frightful examples” – which his bloody Majesty himself admitted – had not yet been told. The Baron and his family did not know how, at Aerschot, the male inhabitants who crossed their thresholds were seized and shot under the eyes of their wives and children; how poor Monsieur Thielemans, the Burgomaster, and his fifteen-year-old son, with a dozen prominent citizens, were set up against a wall and shot, and their bodies cast unceremoniously into a hole. They knew not how young girls, and even little children, had been raped at Orsmael; how wounded Belgian soldiers were tied to telegraph poles and shot; how, constantly, Red Cross waggons bearing doctors and wounded were deliberately fired upon; or how these Teuton apostles of “kultur” had actually mounted machine-guns in their own Red Cross vans and fired at the unsuspecting! Of the awful scenes in St. Trond, Velm, and Haelen, rumour only gave the faintest outline, which was dismissed as imaginary and without foundation.

Alas! however, it was the bitter and terrible truth. Abominable deeds were committed not only in those places, but at Sempst men had their arms and hands cut off; at Corbeek Loo women and girls were bayoneted; at Seraing the blood-guilty ruffians massacred several hundred people, and in more than one village terrified women were made to pass in front of machine-guns amid the laughter of the drunken German soldiers and their threats to blow them out of existence at any moment.

Was it any wonder that many poor wretches went stark mad with terror?

Over this stricken country, between Liège and Louvain, towards Brussels, the “Flying Column” were fighting – struggling along bravely from day to day against the most fearful odds.

While Aimée sat, hour after hour in silence, watching and wondering, Edmond with his Maxim was doing terrible execution. Yet of what use was it all? They were being gradually driven back towards Brussels, compelled to leave the villagers to their fate.

The roads were crowded by homeless men, women, and children, poor wretched people who had watched their homes sacked and burnt. For years they had been thrifty, and saved until they could live in quiet comfort, still working hard. Yet in one short fortnight all had gone from them; all they now possessed was piled into a wheelbarrow, perambulator, or cart, or else carried in a sack upon their backs.

The scenes on that wide, open main road leading through Louvain and Tirlemont to Brussels, a well-kept highway, lined in places by tall poplars, were enough to cause one’s heart to bleed.

Edmond looked upon them with a sigh. Beneath the pitiless sun the never-ceasing crowd moved westward, driven on by the advancing German army. All sorts of ramshackle vehicles were mixed up in the slowly moving mass of humanity who were tramping their way, day and night, on and on to some place of safety – where, they knew not – Brussels, Antwerp, or to Ghent, Ostend, or perhaps the sea. The iron of despair was in their souls.

Such a human tide as this, naturally, hampered the Belgian army severely. Weary, footsore, and sad-eyed, many old persons fainted by the wayside, and those who were friendless were left there to die. Everybody was thinking of his or her own family. They had no time for sympathy with others. Most of them were dressed in their best clothes – in order to save them – and all had fearful tales to tell of the behaviour of the Uhlans. Many of those poor, red-eyed, hatless women in black had seen their husbands, brothers, sons, or lovers shot down before their eyes. Some had been falsely accused of firing at the troops; some had simply been seized by drunken, laughing soldiers; some had been questioned by swaggering German officers, others had not. With all, trial or no trial, the end was the same – death.

And their corpses had been left to rot where they fell, and the village fired by those little black cubes of a highly inflammable chemical substance, which the brutes carried with them for that one purpose.

The fog of war was over everything.

“It is not warfare, father,” declared Aimée one evening, as she sat with her parents in a big, handsome salon, wherein the last blood-red light of the fiery afterglow was fast fading. “It is massacre. They have just told me, over the telephone, of fearful things that have happened in Aerschot. The Germans have wrecked the beautiful church, smashed the holy statues, desecrated the crucifix, and stabled their horses there. And these are the troops upon whom the Kaiser is beseeching God’s blessing. It is all too awful for words!”

“Yes, child,” replied the grey-haired Baroness, looking up from her embroidery – for in these days of excitement she tried to occupy her mind with her needlework. “The Kaiser respects neither the laws of nations, nor the laws of Almighty God, Whose aid he asks. His evil deeds cry aloud to Heaven, and to us who, horror-struck, are watching.”

“The Emperor is carrying out the policy, which I read yesterday in the Indépendance, advocated by Bismarck,” said the Baron. “The Iron Chancellor laid it down, as a maxim, that true strategy consisted in hitting the enemy hard, and in inflicting on the inhabitants of invaded towns the maximum of suffering, so that they might bring pressure upon their Government to discontinue it. He is declared to have said: ‘You must leave the people through whom you march only their eyes to weep with.’”

“The inhuman brute!” ejaculated the Baroness. “But our dear Belgium will never sue for peace.”

“Never,” declared the Baron fiercely, rising and passing to the window, an erect, refined figure. “We have the British on our side. They will quickly wipe the Germans from the seas, and then come here to our assistance. The speech of Asquith in the House of Commons shows their intentions. Besides, have we not Russia – a colossal power in Europe when she commences to move? So we may rest assured that for every evil and unwarrantable act committed upon our soil, ample vengeance will be exacted when the Cossacks are let loose upon our friends of Berlin.”

“They say that at Liège and in other places, German spies have been discovered,” Aimée remarked. “I hear that at the entrance to Liège, the German soldiers were actually met by spies – hitherto respectable inhabitants of the place – who acted as their guides through the city, and pointed out the principal buildings and the residences of the rich.”

“Exaggerated stories,” declared the Baron. “I do not believe in the existence of German spies in Belgium.”

“But they have arrested many both in Brussels and Antwerp.”

“Spy-mania seems to arise in every war,” was his reply.

“But Germany has been long preparing. Her spies are said to be everywhere,” declared the girl with emphasis. “No game is too low or despicable for the enemy to play, it seems.”

At that moment the liveried footman entered and, bowing, announced to the Baron:

“Monsieur Rigaux has arrived.”

“Ah! show him in. He may have news,” cried his master, eagerly.

Next moment the thin-faced, dark-haired man, wearing a smart grey suit and yellow gloves, came forward all smiles and graces, as he bowed low over the Baroness’s hand and then over Aimée’s.

“Well, my dear Arnaud?” the Baron commenced anxiously. “What is the latest from the front? Have you motored from Brussels?”

“Yes. And the news is disquieting – distinctly disquieting. Max, the Burgomaster, is already taking precautions in anticipation of the occupation of the capital by the enemy. Our troops are evacuating the city.”

Mother and daughter exchanged glances, both pale-faced and startled at such a turn of events.

“Then we have again been defeated,” exclaimed the Baron in a hard voice.

“It seems so. The news is out that Liège has fallen at last. The forts are silent – reduced to rubbish-heaps.”

“Liège fallen!” gasped both mother and daughter. “Yes. It seems that several days ago the Germans brought up some big Krupp howitzers, the secret of which has been so admirably kept, and – ”

“Why do you say so admirably, M’sieur Rigaux?” interrupted Aimée quickly. “Such words would make it appear that you admire the Germans.”

The man started. His eyes narrowed, and his face assumed a sinister look. But only for a second. He saw the slip he had made, and hastily corrected it.

“My dear Mademoiselle,” he laughed. “Surely you cannot suspect me of pro-German sympathies? I hate the Kaiser, and all his abominable works. I used the words ‘admirably kept’ because in Germany they really know how to keep a secret. They are not like the English, for example, who will show any foreigner of distinction over their latest Dreadnoughts, or their strongest defences.”

“Well, the tone in which you spoke was certainly as though you entertained pro-German tendencies,” said the girl frankly, adding “but what about these wonderful guns?”

“Ah! Mademoiselle. They are wonderful, alas! As soon as they got these fearful engines of destruction into position they simply pulverised the forts. Poor General Leman was taken out of the ruins, unconscious, and is now a prisoner in Germany.”

“Leman a prisoner?” gasped the Baron. “Why, it was only a month ago that he dined here with us.”

“Poor fellow!” exclaimed the Baroness. “But why was he unconscious?”

“Owing to the deadly fumes from the explosion. One of the big shells from the German howitzer penetrated to the magazine, and it blew up.”

“Ah! But Leman did not surrender.”

“Certainly not,” said Rigaux, who was, in secret, very well informed of all that was in progress along the front. His wireless – worked by a German naval wireless operator who lived in seclusion in his house at Brussels – had, for days been picking up all the official messages, the operator having in his pocket the key to the war-cipher.

Not a move on land or on sea on the part of the Germans but was known at once to Arnaud Rigaux, who daily handed to the fair-haired young operator a brief report of what was in progress in Brussels. This the young man reduced to code and transmitted it, after having called up the German station at Nauen. Other stations heard it, but the message being in a code specially supplied for the purpose, it conveyed to them no meaning.

Arnaud Rigaux, the most clever and most dangerous spy which Germany possessed on Belgian soil, was, because of his high position as a financier, still unsuspected.

From his manner the Baron could see that his friend had come out from Brussels hastily, in order to tell him something which he hesitated to do in the presence of the ladies.

“So an advance is really being made towards Brussels and the Government has moved to Antwerp?” Aimée asked anxiously. “The papers are so vague about it all.”

“I fear that is so,” was Rigaux’s reply. “It seems, too, that the British are moving uncommonly slowly. They have not yet, it is said, embarked their expeditionary force, as we fully expected they would have done days ago.”

“The British, if they move slowly, always move very surely,” was the girl’s reply. “I was at school in England, you know, and I am quite aware of their slowness.”

“It is fatal in war, Mademoiselle. Why are they not here to help us – eh? We have relied upon them.”

“They will be here soon, and when they come they will give a good account of themselves, never fear. They are tried soldiers. The Germans have never seen a modern war. They are only swaggerers.”

“True. But they are at least scientific in their campaign. The English are not.”

“Well, Arnaud, if you continue to talk like that I shall begin to agree with Aimée, and accuse you of taking the German side,” laughed her father.

“Diable! I hate them too much. Look what I have lost – what I stand to further lose – eh?” protested the thin-faced man, with a quick gesture of the hands. “All I hope is that the English army will be in Belgium before the enemy enters Brussels.”

“But the French,” suggested the Baron. “What are they doing? One hears so very little of General Joffré and his army!”

“Ah! he, too, is moving slowly. At Verdun, and along the line of Alsace-Lorraine, there has been some fierce fighting, I hear.”

“How do you know?” asked the girl.

“By the papers.”

“But the papers have published no reports,” she said in surprise. “What journal has given the news? We have them all, and I read them very carefully.”

Again Rigaux was, for a second, nonplussed.

“Oh! I think it was in the Antwerp Matin– the day before yesterday – if I recollect aright.”

The truth was that he had heard it over his secret wireless only that morning.

“Who won?”

“Unfortunately, the Germans.”

“Ah!” sighed the girl. “It is always so. When shall we ever have a victory?”

“Who knows, Mademoiselle? Let us hope it will be very soon. Belgium will never be crushed.”

“Not so long as a single man remains alive who can carry a gun,” declared the Baron fiercely. “I wish I were younger. I’d go to the front at once and do my share.”

“As Edmond Valentin has gone,” Aimée remarked, more in order to spite Arnaud Rigaux than anything else.

In a second the spy’s face was wreathed in smiles.

“Ah, how is M’sieur Valentin? where is he, Mademoiselle?” he inquired.

“He is with the Eighth Chasseurs-à-pied, somewhere near Liège.”

“He is not near Liège now,” their visitor said. “The whole country, up to Louvain, is now held by the enemy. His brigade has, I expect, been thrown back to somewhere near Brussels – unless, of course, it has come south, towards Namur.”

In an instant the girl was eager and anxious. Namur, with its great forts, believed to be impregnable, was only a few miles away.

“Would they come across in this direction, do you think?” she asked eagerly.

“Certainly. If they were in the Meuse Valley they might follow it up towards Huy, and onward.”

“But there has been no sign of the enemy along there.”

“There will be soon, I fear, Mademoiselle. We are not sufficiently strong to keep them back.”

As a matter of fact, he knew that Uhlan patrols were in the woods within fifteen miles of them, and that very soon the whole Meuse Valley would probably run with blood. The Potsdam plan of campaign was to sweep every part of Belgium, from the frontier to the sea, with the fire of war.

“What shall we do if they come?” asked the pale-faced girl, dismayed. “Is it best to stay here?”

“I believe so. You are far safer here in your château than in Brussels.”

“But what will happen to us?”

“Oh, you may have a visit, perhaps, from a polite German officer who may billet some of his men here for the night. He will simply apologise for the inconvenience he causes. That is all.”

“But they have been massacring people north of Liège,” Aimée remarked.

“Bah! those are simply exaggerated tales of the country-people. Do not credit them, Mademoiselle. Nobody in Brussels believes them. In war, such tales are always told,” he said assuringly.

“Who is commanding the Eighth Chasseurs? Do you know?” asked the girl anxiously.

“Well, yes, I happen to know because Jacques, my second chauffeur, is in the regiment of Monsieur Valentin. They belong to the Sixth Brigade under General Paul Thalmann.”

“Thalmann!” echoed the Baroness. “Ah, we know him quite well. He was commandant at Bruges a year ago. Then he was moved to Ghent. Aimée and I stayed with him for three days during the Exhibition. A fine old soldier. One of the best men in all Belgium.”

Arnaud Rigaux smiled curiously. The Hebrew came out in him at that moment.

“Yes,” he said, with slight hesitation. “But a gambler, my dear Baroness. He is in my debt to a considerable extent. Besides, I – well, I suspect him.”

“Of what?” asked the great financier.

“Of dealings with the enemy.”

Aimée started.

“What do you mean, m’sieur?” she asked quickly.

“I simply mean what I say, Mademoiselle. General Thalmann has, to my knowledge, been on the verge of bankruptcy for the past three years. He is a bosom friend of a certain Karl Schnerb, whom I have long suspected of being a secret agent of Germany. After his acquaintance with Schnerb, the General began to repay me some of what I had lent him. Voilà tout!”

“You say, then, that General Thalmann is in the pay of our enemies?” asked Aimée quickly.

“You surely don’t mean that, Arnaud?” asked her father at the same moment.

“I only tell you facts that I know, my dear Baron,” was their visitor’s reply. “And for that reason, and that alone, I say: ‘May God help our poor little Belgium.’”

Aimée was silent.

Was it possible that a traitor was in command of Edmond’s brigade?

The girl held her breath. If what Arnaud Rigaux had alleged was the actual truth – and he always knew the truth – if such things were, then poor little Belgium was, alas! doomed.

Chapter Nine.

The Kaiser’s Secret Agent

“The position is a very grave one, Henri,” Rigaux explained when, a few minutes later, they were alone together in a small, circular, book-lined room, that room below one of the high round towers of the château, which the Baron used as a bureau. “I hesitated to speak very openly before your wife, because it would cause her undue alarm. There is no doubt – indeed, there has been abundant proof in these last four days – that Belgium swarms with German spies. They are everywhere. Our enemies have been most crafty and cunning in their preparations for our undoing. They have arrested and shot sixteen German agents in Antwerp alone. They had carrier-pigeons, secret wireless, code-books, German ammunition, secret stores of petrol, and other things, which showed, only too plainly, their intentions. Now your telephone was cut at noon to-day, was it not, and you are wondering? Well, the truth is that the Germans occupied Brussels at eleven o’clock this morning?”

“They are in Brussels!” gasped the Baron, starting up. “You must be joking!”

“I am not, I regret to say. To-day, at eleven, Burgomaster Max met the German commander in the Chausée de Louvain. There was no resistance, and the enemy marched into the city, doing the goose-step as they passed the Gare du Nord.”

“Impossible?” gasped de Neuville, pale as death.

“But it is the unfortunate truth. The Germans are asking for an indemnity of eight millions sterling. The Minister of finance has asked me to negotiate the loan. Will you and your friends take part in it?”

For a moment the Baron de Neuville was silent. He knew the financial straits of the Government at that moment, and he was reflecting.

At last he said, in a low, earnest voice:

“Arnaud, if I touch it at all, my friends in London and myself will make the whole loan.”

“What, you will bear the eight millions?” asked Rigaux, with some surprise.

“Yes. I feel it my duty to assist in the present crisis.”

“But I only asked for a portion. I can do some myself, and obtain the remainder in Holland.”

“I tell you I will arrange to bear the whole responsibility. I will send word to Monsieur Max to-night. I can arrange with good substantial friends in London to assist me.”

Rigaux was silent for a few seconds.

“Well,” he said enthusiastically at last, “yours is indeed a fine example of patriotism, Henri, I will let Max know your generous offer. There is no telegraphic or telephonic communication with Brussels now.”

He did not add that in his pocket was a special pass, signed by the German commander, which allowed him to go through the enemy’s lines, backwards and forwards, at will. If the Baron and his friends paid over eight millions to the enemy, then his friends in Berlin would be highly pleased at his clever diplomacy.

“You return to Brussels to-night – eh?”

“Yes, at once. It is a risky business to be on the roads at night nowadays.”

“I shall go to Brussels to-morrow, and make the offer personally,” the Baron said.

“But, if you do so, you will not leave your wife and daughter here. If I were you I would send them to Ostend, where, if further trouble occurs, they can easily cross to England. They should not be left here alone. One never knows what may happen.” The Baron did not reply. He was still reassured by the words of certain highly-placed officials in Brussels that the Baroness and Aimée would be quite safe at Sévérac, and Rigaux, on his part, did not think it worth while to tell him of the close proximity of the Uhlans.

“I shall see you in Brussels to-morrow,” the Baron said briefly.

“Yes. May I tell Max that you will be at the Hôtel de Ville at noon – eh?” asked the secret agent of the Kaiser, “and that you and your English friends will, if necessary, guarantee the loan to the municipality of the eight millions demanded?”

“Yes,” was his friend’s reply.

“Ah, Henri,” cried Arnaud Rigaux, “you are a true patriot. You, the wealthiest man in Belgium, to come forward at such a time,” And, Judas-like, he took the Baron’s hand – he who was now secretly acting as financial agent of the German Government. “Monsieur Max has been made responsible for the good behaviour of the capital, and they have handed him back his scarf of office. The surrender was a sad and impressive scene, I can assure you,” he added.

“Ah, yes,” replied the Baron very gravely. “I had no idea that the enemy were already in Brussels.”

“Yes. They have taken Liège, Tirlemont, and Louvain, and are now coming up to bombard Namur.”

“So near!” cried the broad-shouldered Baron, amazed.

“Yes. That is why I suggest to you, privately, that the ladies should be sent at once to the coast.”

“Thanks for your hint, my dear Arnaud. I will certainly consider it,” was the other’s reply.

He handed Rigaux the big silver box of cigarettes, and when both had lit up, the footman brought, in response to his master’s summons, two tiny Bohemian liqueur glasses and filled them with fine old cognac.

They tossed them off, in Belgian fashion, and soon afterwards Rigaux gripped his friend’s hand, saying:

“Au revoir, till to-morrow. And all Belgians will thank you, Henri, for saving their capital from the Kaiser’s brigands.”