“There is no more any Hotel de Ville!” cried one.  “See it blaze.”

“Accompany gladly the house wherein thou hast eaten many good dinners!  Go to the Fire, ingrate!” cried another of my captors.

So for very shame, and because the young maid was silent, I had to cease my crying.  They erected us like targets against the brick wall, and I set to my prayers.  But when they had retired from us and were preparing themselves to fire, I had the grace to put the young girl behind me.  For I said, if I must die, there is no need that the young maid should also die—­at least, not till I am dead.  I heard the bullets spit against the wall, fired by those farthest away; but those in front were only preparing.

Then at that moment something seemed to retard them, for instead of making an end to us, they turned about and listened uncertainly.

Outside on the street, there came a great flurry of cheering people, crying like folk that weep for joy—­“Vive la ligne!  Vive la ligne!  The soldiers of the Line!  The soldiers of the Line!”

The door was burst from its hinges.  The wide outer gate was filled with soldiers in dusty uniforms.  The Versaillists were in the city.

“Vive la ligne!” cried the watchers on the house-tops.  “Vive la ligne!” cried we, that were set like human targets against the wall.  “Vive la ligne!” cried the poor wounded, staggering up on an elbow to wave a hand to the men that came to Mazas in the nick of time.

Then there was a slaughter indeed.  The Communists fought like tigers, asking no quarter.  They were shot down by squads, regularly and with ceremony.  And we in our turn snatched their own rifles and revolvers and shot them down also.... “Coming, Frau Wittwe!  So fort!” ...

* * * * *

And the rest—­well, the rest is, that I have a wife and seven beautiful children.  Yes, “The girl I left behind me,” as your song sings.  Ah, a joke.  But the seven children are no joke, young Kerl, as you may one day find.

And why am I Oberkellner at the Prinz Karl in Heidelberg?  Ah, gentlemen, I see you do not know.  In the winter it is as you see it; but all the summer and autumn—­what with Americans and English, it is better to be Oberkellner to Madame the Frau Wittwe than to be Prince of Kennenlippeschoenberghartenau!

V

THE CASE OF JOHN ARNISTON’S CONSCIENCE

  Hail, World adored! to thee three times all hail! 
    We at thy mighty shrine—­profane, obscure
    With clenched hands beat at thy cruel door,
  O hear, awake, and let us in, O Baal!

  Low at thy brazen gates ourselves we fling—­
    Hear us, even us, thy bondmen firm and sure,
    Our kin, our souls, our very God abjure! 
  Art thou asleep, or dead, or journeying?

  Bear us, O Ashtoreth, O Baal, that we
    In mystic mazes may a moment gleam,
    May touch and twine with hot hearts pulsing free
  Among thy groves by the Orontes stream.