The priest had become a soldier; but he was still a priest in his
heart. For he had buried the German dead in one great grave before the
church, and over them had put the cross of his belief.
It was rather absurd on the way back over the path of death to be
escorted by a cat. It led the way over the fascines, treading daintily
and cautiously. Perhaps one of the destroyed houses at the outpost had
been its home, and with a cat's fondness for places it remained there,
though everything it knew had gone; though battle and sudden death had
usurped the place of its peaceful fireside, though that very fireside
was become a heap of stone and plaster, open to winds and rain.
Again and again in destroyed towns I have seen these forlorn cats
stalking about, trying vainly to adjust themselves to new conditions,
cold and hungry and homeless.
We were challenged repeatedly on the way back. Coming from the
direction we did we were open to suspicion. It was necessary each time
to halt some forty feet from the sentry, who stood with his rifle
pointed at us. Then the officer advanced with the word.
Back again, then, along the road, past the youthful sentry, past other
sentries, winding through the barbed-wire barricade, and at last,
quite whole, to the House of the Barrier again. We had walked three
miles in front of the Belgian advanced trenches, in full view of the
Germans.
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