VERDUN

Night was the same as day in the tunnels; the electric light was always
on, and with the morning no daylight crept in to alter it. The orderly
called her at half-past six and she took her "clients" to a barracks in
the suburbs of Verdun, where Russian prisoners "liberated" from Germany
crowded and jostled to see her from behind the bars of the barrack
square, like wild animals in a cage. Armed sentries paced backwards and
forwards across the gateway to the yard. As it came on to snow a French
soldier came out of a guardroom and invited her in by the fire.

Inside, the rest of the guard huddled about the stove, and behind them
a Russian prisoner with a moon face swept up the crumbs from their last
meal.

"Why do Americans guard the gate?" she asked, "since you are a French
guard?"

"Because we don't shoot with enough goodwill," grinned a little man.

"But who do you want to shoot?"

"Those fellows!" said the little man, slapping the moon-faced Russian on
the thigh. "We used to guard the gates a week ago. But the Russians were
always escaping, and not enough were shot as they got over the wall. So
they said: 'The Americans are the types for that!' and they put them on
to guard the gates. Look outside! You are having a success,
mademoiselle!"