"I'm afraid I didn't quite understand about this afternoon," began Sara Lee."You spoke about taking a chance.I am not afraid of danger, if that is what you mean.""That, and a little more, mademoiselle," said Henri."But now that I am here I do not know.
His eyes were keen.Sara Lee had suddenly a strange feeling that he was watching the couple who talked over their coffee, and that, oddly enough, the couple were watching him.Yet he was apparently giving his undivided attention to her.
"Have you walked any to-day?" he asked her unexpectedly.
Sara Lee remembered the bus, and, with some bitterness, the two taxis."I haven't had a chance to walk," she said.
"But you should walk," he said."I - will you walk with me? Just about the square, for air?" And in a lower tone: "It is not necessary that those two should know the plan, mademoiselle.""I'll get my coat and hat," Sara Lee said, and proceeded to do so in a brisk and businesslike fashion.When she came down Henri was emerging from the telephone booth.His face was impassive.And again when in time Sara Lee was to know Henri's face better than she had ever known Harvey's, she was to learn that the masklike look he sometimes wore meant danger - for somebody.
They went out without further speech into the clear cold night.Henri, as if from custom, threw his head back and scanned the sky.Then they went on and crossed into the square.
"The plan," Henri began abruptly, "is this: You will be provided to- morrow with a passport to Boulogne.You will, if you agree, take the midnight train for Folkestone.At the railway station here you will be searched.At Folkestone a board, sitting in an office on the quay, will examine your passport.""Does any one in Boulogne speak English?" Sara Lee inquired nervously.Somehow that babel of French at the Savoy had frightened her.Her little phrase book seemed pitifully inadequate for the great things inher mind.
"That hardly matters," said Henri, smiling faintly."Because I think you shall not go to Boulogne.""Not go!" She stopped dead, under the monument, and looked up at him.
"The place for you to go, to start from, is Calais," Henri explained.He paused, to let pass two lovers, a man in khaki and a girl."But Calais is difficult.It is under martial law - a closed city.From Boulogne to Calais would be perhaps impossible."Sara Lee was American and her methods were direct."How can I get to Calais?""Will you take the chance I spoke of?"
"For goodness' sake," said Sara Lee in an exasperated tone, "how can I tell you until I know what it is?"Henri told her.He even, standing under a street lamp, drew a small sketch for her, to make it clear.Sara Lee stood close, watching him, and some of the lines were not as steady as they might have been.And in the midst of it he suddenly stopped.
"Do you know what it means?" he demanded."Yes, of course.""And you know what date this is?" "The eighteenth of Pebruary."But he saw, after all, that she did not entirely understand.
"To-night, this eighteenth of February, the Germans commence a blockade of this coast.No vessels, if they can prevent them, will leave the harbors; or if they do, none shall reach the other side!""Oh!" said Sara Lee blankly.
"We are eager to do as you wish, mademoiselle.But "- he commenced slowly to tear up the sketch - "it is too dangerous.You are too young.If anything should go wrong and I had - No.We will find another way."He put the fragments of the sketch in his pocket.
"How long is this blockade to last?" Sara Lee asked out of bitter disappointment.
He shrugged his shoulders.
"Who can say? A week! A year! Not at all!""Then," said Sara Lee with calm deliberation, "you might as well get out your pencil and draw another picture - because I'm going."Far enough away now, the little house at home and the peace that dwelt therein; and Harvey; and the small white bedroom; and the daily round of quiet duties.Sara Lee had set her face toward the east, and the land of dying men.And as Henri looked down at her she had again that poised and eager look, almost of flight, that had brought into Harvey's love for her just a touch of fear.
