"Chicken! Good heavens!" moaned Fallowby. "Chicken," repeated West, enjoying Fallowby's grief;--"I--that is, I must
explain that things are changed. Colette and I--are to be married--"

"What--what about the chicken?" groaned Fallowby. "Shut up!" laughed Trent, and slipping his arm through West's, walked to
the stairway. "The poor little thing," said West, "just think, not a splinter of
firewood for a week and wouldn't tell me because she thought I needed
it for my clay figure. Whew! When I heard it I smashed that smirking
clay nymph to pieces, and the rest can freeze and be hanged!" After a
moment he added timidly: "Won't you call on your way down and say _bon
soir_? It's No. 17." "Yes," said Trent, and he went out softly closing the door behind. He stopped on the third landing, lighted a match, scanned the numbers over
the row of dingy doors, and knocked at No. 17. "C'est toi Georges?" The door opened. "Oh, pardon, Monsieur Jack, I thought it was Monsieur West," then blushing
furiously, "Oh, I see you have heard! Oh, thank you so much for your
wishes, and I'm sure we love each other very much,--and I'm dying to see
Sylvia and tell her and--"

"And what?" laughed Trent. "I am very happy," she sighed. "He's pure gold," returned Trent, and then gaily: "I want you and George
to come and dine with us to-night. It's a little treat,--you see to-morrow
is Sylvia's _fête_. She will be nineteen. I have written to Thorne, and
the Guernalecs will come with their cousin Odile. Fallowby has engaged not
to bring anybody but himself." The girl accepted shyly, charging him with loads of loving messages to
Sylvia, and he said good-night. He started up the street, walking swiftly, for it was bitter cold, and
cutting across the rue de la Lune he entered the rue de Seine. The early
winter night had fallen, almost without warning, but the sky was clear and
myriads of stars glittered in the heavens. The bombardment had become
furious--a steady rolling thunder from the Prussian cannon punctuated by
the heavy shocks from Mont Valérien. The shells streamed across the sky leaving trails like shooting stars, and
now, as he turned to look back, rockets blue and red flared above the
horizon from the Fort of Issy, and the Fortress of the North flamed like a
bonfire. "Good news!" a man shouted over by the Boulevard St. Germain. As if by
magic the streets were filled with people,--shivering, chattering people
with shrunken eyes. "Jacques!" cried one. "The Army of the Loire!" "Eh! _mon vieux_, it has come then at last! I told thee! I told thee! To-morrow--to-night--who knows?" "Is it true? Is it a sortie?" Some one said: "Oh, God--a sortie--and my son?" Another cried: "To the
Seine? They say one can see the signals of the Army of the Loire from the
Pont Neuf." There was a child standing near Trent who kept repeating: "Mamma, Mamma,
then to-morrow we may eat white bread?" and beside him, an old man
swaying, stumbling, his shrivelled hands crushed to his breast, muttering
as if insane. "Could it be true? Who has heard the news? The shoemaker on the rue de
Buci had it from a Mobile who had heard a Franctireur repeat it to a
captain of the National Guard." Trent followed the throng surging through the rue de Seine to the river. Rocket after rocket clove the sky, and now, from Montmartre, the cannon
clanged, and the batteries on Montparnasse joined in with a crash. The
bridge was packed with people. Trent asked: "Who has seen the signals of the Army of the Loire?" "We are waiting for them," was the reply. He looked toward the north. Suddenly the huge silhouette of the Arc de
Triomphe sprang into black relief against the flash of a cannon. The boom
of the gun rolled along the quay and the old bridge vibrated. Again over by the Point du Jour a flash and heavy explosion shook the
bridge, and then the whole eastern bastion of the fortifications blazed
and crackled, sending a red flame into the sky. "Has any one seen the signals yet?" he asked again. "We are waiting," was the reply. "Yes, waiting," murmured a man behind him, "waiting, sick, starved,
freezing, but waiting. Is it a sortie? They go gladly. Is it to starve? They starve. They have no time to think of surrender. Are they
heroes,--these Parisians? Answer me, Trent!" The American Ambulance surgeon turned about and scanned the parapets of
the bridge. "Any news, Doctor," asked Trent mechanically. "News?" said the doctor; "I don't know any;--I haven't time to know any. What are these people after?" "They say that the Army of the Loire has signalled Mont Valérien." "Poor devils." The doctor glanced about him for an instant, and then: "I'm
so harried and worried that I don't know what to do. After the last sortie
we had the work of fifty ambulances on our poor little corps. To-morrow
there's another sortie, and I wish you fellows could come over to
headquarters. We may need volunteers. How is madame?" he added abruptly. "Well," replied Trent, "but she seems to grow more nervous every day. I
ought to be with her now." "Take care of her," said the doctor, then with a sharp look at the people:
"I can't stop now--goodnight!" and he hurried away muttering, "Poor
devils!" Trent leaned over the parapet and blinked at the black river surging
through the arches. Dark objects, carried swiftly on the breast of the
current, struck with a grinding tearing noise against the stone piers,
spun around for an instant, and hurried away into the darkness. The ice
from the Marne. As he stood staring into the water, a hand was laid on his shoulder. "Hello, Southwark!" he cried, turning around; "this is a queer place for
you!" "Trent, I have something to tell you. Don't stay here,--don't believe in
the Army of the Loire:" and the _attaché_ of the American Legation slipped
his arm through Trent's and drew him toward the Louvre. "Then it's another lie!" said Trent bitterly. "Worse--we know at the Legation--I can't speak of it. But that's not what
I have to say. Something happened this afternoon. The Alsatian Brasserie
was visited and an American named Hartman has been arrested. Do you know
him?" "I know a German who calls himself an American;--his name is Hartman." "Well, he was arrested about two hours ago. They mean to shoot him." "What!" "Of course we at the Legation can't allow them to shoot him off-hand, but
the evidence seems conclusive." "Is he a spy?" "Well, the papers seized in his rooms are pretty damning proofs, and
besides he was caught, they say, swindling the Public Food Committee. He
drew rations for fifty, how, I don't know. He claims to be an American
artist here, and we have been obliged to take notice of it at the
Legation. It's a nasty affair." "To cheat the people at such a time is worse than robbing the poor-box,"
cried Trent angrily. "Let them shoot him!" "He's an American citizen." "Yes, oh yes," said the other with bitterness. "American citizenship is a
precious privilege when every goggle-eyed German--" His anger choked him.