"'Tis a young lady, and she volunteering to see to bedding for the pigs!" Desmond answered.

The ladder creaked, and, peering out, they saw a shock yellow head rise into the trap-door. The girl who came up was about twenty--stoutly built, with a broad, good-humoured face. She wore rough clothes, and but for her two thick plaits of yellow hair, might easily have pa.s.sed for a man.

The heavy steps came slowly across the floor, while the men lay trying to breath so softly that no unusual movement should stir the loose pea-straw. Then, to their amazement, she spoke.

"Where are you?" she said in English.

Astonishment as well as fear held them silent. She waited a moment, and spoke again.

"I saw you come in. You need not be afraid."

Still they made no sign. She gave a short laugh.

"Well, if you will not answer, I must at least get my straw for my pigs."

She stooped, and her great arms sent the loose stalks flying in every direction. Desmond and Jim sat up and looked at her in silence.

"You don't seem to want to be killed," Desmond said. "But a.s.suredly you will be, if you raise an alarm."

The girl laughed.

"I could have done that all day, if I had wished," she said. "Ever since I saw you run in when I put up my window this morning."

"Well--what do you want? Money?"

"No." She shook her head. "I do not want anything. I was brought up in England, and I think this is a silly war. There is a bucket of milk for you downstairs; it will come up if one of you will pull the string you will find tied to the top of the ladder." She laughed.

"If I go to get it you will think I am going to call for help."

Jim was beyond prudence at the moment. He took three strides to the ladder, found the cord, and pulled up a small bucket, three parts full of new milk. The girl sat down on an empty oil-drum and watched them drink.

"So! You are thirsty, indeed," she said. "Now I have food."

She unearthed from a huge pocket a package of bread and sausage.

"Now you can eat. It is quite safe, and you could not leave yet; my uncle is still wandering about. He is like most men; they wander about and are very busy, but they never do any work. I run the farm, and get no wages, either. But in England I got wages. In Clapham.

That is the place of all others which I prefer."

"Do you, indeed?" Desmond said, staring at this amazing female. "But why did you leave Clapham?"

"My father came back to fight. He knew all about the war; he left England two months before it began. I did not wish to leave. I desired to remain, earning good wages. But my father would not permit me."

"And where is he now?"

She shrugged her shoulders.

"I do not know. Fighting: killed, perhaps. But my uncle graciously offered me a home, and here am I. I do the work of three men, and I am--how did we say it in Clapham?--bored stiff for England. I wish this silly old war would end, so that I could return."

"We're trying to return without waiting for it to end," said Jim solemnly. "Only I'd like to know how you knew what we were."

"But what else could you be? It is so funny how you put on these clothes, like the ostrich, and think no one will guess who you are.

If you wore his suit of feathers you would still look like British officers and nothing else."

"You're encouraging," said Desmond grimly. "I hope all your nation won't be as discerning."

"Ach--they!" said the girl. "They see no farther than their noses.

I, too, was like that before I went to Clapham."

"It's a pleasant spot," said Desmond. "I don't wonder you improved there. But all the same, you are German, aren't you? I don't quite see why you want to befriend us." He took a satisfying mouthful of sausage. "But I'm glad you do."

"In England I am--well, pretty German," said his fair hostess. "The boys in Clapham, they call me Polly Sauer Kraut. And I talk of the Fatherland, and sing 'Die Wacht am Rhein.' Oh yes. But when I come back here and work for my so economical uncle on this beastly farm, then I remember Clapham and I do not feel German at all. I cannot help it. But if I said so, I would skinned be, very quickly. So I say 'Gott Strafe England!' But that is only eyewash!"

"Well, we'll think kindly of one German woman, anyhow," said Desmond.

"The last of your charming sisters I met was a Red Cross nurse at a station where our train pulled up when I was going through, wounded.

I asked her for a gla.s.s of water, and she brought it to me all right--only just as she gave it to me she spat in it. I've been a woman-hater ever since, until I met you." He lifted the bucket, and looked at her over its rim. "Here's your very good health, Miss Polly Sauer Kraut, and may I meet you in Clapham!"

The girl beamed.

"Oh, I will be there," she said confidently. "I have money in the Bank in London: I will have a little baker shop, and you will get such pastry as the English cannot make."

Jim laughed.

"And then you will be pretty German again!"

"I do not know." She shook her head. "No, I think I will just be Swiss. They will not know the difference in Clapham. And I do not think they will want Germans back. Of course, the Germans will go--but they will call themselves Swiss, Poles, any old thing. Just at first, until the English forget: the English always forget, you know."

"If they forget all they've got to remember over this business--well then, they deserve to get the Germans back," said Desmond, grimly.

"Always excepting yourself, Miss Polly. You'd be an ornament to whichever nation you happened to favour at the moment." He finished the last remnant of his sausage. "That was uncommonly good, thank you. Now, don't you think we could make a move?"

"I will see if my uncle is safely in. Then I will whistle." She ran down the ladder, and presently they heard a low call, and going down, found her awaiting them in the cow-shed.

"He is at his supper, so all is quite safe," she said. "Now you had better take the third road to the right, and keep straight on. It is not so direct as the main road, but that would lead you through several places where the police are very active--and there is a reward for you, you know!" She laughed, her white teeth flashing in the dim shed. "Good-bye; and when I come back to Clapham you will come and take tea at my little shop."

"We'll come and make you the fashion, Miss Polly," said Desmond.

"Thank you a thousand times." They swung off into the dusk.

CHAPTER XVII

LIGHTS OUT

"There was two of every single thing in the Ark," said Geoffrey firmly. "The man in Church read it out of the Bible."

"Two Teddy-bears?" asked Alison.

"No; Teddies are only toys. There was real bears, though."