Their position inside the lines was of the greatest strategic value. The
rooms of the servants were under the roof, and that Briand should sleep
in one of them was natural. That to reach or leave his room he should
constantly be ascending or descending the stairs also was natural. The
field-wireless outfit, or, as he had disdainfully described it, the
"knapsack" wireless, was situated not in the bedroom he had selected for
himself, but in one adjoining. At other times this was occupied by the
maid of Madame Iverney. To summon her maid Madame Iverney, from her
apartment on the second floor, had but to press a button. And it was in
the apartment of Madame Iverney, and on the bed of that lady, that
Madame Benet now reclined. When through the open door she saw an officer
or soldier mount the stairs, she pressed the button that rang a bell in
the room of the maid. In this way, long before whoever was ascending the
stairs could reach the top floor, warning of his approach came to
Anfossi. It gave him time to replace the dust-board over the fireplace
in which the wireless was concealed and to escape into his own bedroom.
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