You are to sleep where you are tonight. Your bed, the
earth, will be as good as ours, and perhaps in the morning we'll find an
answer to your question."
Von Arnheim bade him a pleasant good night and turned to duties
elsewhere. John watched him as he strode away, a fine, straight young
figure. He had found him a most likable man, and he was bound to admit
that there was much in the German character to admire. But for the
present it was--in his view--a Germany misled.
The prisoners numbered perhaps six hundred, and at least half of them
were wounded. John soon learned that the hurt usually suffered in
stoical silence. It was so in the great American civil war, and it was
true now in the great European war.
Rough food was brought to them by German guards, and those who were able
drank at the brook. Water was served to the severely wounded by their
comrades in tin cups given to them by the Germans, and then all but a
few lay on the grass and sought sleep.
John and his new friend, Fleury, were among those who yet sat up and
listened to the sounds of battle still in progress, although it was far
in the night. It was an average night of late summer or early autumn,
cool, fairly bright, and with but little wind. But the dull, moaning
sound made by the distant cannonade came from both sides of them, and
the earth yet quivered, though but faintly. Now and then, the
searchlights gleamed against the background of darkness, but John felt
that the combat must soon stop, at least until the next day.
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