bad, treacherous, evil swine. We must be prepared for the worst, and if it comes"
"What?" asked Brand.
Harding had a grim look, and his mouth was hard.
"We must act without mercy, as they did in Louvain."
"Wholesale murder, you mean?" said Brand, harshly.
"A free hand for machine-guns," said Harding, "if they ask for it."
Brand gave his usual groan.
"Oh, Lord!. . . Haven't we finished with blood?"
We dipped down towards Malmédy. There was a hairpin turn in the road, and we could see the town below us in the valley—a German town.
"Pretty good map-reading!" shouted the cavalry kid. He was pleased with himself for having led his troop on the right road, but I guessed that he would be glad to halt this side of the mystery that lay in that town where Sunday bells were ringing.
A queer thing happened then. Up a steep bank was a party of girls. German girls, of course, and the first civilians we had seen. A flutter of white handkerchiefs came from them. They were waving to us.
"Well, I'm damned!" said Harding.
"Not yet," answered Brand, ironically, but he was as much astonished as all of us.
When we came into Malmédy, the cavalry patrol halted in the market square and dismounted. It was about midday, and the German people were coming out of church. Numbers of them surrounded us, staring at the horses, whose sleek look seemed to amaze them, and at the men who lit up cigarettes and loosened the straps of their steel hats. Some girls patted the necks of the horses, and said;
"Wünderschön!"
A young man in the crowd, in black civilian clothes,
