At the railway station I quickly learned the truth; the
Germans were only a few miles away, in great force. At any moment they
might come down, smashing everything in their way and killing every
human being along that road.
The station master, a brave old type, and one or two porters had
determined to stay on to the last. "We are here," he said, as though the
Germans would have to reckon with him; but he was emphatic in his
request for me to leave at once if another train could be got away,
which was very uncertain. As a matter of fact, after a bad quarter of an
hour I was put on the last train to escape from this threatened town,
and left it with the sound of German guns in my ears, followed by a dull
explosion when the bridge behind me was blown up.
My train, in which there were only four other men, skirted the German
army, and by a twist in the line almost ran into the enemy's country,
but we rushed through the night, and the engine driver laughed and put
his oily hand up to salute when I stepped out to the platform of an
unknown station. "The Germans won't get us, after all," he said. It was
a little risky, all the same.
The station was crowded with French soldiers, and they were soon telling
me their experience of the hard fighting in which they had been engaged.
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