I. A. R. Wylie

“ He had his race's gift for self-expression, and one saw the red horror of it all—the torture, the bestiality, the grey misery. "Let them died," he said. "Let the children die. They are a bad people. They are like rats. They breed like rats. If I find a baby rat in my house, I don't wait for it to grow up. I stamp on it."
He nodded and looked about him, strong and convinced. But there was only one other person in the carriage besides the secretary—the little girl with the absurd crêpe hat over one ear, and the black gloved hands, and the dangling, black legs. ”

“ We poor Germans—we've suffered. The English couldn't rest until they had ruined us. God knows we are kind and easy-going. But when one is always hungry, it is difficult to forgive."
"Are all the English bad, Frau Hildebrandt?"
Frau Hildebrandt fidgeted. She was a truthful woman. It went against her principles to tell lies—even to children. "Well, God made them, Kindchen. He must have had His reasons. The French are worse, perhaps."
"But my mother——?"
"Ah, there now! She was a sweet soul. If only she could have been a good German! But she couldn't. Blood is blood, my dear. ”

“ Then the Hampdens' only son was killed—murdered, so her father wrote—and then one by one the Prütwitz family was wiped out, and a great, implacable bitterness spread like an ulcer. And when the young English wife wrote home, she defended her new countrymen and accused her own people, and when the old Prütwitzs came, she quarreled with them so that they never came again. She fought every one—poor, exiled, uprooted, little woman, breaking her heart, until at last she had no one in the world but Trüdchen and her husband. ”

“ He talked rather loudly and emphatically, as though he were addressing a public meeting:
"There must be no sentimentalism," he said. "Sentimentalists are more dangerous than scoundrels. They knock a murderer down, and then they help him up again so that he can murder some one else. We are at least a logical people. We know what the Germans are—we have experienced them in our flesh. Any man who has seen what I have seen——!"
He gave an exclamation, bitter and ironic. There was no need to convince his secretary, and yet he felt himself driven by an odd necessity to convince some one. ”

“ The people behind fidgeted. Every one saw that she was different.
"A baby rat!" That was what the big Frenchman had said. You put your foot on it, and the little bones went crunch-crunch. She began to shake all over. It was very cold. And she had always been so frightened of rats. This great barn-like place might be full of them. She was a baby rat herself—black, scurrying, terrified, amid all these big people who hated her. And at any moment one of them might——
She slipped out of the shed on to the open quay. A wet wind swept across its terrifying emptiness and nearly blew her off her feet. ”

“ They didn't know how every one hated them or why—they didn't see they were different. Frau Hildebrandt and the Frau Bäckerin—they seemed like every one else—ordinary people. But you couldn't tell—you thought you were just ordinary, yourself. But you weren't—every one else knew. And they said it would have been better if you hadn't been born, so that you wouldn't grow up. They wanted to put their foot on you and crunch the life out of you, they hated you so.
The rats had hated her mother. They had hated her. There wasn't anywhere in the world where you could go—to escape——
She stood up. ”

“ And Trüdchen would have cried, too, if she hadn't been Fräulein auf-und-zu and all the rest of it, because Frau Hildebrandt, in spite of everything, was fond of her. And that was wonderful. But instead she sat stiffly with her hands in their little black cotton gloves folded on her lap, and her mouth compressed, and cried inside. Which, as everybody knows, is so much, much worse.
The carriage was jammed tight with people. ”

“ A big man in a blue-green blouse seized her Handgepäck from her and yelled a number which she didn't hear. She was quite sure that her little bag was lost forever. Nothing would ever find itself again.
It was raining. The long, slanting lines shone in the lamplight. The platform gleamed blackly. Men pushing great trolleys or staggering under impossible loads lurched in and out of the dripping darkness like lost souls. Every one looked pale and tired and irritable. ”

“ There was nothing terrible in being alone with bees and flowers and even wild beasts. But it was terrible to be alone in a world crowded with people. They might jostle you and almost knock you over, and yet they never really touched you. ”

“ And whereas Trüdchen was terribly ashamed and only wished people wouldn't look at her at all, her mother carried herself like a queen who had to live among inferior people. So that in all the little town they had only one friend—large Frau Hildebrandt who quarreled with every one.
The dragon moved terribly slowly. First it stood on one leg and then on another. It was very cold, and the rain sogged through the paper soles of its innumerable shoes. First Trüdchen's feet hurt, and then they didn't hurt at all. The dragon gave a wriggle, and its last minute vertebra was shaken loose. ”

“ What have the dead done? Perhaps the dead don't care anyway. But the living would have been so glad.
Trüdchen, in her new black dress and her black hat with crêpe and her new black shoes and stockings, couldn't help thinking how pleased and astonished her mother would have been at her own wonderful funeral. The Kriegsverein sent a deputation to walk behind the coffin with a wreath, and three officers from Hauptmann von Arnstein-Prütwitz's old regiment (in brand-new uniforms with shining epaulettes) came with another wreath and an inscription. ”

“ There isn't any end. It's round. And so sooner or later you have to come back to your own door.
Trüdchen stood outside. People passing would hardly have seen her, she was pressed so closely against the dripping wall. She could just see through the glass top of Frau Hildebrandt's shop window, and the jumble of goods on the counter had an eerie look in the twilight. But then Trüdchen couldn't see very well. Her glasses were broken. That meant that she could never go in. Because her mother had said:
"You mustn't break your glasses, Trudi darling—not whatever you do. ”

“ The stout man leaned across and took the label and read aloud:
"Fräulein auf und zu und von Arnstein-Prütwitz, bei Sir Ambrose Hampden, Stanten Court, Ayrsdale, Cheshire, Holland—Dover." He looked up at her, smiling, puzzled. "All that way, Mädel?"
"Yes."
"To England?"
They were all listening now. They had even stopped eating, with their Butterbrötchen halfway to their mouths, and in a minute that queer, withdrawn look would come into their faces. It was a terrible thing to be very small and belong to a family of heroes who were never afraid. ”

“ And indeed she did not want her mother to wake up. For when she did wake up, she would have to think about the hole, and the hole was quite hopeless—beyond repair. It was much nicer to go on sleeping.
But it so happened that Frau Hildebrandt, who ran the little haberdashery shop behind which they had their one room, came in and said, "Ach, du liebe Gott!" and picked up Frau von Arnstein in her strong arms and laid her on the bed and dashed water into her face. ”

“ And then suddenly she felt frightened, as she often did. She felt she couldn't bear to see her mother's white face or tell Frau Hilderbrandt about the coffee. She took her mother's purse where it lay on the table, and her basket, and set out, walking very sedately, because of being so terribly afraid. But of course it was long past nine when she turned the corner of the Kaiserstrasse, and the dragon's head had disappeared into the baker's shop, and instead of being swallowed up, she became the last minute vertebra in the creature's tail. ”

“ The clock of the Lutheran Church at the end of the street boomed twelve. By this time there was nothing left of the dragon but Trüdchen, and the woman who had rubbed her legs and said "Tsh! Tsh!" at the hole in the black stocking. They stood together in the baker's shop, which had a flustered, devastated look as though it had been swept bare by a whirlwind, and the baker's wife whispered mysteriously:
"See what I have kept for you, Frau Gephardt!" She produced a stick of bread and three shiny brown Bretzeln from under the counter.. ”

“ Frau Hildebrandt had been servant to Hauptmann von Arnstein-Prütwitz and his young English wife when they had first married. So she knew everything. She told Trüdchen how happy every one had been. One particular Christmas she could remember. There had been a sort of gathering of the clans. The Arnstein-Prütwitz (auf und zu und von) had come, and the Hampdens had come, and there had been tremendous jollifications with toast ing, drinking and joking about "Der Tag."
"Der Tag" was to be Trüdchen's first birthday. But before "Der Tag" came they were all killing one another. ”

“ She hadn't had any breakfast, and there wouldn't be any lunch or supper—unless Frau Hildebrandt took pity on them. She was wet through and cold, and there wouldn't be any fire. She thought of her mother's poor white face when she heard that there was no bread. Perhaps she would faint again. It must be very nice to faint and forget things. ”

“ Frau Hildebrandt tied a label round Trüdchen's neck with her name and English address and felt her pockets to see that the purse and the precious passport were all safe. Without the passport, evidently, one came to a bad end. ”

“ He was very tired. But before he had taken off his overcoat, he knew that he would not be able to sleep. It had been a wonderful day. But it often happened that after he had been peculiarly successful, he would toss the whole night through. Nerves, of course. It was high time he retired. Only a sense of duty kept him going. The war had deprived men of their youth and their old age, too.
"I shall go for a stroll on deck," he told his secretary, who intruded a sleek head to inquire after his well-being. "The fresh air will quiet me down." ”

“ You must never forget that. You must carry your head high, Kindche'. You must be your father's daughter—a real German little girl."
But Trüdchen sat very still. It was of no use. She didn't ask any more questions Frau Hildebrandt wouldn't tell her the truth. She would have to find it out for herself. Even now she was beginning to understand. Because of her poor little mother there was a terrible wicked taint in her blood. So that she couldn't live any more in her own country, and her own people could never love her
IV
Perhaps going away was a little like dying. ”