The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1914-10-07
(continued.9

the lessons stHaC old DuDo1S had mas tered years ago. To seem to knew all, to betray no surprise, to refuse to hur- ry-itself confession of miscalcula- ton, by attention to these simple rules Dubois had built up a steady reputa- ton from the days when he had been a promising junior officer, a stil al- most distracted young man, deliberate but ready. Even then men had looked at him and said ttHe will go far' Through. fifty years of peace he had never once been found wanting, and at maneuvers his impassive persistence had perplexed and hypnotized and shattered many a more actively intel Iigent man. Deep in his soul Dubois had hidden his one profound discox- cry about the modern art of warfare the key to his career. And this disc0x- cry was that nobody knew, that to act, therefore, was to blunder, that to talk was to confess, and that the man who acted slowly and steadfastly and above all silently had the best chance of winning through. Meanwhile one fed the men. Now by this same strat- egy he hoped to shatter those mysheri- ous unknowns of the central European command. Delhi might talk of a great flank march through Holland with all the British submarines and hydro planes and torpedo craft pouring up the Rhine in support of it; Viard might crave for brilliance with the, motor bicycles, aeroplanes and ski-men among the Swiss mountains, and a sudden swoop upon Vienna; the thing was to listen, and wait for the other side to begin experimenting. It was all ex- perimenting. And meanwhile he re mained in profile, with an air of as- surance-like a man who sits in an automobile after the chauffeur has had his directions sf9 ft3
 And every one about him was the stronger and surer for that quiet face, that air of knowledge and unruff1ed confidence The clustering lights threw q score of shadows of him upon the maps, great punches of him, versions of a commanding presence7 lighter or darker, dominated the field and point 7 ed in every direction. Those shadows symbolized his control. When mes senger came from the wireless room to shift this or that piece in the game, to replace under amended reports one central European regiment by score, to draw back or thrust out or dis tribute this or that force of the allies, the marshal would turn his head and seem not to see or look and nod slight ly as a master mods who approves pupils self correction. "Yes, that's bet ter"
 How wonderful he was. thought the woman at the window, how wonderful it all was. This was the brain of the western world this was Olympus with the warning earth at it's feet And he was guiding France, France so long a resentful exile from imperialism, back to her old predominance.
 It seemed to her beyond the desert of a woman that she should be privileged to participate.
 It is hard to be woman, full of the stormy impulse to personal devotion, and to have to be impersonaI, abstract, exact, punctual. She must control her self
 She gave herself up to fantastic dreams, dreams of the days when the war would be over and victory en- throned. Then perhaps this harshness. this armcr, would be put aside and the gods might unbend. Her eyelids dropped.
 She reused herself with a start She became aware that the night outside was no longer still. That there was an excitement down below on the bridge and running in the street and a flickering of searchlights among the clouds from some high place away beyond the Trocadero, and then the excitement came surging up past her and invaded the hall within.
 One of the sentinels from the ter race stood at the upper end of the room gesticulating and shouting some thing.
 And all the world had changed-a kind of throbbing. She couldn't un- derstand. It was as if all the water pipes and concealed machinery and cables of the ways beneath were beat ing-as pulses beat. And about her blew something like a wind-a wind that was dismay.
 Her eyes went to the face of the marshal as a frightened child might @ look toward it's mother.
 He was still serene. He was frown- ing slightly, she thought, but that was natural enough, for the Earl of Delhi, with one hand gauntly. gesticuiating, had taken him by the arm and was all too manifestly disposed to drag him toward the great door that opened on the terrace. And Ward was htlErying toward the huge windows and doing so in the strangest of attitudes, bent forward and with eyes upturned.
 Something up there?
 And then it was as if thunder broke overhead.
 The sound struck her like a blow. She crouched together against the ma sorry and looked up. She saw three black shapes sweeping down through the torn clouds, and from point lit tie below two of them had already started curling trails of red.
 Everything else in her being was par alyzed. She hung through moments that seemed indnities watching those red missiles whirl down toward her.
 She felt torn out of the world There was nothing else in the world but crimson purple glare and seund. deaf