New Mexico state record. (Santa Fe, N.M.) 1914-19??, 1918-09-27
CHAPTER XIII.
Five Days in an Empty House.

Five Days in ar Empty House.
The five days | spent in that hous,
seemed to Inc like five years. Durini
ail that time l had very little to eat
less in fact than | had been getting il
the fields. | did not feel ii So bad. per
haps. because of the fact that ] was NJ
longer exposed 10 the other privation'
which before had combined 10 make
my condition so wretchcd. | nov had ,
good place to sleep. at amy rate, and
did not wake every half hour or 81 n'
! had been accustomed to do in The
fields and woods, and, of course, IN,
hunger was not aggravated by III,
physical eXertions which had beer
necessary before.
Nevertheless, perhaps because | had
more time now to think of the hunger
pains which We're gnaWing at me al
the time, | don't believe | was ever $,
miserable rs | WIS ut that period OF
my adventure. | felt SO mean towards
the world | would have committed
murder, | blink, with very little prov
o"atl0n.
German soldiers We're passing the
mouse at All hours of the day. ]
watched them hour after hour from the
kcyhule of the doVr-to have shown
myself at the Windows WaS out of the
question because the house in which
] was concealed was supposed to he.
untonHntod.
because of the fact that | was IN.
nblc to speak either Flemish or Ger
man could not 60 out and buy food,
nlth"tigh | still had the money with
which to uo it. That was On" of the
things THAI CALLED one the thought
that | had the Wh"rcWithnI in my
jeans ~ buy all the i1oi | needed and
yet no way of getting il without en-
d%angering my liberty and life.
AT night. however, after it was dark,
/ would steal quietly out of the house
to see what l could pick up in the way
of food. BY that time, of course. the
stores We're closed. but | secured the
streets. the alleys and the byways for
scraps of food and occasionally got up
IN dS' 'II'IEiI. w hlI"hl - i'lNIuh
peasants whom | met on the streets.
and in that way | managed to keep
body and soul together.
1t was quite apparent to me, how
YER that ! was worse off III the city
thar | had been in the fields, and |
decided to get ont of that house Just
as soon as | knew definitely that Huy-
Tiger had made up his mind to do moth
ing further for me.
When | vas not at the keyhole of the
floor in a room which looked out OH the
street. BY keeping we'll away from the
window | could see much of what was
going III without being seen myself.
In my restlcssneSS, | used to walk back
and forth in that rooln and | kept it up
so constantly that | believe | must have
worn Il path in the floor. 1t was nine
steps from one wall to the other, and
as ! had little else to amlSe me | fig
ured out one day after | had been
pacing up and down for several hours
just how much distance | would have
fDVtTfu tu NY way W IIDIIiHu IL lily
footsteps had been taken in that direc-
ton instead of just up and down that
old | was very much surprised
to find that in three hours | crossed
the room no less than 5000 times and
the distance covered was between nine
and ten miles. 1t was not very graft
flying t realize that after walking al
that distance | wasn't Il step nearer my
goal than when | started. but | had to
do something while waiting for Huy-
tiger to help me, and pacing up and
down was Il natural outlet for my
reStlcSSneSS.
While looking out of the top floor
window one day. I noticed ii cat on Il
window ledge Of the house across the
| had a nice piece of n broken