That was mid September, and we put his opinion down to a very natural pessimism. No one knew then of the concrete platform under the gay little villa outside the walls, built by the amiable German family who was so well known and respected at Antwerp; and we have since heard, too, of the shells supplied by Krupp and filled with sand; and the last Krupp guns made of soft iron, which crumpled up after the first shot.
Alas, he was justified in his gloomy prophecy! But we do not think that it was as much the sense of national calamity that overwhelmed him as the acute family anxiety. Yet, honest, good, severe, ugly little man--worth a hundred plausible, handsome, lying scamps such as Mérino--he was a patriot before all else! He would have had a very good excuse, we think, for delaying another twelve hours to place his volatile spouse in safety with the elderly relations at Eastbourne--but he had given his word. Had he arrived at the Villino only to find that she had tripped off to London, with that chance acquaintance of cafés, Monsieur Mérino (to whose care he had in a distraught moment committed her); had he thereafter been assailed by the most hideous doubts; had he believed, as we did, that she meant to abandon husband and babes at this moment of all others; or had he--scarcely less agonizing surmise!--trembled for her, innocent and lost in London, the prey of a villain, we yet believe that he would have kept his word.
What a horrible, tragic story it might have been, fit for the pen of a Maupassant! We shall never cease to be thankful that it did not happen. That is why we are glad to have received Madame Koelen at the Villino.
Our next refugees came to us quite by accident, and then only for a meal. A home had already been prepared for them in the village, but the excellent Westminster Canon, who seemed to be the channel through which the stream of refugees was pouring to us, announced five, and casually added a sixth at the last minute, with the result that the party were not recognized at the station. The name of the Villino having become unaccountably associated with every refugee that arrives in this part of the world, the Van Heysts landed _en masse_ at our doors, demanded to have their cab paid, and walked in.