Through the remainder of the night there came from the road to those in
the chateau the roar and rumbling of the army in retreat. It moved
without panic, disorder, or haste, but unceasingly. Not for an instant
was there a breathing-spell. And when the sun rose, the three spies--the
two women and the chauffeur--who in the great chateau were now alone,
could see as well as hear the gray column of steel rolling past below
them.
The spies knew that the gray column had reached Claye, had stood within
fifteen miles of Paris, and then upon Paris had turned its back. They
knew also that the reverberations from the direction of Meaux, that each
moment grew more loud and savage, were the French "seventy-fives"
whipping the gray column forward. Of what they felt the Germans did not
speak. In silence they looked at each other, and in the eyes of Marie
was bitterness and resolve.
Toward noon Marie met Anfossi in the great drawing-room that stretched
the length of the terrace and from the windows of which, through the
park gates, they could see the Paris road.
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