On foot, swinging my big yellow furs closer round me in the true Belgian manner, I walked along at Jean's side, trying to convince myself that this was all real, this Brussels full of grey-clad and blue-clad Prussians, Saxons, and Baverois, with here and there the white uniform of the Imperial Guard. Suddenly I started. Horribly conscious as I was that I was an English authoress and with no excuse to offer for my presence there, I felt distinctly nervous when I saw a queer young man in a bulky brown coat move slowly along at my side with a curious sidling movement, whispering something under his breath. I was not sure whether to hurry on, or to stand still. Jean chose the latter course. Whereupon the stranger flicked a look up and down the street, then put his hand in his inner breast pocket. "_Le Temps_," he whispered hoarsely, flashing looks up and down the street. "How much?" asked Jean. "Five francs," he answered. "Put it away toute suite, vous savez c'est dangereux." Then quickly he added, walking along beside us still, and speaking still in that hoarse, melodramatic voice (which pleased him a little, I couldn't help thinking), "Les Allemands will give me a year in prison if they catch me, so I have to make it pay, n'est-ce-pas? But the Brussels people _must_ have their newspapers. They've got to know the truth about the war, n'est-ce-pas? and the English papers tell the truth!" "How do you get the newspapers," I whispered, like a conspirator myself. "I sneak in and out of Brussels in a peasant's cart, all the way to Sottegem," he whispered back. "Every week they catch one of us. But still we go on--n'est-ce-pas? We don't know what fear is in Brussels. That's because we've got M. Max at the head of us! Ah, there's a man for you, M. Max!" A look of pride and tenderness flashed across his dark, crafty face, then he was gone, and I found myself longing for the morning, when I should talk with M. Max myself. But Sunday I was awakened by the loud booming of cannon, proceeding from the direction of Malines. "What is happening?" I asked the maid who brought my coffee "Isn't that firing very near?" "Oui, Madam! On dit that in a few days now the Belgian Army will re-enter Brussels, and the Germans will be driven out. That will be splendid, Madam, will it not?" "Splendid," I answered mechanically. This optimism was now becoming a familiar phrase to me. I found it everywhere. But alas! I found it alongside what was continually being revealed as pathetic ignorance of the true state of affairs. And the nearer one was to actual events the greater appeared one's ignorance. This very day, when we were saying, "In a few days now the Germans will be driven out of Brussels," they were commencing their colossal attack upon Antwerp, and we knew nothing about it.