"All right! It's you, it's you who are the executioners! . . . Oh, what folly! . . . So you will have it so? But they must be mad! Look at them, calmly sacrificing their generals, their commander-in-chief, in their stupid obstinacy. Well, so much the worse for them! You have insisted on it. I hold you responsible. A word from you, a single word. . . ." She had a last moment of hesitation. With a fierce and unyielding face she stared at those stubborn men who seemed to be obeying an implacable command. Not one of them budged. Then it seemed as if, at the moment of taking the fatal decision, she was overcome with such an outburst of voluptuous wickedness that it made her forget the horror of her own position. She simply said: "May God's will be done and my Emperor gain the victory!" Stiffening her body, her eyes staring before her, she touched the switch with her finger. The effect was almost immediate. Through the outer air, through the vaulted roof, the sound of the explosion reached the cellar. The ground seemed to shake, as though the vibration had spread through the bowels of the earth. Then came silence. The Comtesse Hermine listened for a few seconds longer. Her face was radiant with joy. She repeated: "So that my Emperor may gain the victory!" And suddenly, bringing her arm down to her side, she thrust herself backwards, among the skirts and blouses against which she was leaning, and seemed actually to sink into the wall and disappear from sight. A heavy door closed with a bang and, almost at the same moment, a shot rang through the cellar. Bernard had fired at the row of clothes. And he was rushing towards the hidden door when Paul collared him and held him where he stood. Bernard struggled in Paul's grasp: "But she's escaping us! . . . Why can't you let me go after her? . . . Look here, surely you remember the Èbrecourt tunnel and the system of electric wires? This is the same thing exactly! And here she is getting away! . . ." He could not understand Paul's conduct. And his sister was as indignant as himself. Here was the foul creature who had killed their mother, who had stolen their mother's name and place; and they were allowing her to escape. "Paul," she cried, "Paul, you must go after her, you must make an end of her! . . . Paul, you can't forget all that she has done!" Élisabeth did not forget. She remembered the Château d'Ornequin and Prince Conrad's villa and the evening when she had been compelled to toss down a bumper of champagne and the bargain enforced upon her and all the shame and torture to which she had been put. But Paul paid no attention to either the brother or the sister, nor did the officers and soldiers. All observed the same rigidly impassive attitude, seemed unaffected by what was happening.