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Title: Red Cross & Iron Cross, by A Doctor in France
Author: Munthe, Axel Martin Fredrik (1857-1949)
Date of first publication: 1916
Edition used as base for this ebook:
   Toronto: S. B. Gundy, 1916
Date first posted: 30 January 2011
Date last updated: 30 January 2011
Project Gutenberg Canada ebook #710

This ebook was produced by Barbara Watson, Ross Cooling
& the Online Distributed Proofreading Canada Team
at http://www.pgdpcanada.net

This ebook was produced from images generously made
available by the Internet Archive/University of Toronto
- Robarts Library






  RED CROSS AND IRON CROSS




  _The Author's profits on the sale of this book
  will be handed over to the French Red Cross._




  RED CROSS & IRON CROSS

  By A DOCTOR IN FRANCE


  TORONTO:
  S. B. GUNDY
  1916




  FOREWORD




  FOREWORD


The day of reckoning will come. The day when the civilized world sets to
work to pick out the criminals from the barbarians, the criminals
responsible for the atrocities and infamies committed by the savage foe.
The documents for the accusation furnished by the accused themselves--a
most valuable contribution to the sombre study of German
criminology--establish beyond doubt that it is on the leaders and not on
the men that the heaviest responsibility will fall. The hanging evidence
against several of the commanding German Generals in Belgium is
overwhelming--their proclamations to their victims and their orders to
their troops contain damning proofs that they are morally and legally
responsible for the slaughter of hundreds of helpless civilians, men,
women and children. Accusations of instigation to murder, even of the
wounded, are brought against officers of all ranks by their men in their
note-books--now in the hands of the Belgian, French and English
authorities. As to the men themselves, the writers of these precious
human documents, most of them have already gone to their doom, and all
we know of them are the horrors they have witnessed and the atrocities
they have committed. Many are still alive and prisoners of war. Others
have died in our ambulances side by side with their former foes, now
their comrades in suffering and as often as not almost their friends. I
have had some dealings with several of these men. I have read their
note-books, I have heard from their own lips their gruesome tales of
recorded and unrecorded horror. Those dying men told no lies. Man speaks
the truth when he is aware that Death is listening to what he says.

Suffering has no nationality and Death wears no uniform. There are
neither friends nor foes on "no-man's-land," on all men's land, on the
borderland between life and death, dreaded by all. Men die as best they
can. Most men fear death, all men fear dying. All men are more or less
alike when they are about to die. What they did with their life whilst
it belonged to them may concern the priest if he is at hand, but Death
does not care, he welcomes them all in his own rough way, good men and
bad men are all the same to him. So they are to the doctor. Now and then
I tried to say to myself that I disliked these dying Boches, but I
cannot honestly say I did; in fact, I rather liked them. These were all
so forlorn, so patient, so humble, so grateful for the little one was
able to do for them. They were all delighted to come across a man who
knew their language--those who could smile grinned all over with joyous
surprise, those who could not, greeted the familiar sound with a
friendly look or a tear in their tired eyes. Those who could speak, or
nearly all of them, spoke with humiliation and shame of what they had
witnessed and what they had done. They certainly did not spare
themselves; on the contrary, they seemed to like to talk of their evil
deeds as if it gave them some relief--in fact, they did not want to talk
of anything else. I saw several of these men die. They died as brave men
die.

No one accustomed to the cheerful, affectionate way the French and
English soldiers are wont to speak of their leaders, could avoid being
struck by the way these German soldiers talked of their officers. They
all spoke of them with fear and bitterness and often with hatred. Even
as they lay there safe in one of our ambulances they seemed to be afraid
of lying next to their own officers. Luckily this did not happen often
and never for long, for the German officers always protested furiously
against being placed with their own men. Besides, it mattered little
where they were placed, they were invariably dissatisfied anyhow. Those
I saw were sullen, arrogant and often insolent; displeased with
everything and everybody and most difficult to deal with. They always
spoke of their rank and their Iron Cross--unavoidable it seemed to me,
as I never came across an officer without it--as if entitling them to
privileges shared by no one else. They were well pleased with themselves
and their doings, frightfulness and all, and never did I hear from any
of them a word which sounded like disapproval of the atrocities they had
witnessed. Personally I only know of one German officer who disapproves
this frightfulness, and his mother was a Russian. On the contrary, I
heard a captain say that the Belgians had been treated much too
leniently, and that all the civil population ought to have been driven
out of their country and those who resisted shot on the spot. This
officer was a Prussian. The marked difference between Prussians and
South Germans, well known to those who have visited Germany in times of
peace, has been amply illustrated by the conduct of the different units
in this war.

"The Prussian is cruel by birth, civilization will make him ferocious,"
said Goethe, who knew his country well. It is true that the French
soldier always singles out the Bavarians as particularly brutal and
violent and especially fond of looting; but I wonder if this evil
reputation of theirs is not to a certain extent founded upon vague
reminiscences from the war of '70. It must be admitted though that their
record at Nomly, Blamont and several other places is a terrible one.
But I do not forget that the unnamed hero of this little book was a
Bavarian soldier.

It matters little that I could not identify the band of barbarians who
had established themselves in the chteau mentioned in this
book--similar scenes have occurred everywhere ever since the war began,
and hundreds of chteaux in Belgium and France, have had a much worse
fate. I admit though that when I wrote down the description of the
devastated nursery I believed that this particularly revolting deed was
unique of its kind. Not at all; I was mistaken. I have read since then
from the pen of a distinguished English surgeon in Belgium a description
of a similar act of incredible barbarism. But I am very sorry I do not
know more of the German officer who after a prolonged contemplation in
front of the Venetian mirror smashed it with a knock of his
sword-hilt--the old caretaker just entered the drawing-room in time to
witness this performance.

I am glad at least to be able to hail his comrade-in-arms, the Adalbert
of this book, by his well-fitting Christian name; his family name was
too long to remember, I have had to shorten it here for convenience
sake. I know well he is a rather unusual type of German officer, but
since I had the good luck to have half an hour's conversation with this
phenomenon I do not see why I should not let the reader share the
pleasure of his acquaintance. Moreover, I was told by Dr. Martin, who
knew the Germans far better than I do, that after all Adalbert was not
such an uncommon type of German officer as I seemed to think--I was
delighted to hear it, so much the better for us. He wanted to know if I
was a nobleman: _sind sie Adel_? He seemed to have his doubts about it.
It would amply satisfy all my literary ambitions were I able to present
him with this photograph of himself, slightly retouched by a lenient
hand, but very like him. I wish I knew where he was, he ought not to be
difficult to trace. Maybe "Potsdam" would find him . . .

But the others, the dear old village doctor, the white-haired Cur,
Soeur Marthe and Soeur Philippine, and Josephine with her kind brown
eyes, where shall I find them? Their village is a heap of blackened
ruins, four naked walls are all that remains of their church, and God
knows where they are! God knows where they are. They are all over
France, in every hamlet, every village and every town, soothing the
sufferings of the wounded and sharing their bread with the homeless. Dr.
Martin is dead. He was first reported missing and it was thought he had
fallen into the hands of the Boches. He was soon afterwards found dead,
with Josephine's medal round his neck. Better so for him. I am sure he
would have preferred the second alternative had he had the choice.

But I am equally sure that Adalbert is not dead. I am sure he is still
as fit and alert as when I saw him, safe under the protection of the law
of irony--maybe I would have spared him had I doubted his
invulnerability. Even so, as I read through this manuscript, my literary
instinct, rudimentary though it may be, tells me that this Adalbert does
not fit in very well in the "composition," if a layman may use such an
expression. I am sure it would have been wiser to keep him to myself for
fear that his harsh giggle might jar on the reader of this tale of
suffering and woe. But life is made up of such contrasts and so is
death. No, I know well he does not fit in the composition. Anyhow I
shall leave him in the place where I found him like the bell-capped
buffoon strutting about amongst the swordsmen and arquebusiers on an old
Flemish tapestry, or like the grinning monkey crouching in the corner of
a primitive old painting of martyrs and saints. Yes, martyrs and saints
they are indeed, the other figures I have tried to paint with loving
hands on the remaining pages of this little book! Martyrs giving their
lives for a sacred cause and saints bending over bleeding wounds and
gently closing the eyes of the dead with prayers on their lips. The
background of the picture is the fair land of France with its devastated
plains and its ruined homes, and far away against the reddening sky
Rheims Cathedral in flames! Brave and chivalrous France, so calm in her
hour of danger, so dignified in her sorrow, so strong in the
consciousness of her unconquerable soul.

       *     *     *     *     *

I just caught a glimpse of a handful of Tommies as they flung themselves
into the midst of the fray to fight the Hun by the side of their
dauntless ally. I heard them singing and laughing in their water-logged
trenches in Flanders, and I saw them, agile as leopards, leap from their
parapets and, led by a boy officer swinging his cane, spring forward to
meet death half-way as joyously as though to welcome a friend.

I know that Tommy will play the game, it is the game he has played so
often and played so well, it is the old game between Right and Wrong!

I know what stuff he is made of, that mighty fighter; I know that his
heart is sound and that his arm is strong. Strike hard, Tommy, strike
your hardest! It is the salvation of the world you are fighting for! I
have known all along that you were coming. I have known it ever since I
was a boy and began to read the History of England! I have known it all
along, but God bless you all the same, Tommy, for coming! And God be
thanked that you came!




  I




  RED CROSS AND IRON CROSS


  I


The stranger walked slowly down the narrow main street stretching from
one end of the village to the other. Some of the houses were all in
ruins, and in others the roof or a portion of the wall had fallen in.
The road was covered with debris of bricks and plaster and strewn with
broken glass. In the Square some children crawled out from under a
broken-down transport wagon to gaze at the stranger as he passed, and
further down the street two boys sat riding astride a gun-carriage with
smashed wheels.

A glance at the inn took away his last hope of breakfast; a huge hole in
the wall just over the porch showed only too clearly that the shell had
done its work well, and that the whole fabric was on the point of
tumbling to pieces at any moment. Here and there the anxious face of a
woman looked out from a half-closed doorway, but otherwise all seemed
deserted.

At the other end of the street stood the church on rising ground, and
further on, as far as the eye could see, the usual poplar-lined French
chausse stretched away in one straight line towards the distant Eastern
hills. The church looked undamaged, and so did the adjoining Presbytery
in its little grove of elm-trees.

Outside the portal of the church stood the old Cur, and at his side
another old man who proved to be the mayor and the village doctor in one
person, eyeing with uncomfortable curiosity the approaching stranger.
The sight of the red ribbon on his dilapidated tunic removed their
uneasiness at once, and when the stranger told them that he was a doctor
and belonged to the British Red Cross they received him with open arms.

"It is God Himself who has sent you here, Dr. Martin," said the Cur in
his kind voice.

The doctor did not look quite so sure of that, but was evidently pleased
to be spared any explanation as to what had landed him there, with all
his kit lost and nothing but a morphia syringe in his pocket and a
packet of cigarettes and a little tea in his haversack.

"We are badly in need of help, _mon cher confrre_," said the old
village doctor as they went in.

A heart-rending subdued moan filled the church with awe. On the
straw-covered floor lay, side by side, over a hundred grievously wounded
soldiers. They were all dying men, with blood-stained, mud-covered,
greatcoats hiding ghastly wounds and torn limbs. Here and there the very
straw was red, and streamlets of blood trickled slowly down the slippery
marble floor. Here and there well-meaning but inexperienced hands had
tried to stem the hmorrhage or to cover a gaping wound with some
improvised sort of bandage made out of a towel or a torn sheet. Most of
the men, however, lay there as they had been picked up by the villagers
in the abandoned trenches or under the hedges along the muddy river
bank. The two doctors had not half finished their round before the
new-comer had taken out of his pocket his morphia syringe, once again to
prove itself more valuable than all surgical instruments put together.
The village doctor raised his hands to heaven in a gesture of despair.
He took his colleague into the sacristy, and opening a cupboard in the
wall he pointed to a row of old-fashioned faience jars, labelled with
names in Latin of a dozen useless drugs and ointments. No morphia, no
chloroform, no ether, no ansthetics whatsoever; no iodine, no
disinfectants, no dressing material of any kind! The cupboard contained
all that had been saved, said the Mayor, from the wreckage of the
chemist's shop struck by the very first shell that had fallen on the
village, killing the chemist outright, and destroying all its scanty
supplies.

"I am not a surgeon," said the old village Doctor humbly. "I have never
been a surgeon; all our surgical cases were sent to St. ----, and my
other colleague here was mobilized as soon as the war broke out. I have
no instruments, not even an artery forceps, and I should not know how to
use them if I had any. Do you hear their groans? For three days and
nights this terrible sound has not been out of my ears! It may be easier
to bear for a young man like you--I am sure you are not half my age--but
I feel I can stand it no longer, it is killing me. I am sixty-five, but
I had hardly a grey hair three days ago. Look at me now; my wife says I
am all white!"

The young doctor looked at the kind face of his old colleague, wondering
to himself whether he would not rather have been one of the men on the
straw-covered floor than to have had to live through these three nights
and days as their doctor, powerless to help his patients to live,
powerless to help them to die. And no morphia, priceless and mysterious
gift from benevolent Mother Earth, giving power to the physician to
bring relief to those the surgeon cannot help, to those who lie waiting
for the other, the Great Physician who goes from bed to bed with his one
remedy, his everlasting sleeping-draught!

"Listen to them," said the old Doctor, as if reading his colleague's
thoughts, "and not even to be able to give them an injection of
morphia!"

The other sat silent for awhile. "I am, alas! not more of a surgeon than
you are," said he at last, "but we both know that surgery can do nothing
for these dying men."

A hunchback, with quick restless eyes in an astute face ravaged by
smallpox, entered the sacristy.

"Pierre started before daybreak, Monsieur le Maire," said he, "his
mother sewed your letter in his waistcoat-lining, and I made him repeat
all your instructions twice over. He is as clever as he can be, and I am
sure if he does not succeed nobody else will. He was to keep away from
the high road and ford the river below the mill."

"Well done, Anatole," said the Mayor, "and may God help him to return
safe. He is quick of foot, and he ought to be back to-morrow morning if
all goes well. This is the third messenger I have sent to St. ----," he
said, turning to his colleague, "to get assistance for the wounded, and
to tell them of our terrible plight. We are almost without food, all
eatables were requisitioned for the retreating troops, and every cart
and horse was taken from us for the evacuation of the wounded. Thousands
of them passed through our village. Those you saw in there had been left
as dead. Once the Germans had succeeded in blowing up the bridge there
would besides have been no possibility of getting them away. There were
many more here three days ago, and in a day or two there will be none
left. They are dying one after another and I can do nothing for them!"

A handsome middle-aged woman with a small black shawl over her shoulders
stood at the door.

"There is not a drop more milk in the whole village," said she
despairingly, pointing to the pitcher she was holding in her hand.

"Be sure at least to give what there is to our men and not to that young
Boche," said Anatole fiercely. "The Boches feed on blood and not on
milk, and, believe me, he won't die, your young Boche, no more than will
the big Uhlan next to him, who looks at one as if he wanted to eat one
alive! And that brute of an officer with his Iron Cross, who has been
yelling for another blanket the whole morning, and who cursed the
Sister when she told him that the one he had was taken from Monsieur le
Cur's own bed--he won't die either! Do you know that he ordered the
German soldier next to him to give him his greatcoat and actually
crawled out of his bed and took it from him! Believe my word, they won't
die, the Boches! It is only our soldiers who are dying one after
another; and the Boches will all get well and come back and murder our
wives and children!"

"Shame, Anatole," said Josephine; "Boche or no Boche, they are all the
same to me, these poor dying men. None of them will ever harm you or
anybody else, and you need have no fear that even a Boche would like to
eat you," she added hotly, as she went back into the church.

"Be quiet, Anatole," said the Mayor severely, "I have told you over and
over again to leave those poor wretches alone; they could not help being
born Boches. Anatole is our village barber," said the Mayor turning to
the new-comer; "he is not as hard-hearted as he tries to make out. He
has been most useful to us during these terrible days. He is as strong
as a horse though he does not look it, and he has carried down more
wounded than any of us."

"And if you had not ordered me to carry down that young Boche instead
of . . ."

The Mayor stopped him short with an uneasy glance at the door.

"I told you to be quiet, and if you go on like that I shall get
downright angry with you. You know I am very sorry for you; but
Josephine is even worse off than you--try not to forget it. Her husband
was killed at Charleroi," said the Mayor to the Doctor; "her only son
passed with his battalion through our village last Sunday, and she had
just time to say 'God bless you' to him as he marched past her in the
street. His battalion held the ridge up there for the whole day under a
terrible shell-fire. In the night the Germans charged with the bayonet.
Nearly the whole battalion was annihilated; but she does not know it.
She stood the whole day and night in the porch of the church, anxiously
looking in the faces of the wounded as they were brought in. She has now
made up her mind that her boy was amongst those few who got away. Since
then she has never left the church, and I do not know what we would have
done without her. It is besides the best thing for her to keep working.
Neither the Cur nor I have had the heart to tell her yet----"

"Won't you come and look at him, Monsieur le Maire," pleaded Josephine
at the door; "he is so pale, and his hands are so cold."

They all went back into the church.

The Cur was giving the last Sacrament to an officer who lay there
motionless and silent, with half-closed eyes.

"He has never moved or spoken since he was brought here," said the nun,
"but a moment ago as I wiped the perspiration off his face he said
'Thank you,' and turned his head towards the high-altar."

"Yes," said the other nun softly, "one can see by the way they are lying
if they are conscious or not. All those who are conscious have their
faces turned towards Our Lord."

"Water! Water!" murmured a soldier close by, who, as he lay there, with
his face turned away, seemed to belie the nun's gentle observation. The
soldier took the cup out of the nun's hand, and as he tried to put it to
his lips it all dripped down his beard.

"He always wants to hold the cup by himself," said she; "he does not
seem to know that he is quite blind."

       *     *     *     *     *

"I am sure he is conscious and hears all we say," said the Mayor,
stopping before another soldier. "Of course you may stay with him, but
you must promise to sit quite still and not to talk to him, and above
all you must not try to make him speak or he might spit blood again. And
be sure the child does not disturb him," he added, pointing to the
little girl sitting on the straw mattress at her father's feet. "I think
you had better put her on the floor."

The little girl sat quite still, playing with a doll Josephine had just
made for her out of a towel and some straw.

"Do let her stay," pleaded the wife, "she never leaves her father's side
when he is at home, and I am sure he likes to have her on his bed. She
is only four, but she understands everything, and she knows quite well
she must not speak or make any noise. She has not uttered a sound since
she crept on to his bed."

"Papa is asleep, you must sit quite still and not speak!" whispered the
child to her doll, putting her little fingers to her lips as she had
seen her mother do.

"Perhaps you could persuade him to drink a little milk," said Josephine,
as they bent over the soldier; "he has only had a drop of water since
yesterday. And look!" said she, gently lifting a corner of the
greatcoat, "we have changed his straw twice since yesterday and now
there is no more straw left in the whole village."

The unbuttoned tunic was soaked with fresh blood oozing from a terrible
shrapnel wound in the chest.

"The gentleman is a doctor," said Josephine, covering the wound with a
clean towel which slowly turned red as she spoke.

"Monsieur le Docteur, shall I soon get well?" murmured the soldier.

The Doctor watched his heaving chest and his superficial, irregular
breathing, and said:

"Yes, soon."

"He is only twenty-five," said Josephine, "he is a _luthier_."

"A _luthier_! A violin-maker!"

"I never thought he would live through the night," said the Mayor in a
low voice to his colleague. "But I must say that if anything his pulse
seems to me a little better this morning, and I do think he is losing
less blood. If only his heart can hold out."

"She is the image of her father," said Josephine, gently stroking the
little girl's fair hair.

"Do you think so, Josephine?" said the wife. "I think the boy is much
more like his father," she said, tenderly resting her tear-filled eyes
on the rosy baby asleep on her lap. "If you knew what a wonderful child
he is, Josephine! He never frets or cries, and nothing seems to upset
him. I thought I was going crazy with the terrible roaring of the guns
which has never ceased round our village for days and nights, but he did
not mind it in the least. And did you ever see such a big boy, and so
fat and firm! I am sure he will be as tall as his father. You know he
was born only the day after the mobilization and his father has not seen
him till now. I wish the doctor had let me put him on the bed for his
father to have a real look at him, but the doctor said I was not to do
it. I am sure he would not have cried; he never cries, and I am quite
certain he knows it is his father, for he kept looking at him off and on
before he went to sleep. I thought his father smiled at him a moment
ago, but I am not quite sure. He looks at us the whole time, but now and
then it seems as if he could not see us," she said, trying to keep back
her sobs.

"I am sure he has seen the boy," said Josephine; "it is only that he is
too tired to speak."

"Yes, I know," said the wife, "but if I only could be sure that he had
seen the boy!"

"He must have lost an enormous quantity of blood," said the Doctor to
his colleague, "his pulse is so very thin. I wish we could try to
improvise some sort of transfusion apparatus to inject a warm saline
solution into his veins. Do put another hot water bottle to his feet,
Josephine; they are quite cold."

"Don't you think he is breathing a little better?" said the Mayor in a
low voice. "Perhaps he is going to sleep."

"Perhaps," said the other.

The two doctors stood watching the soldier for awhile in silence.

Suddenly the little girl dropped her doll and looked up with
terror-stricken eyes, her whole body trembling with fear and her face
twitching with the effort not to cry.

"What is it?" said Josephine, looking uneasily at the little girl, "her
face is quite white! Something has frightened the child!"

At the same instant the baby on his mother's knee started in his sleep
with a sharp cry of distress.

The mother looked anxiously at her son and began to rock him to and fro
in her strong arms.

"Something has frightened the boy . . ." said she.

The little girl flung herself from her father's bed and sprang to hide
her face in her mother's lap.

"What is it?" said the old Doctor.

"I don't know," said Josephine, quite pale in the face, "I don't
understand. Something has frightened the children!"

The soldier lay there just as before, his wide-open eyes looking towards
his wife and child. The Doctor bent rapidly over him to listen to the
heart, and made a sign to his colleague as he lifted his head.

"I would never have believed it," said the village Doctor, "it is hardly
a minute since he spoke! I was looking at him the whole time and I did
not notice anything."

"Neither did I," said the other. "It is very strange, but I have seen it
once before. Small children know."

Josephine lifted the little girl in her arms, gently stroking her hair.

"Papa is asleep," whispered the little girl, putting her fingers to her
lips and stretching out her other hand for the doll.

The soldier's wife opened her blouse and the boy began eagerly to drink
life in deep draughts at his mother's breast.

       *     *     *     *     *

"Who is that?" exclaimed the Doctor.

The soldier was lying with his face towards the wall, and the broad
collar of his khaki-coloured greatcoat turned up over his ears.

"I am so sorry," said the Mayor, "I quite forgot to tell you about him.
He is an Englishman. We found him down by the river half buried under
the wreckage of the blown-up bridge. The poor fellow was quite stunned.
He has two of his fingers blown away, and he has a bullet wound in the
back."

"Rather an unusual place for an Englishman to be hit in," said the
Doctor.

"I have not been able to examine the wound very well, he is so very
sensitive, and he begins to groan as soon as one touches him. He has had
no internal hmorrhage, and to-day his temperature is normal. His
appetite is very good, he sleeps a lot, and I think he is doing very
well considering."

"It takes a lot to kill an Englishman," said the Doctor.

"He does not speak French and none of us here understand his English,
but we are trying to look after him as well as we can. You know we all
like the English here," said the Mayor. "He will be very glad to see
you."

"Hallo!" said the Doctor in English. "How are you getting on, Tommy
Atkins?"

The man did not move.

"I think he is sound asleep," said the Mayor.

"His breathing is perfect, I do not think we need have any great anxiety
about him," said the Doctor smilingly. "It does one's ears good to hear
that snoring. I think the best thing we can do is to let him have his
nap. I will come back to him by and by."

"He has a marvellous appetite," said the Mayor, "and is always ready for
a glass of wine, and has no objection to a drop of brandy either."

"I quite believe you," said the Doctor, "but the fine thing about Tommy
is that he is just as cheerful when he doesn't get it."

"He has just eaten a whole pot of marmalade," said the nun.

"I wonder how he came here," said the Doctor; "it is nearly thirty
kilometres as the crow flies to the English line, but there are
stragglers about everywhere."

"As far as I could gather," said the Mayor, "from something he muttered
in, if you allow me to say so, most shocking French, he had been taken
prisoner by the Boches and had managed to escape."

"Well done, and good luck for him that he fell in with your troops. Tell
me when he wakes up," said the Doctor to the nun.

       *     *     *     *     *

They bent over another who looked at them with the terror of death in
his deep-sunk eyes.

"Do you think she will come to-day?" he whispered to Josephine.

"It is his wife he is waiting for," said she softly; "he knows quite
well he is dying, he has dictated two telegrams to her to come, and
nobody has had the heart to tell him that all the wires are cut and no
message can be sent anywhere with the Germans swarming all round us. I
am sure she will come," said she, gently stroking his hand.

       *     *     *     *     *

"Have you been a nurse before?" said the Doctor, "you are so patient and
helpful to these poor men."

"No," said she simply, "but you see, Monsieur le Docteur, my boy is at
the Front and I try to say to myself that if I am patient and kind to
these poor fellows somebody else will be kind to him if he gets wounded.
_Ah! le sang, le sang! Que Dieu punisse celui qui fait couler tant de
sang!_" she suddenly cried out in terror pointing to a pool of blood on
the floor. "It is not an hour since I washed it and there is the blood
again!" She rushed to fetch a pail of water and began to wipe the marble
floor.

The Cur looked at her with pitiful eyes. "Her son is dead," he
whispered to the Doctor; "we found his body up in the wood, and he was
buried there with all the others. She does not know it yet."

They passed a long line of silent men with still white faces and
half-closed eyes. They stopped before a big soldier with a rough bandage
round his head and the blue cloak of the Saxon thrown over him.

"He has had no more convulsions," said the nun, "but he has never ceased
to talk like this since this morning."

"He has a big hole in his skull from the splinter of a shell and has
Jacksonian epilepsy," explained the old Doctor, "it is a marvel he is
still alive. I am sure he ought to be trepanned, but how can we do it!"

The man's voice was still quite strong and he was talking with
vertiginous rapidity. Dr. Martin bent over the Saxon, listening
attentively to his incoherent flow of words; he put his hand firmly on
the man's forehead and said, very slowly and distinctly, some words in
German. The effect of the sound of his voice was instantaneous. The flow
of words ceased at once and the man lay there motionless and silent as
if listening to a voice from afar. After a moment he began talking
again, and again he stopped as soon as the sound of words in his own
language caught his ear. The Doctor sat quite still with his hand on his
forehead, slowly and distinctly repeating the same words of greeting
from the land of his birth. The intervals of listening silence grew
longer and longer. His wild eyes gradually became steadier and his whole
face twitched under a tremendous effort to regain consciousness. After a
while he lay there quite still, looking fixedly at the stranger at his
side.

"Where am I?" he murmured at last.

"With friends," answered the Doctor, fearless of his lie.

"Fritz?" said the Saxon hesitatingly.

"You are wounded, but you are with friends and you will soon get well
and return home if you lie quite still and try to sleep."

"Yes," said he, and closed his eyes.

"Is he asleep?" said Josephine softly after awhile.

"No," said the Doctor, lifting his hand from the Saxon's forehead. "He
is dead."

       *     *     *     *     *

"I am afraid he is very bad," said Josephine. "Monsieur le Maire says he
is quite unconscious, he is bleeding internally and he has both his
hands shot away by a shell. He has never opened his eyes and never
uttered a word since he came. He belongs to the same battalion as my son
and they are great friends. Jean always goes to see him when he has any
time to spare; their farm is only an hour from here. I always want Jean
to be with him, he is such a nice quiet fellow; and he is such a
wonderful gardener. He is their only son," said she, pointing to the two
old peasant-folk sitting beside him. "I sent word to them that he was
here and they came yesterday. They have been sitting here ever since.
They do not seem to understand how bad he is. I have tried to make them
see it and Monsieur le Maire has told them that he is very dangerously
wounded, but it is quite useless, they don't seem to understand. Perhaps
you could tell them; maybe it will have more effect if you say it."

"Yes," said the Doctor, looking attentively at the soldier, "they had
better be told, it is high time. I have, alas! had to tell the same
thing so often, and, if you cannot, I shall have to tell it again to
these two."

The old farmer in his long blouse, his big horny hands leaning on his
stick, sat looking with dim eyes at his son. The old woman in her neat
white _coiffe_ sat with her hands crossed over the basket on her lap.

"Monsieur is the new doctor," said Josephine.

The mother stood up and curtsied and the father raised his hand towards
his head as if to take off his _bret_.

"I am so sorry for you," began the Doctor . . .

"Thank you, Monsieur le Docteur," said the old mother, "he has been
asleep ever since we came, and I know well that is the very best thing
he can do. He was always such a delicate child; I nursed him through all
sorts of illnesses and I always knew that once he had gone to sleep he
would wake up much the better for it. And don't you remember, pre, when
he fell down from the pear-tree and the doctor thought he had broken his
skull, how he went straight off to sleep, and when he woke up he was out
of danger? We do not mind sitting here the whole day; I have so often
been sitting watching him sleep for hours and hours when he was a boy,
and I say to his father to doze a little and that I will tell him as
soon as the boy wakes up."

The old man blinked with his dim eyes approvingly, and leaned his chin
against the stick.

"I wish he would just wake up for a moment to see that we are here, and
then go off to sleep again. I am sure he wants to know all about the
farm, and the vines, and the orchard, and his flowers. You know,
Monsieur le Docteur, he was born on the farm and so was his father, and
he has never left it. There is nobody like him for training vines, and
whatever he plants grows like a miracle. It is only two years ago he
made the new orchard, and the trees are already bearing--I have just
brought this pear to show him. Look what a pear!" said she, producing a
big Duchess pear out of her basket. "I am sure he will like to have a
slice of it when he wakes up. And if you knew what a hand he is with
flowers! There is not a farm anywhere like ours for flowers; even Madame
la Comtesse when she drove past the other day said that in the Chteau
itself there was not such a show of roses as we have. He has learnt it
all by himself; he knows the names of all sorts of flowers, and those he
does not know he himself gives names to. We did not mind the orchard,
but we were a little against his turning the cabbage-land into
flower-beds. We just want to tell him that we don't mind it any more,
not even if he turns the whole kitchen-garden into flower-beds. We do
not mind what he does, he is such a good and obedient son; the only
disappointment he has ever given us was that he did not want to marry
when his father wanted him to; he said there was not one girl in the
whole country as pretty as his flowers, and that he liked better to keep
company with them. The only quarrel he ever had with his father was when
he wanted to go to work for a whole year under the head-gardener at the
Chteau and become a real gardener himself. But how could we spare him
on the farm, his father is getting so old! And now we want to tell him
that he can become a real gardener if he wants. We will sell the cow and
give him all the money he needs."

The old man scratched his head meditatively: "It is a very good cow, and
don't you think we could see first what we could get for that old clock
Madame la Comtesse always wants to buy?"

"He did not want to go to the war," the old mother went on, "but he said
he must go. The last evening he took me out to his flowers and made me
promise to look after them just as he had done, and he spoke about them
as if they were alive. He always used to say that the flowers knew him
and he never wanted to pick them, not even for the flower-show."

"Josephine, I think you had better tell them," said the Doctor. "I
don't know why, but I can't do it."

"Mre Christine," said Josephine, with her kind voice, "don't you
understand that he is so dangerously wounded and has lost so much blood
that he may never come back to you any more. He is so weak . . ."

"That is just what we have been talking about, le pre and I," said the
mother. "You know the Government has taken our horse, but we have
thought that we would fetch him in the ox-cart, all filled with hay so
as not to shake him. I know, Josephine, how good you have been to him,
but don't you yourself think he would be better at home where he can lie
out on sunny days in the garden amongst his flowers. It is so dark
here," said she, looking round with awe. "His father was wounded in '70
and never got well in the hospital, but as soon as they took him home he
began to get all right again. If only he wasn't so weak," said she, with
an anxious look at her son, "but how can he be otherwise with not a
morsel of food nor drink since he was shot, and all that blood! If he
only would wake up for a moment and eat something! I just made this
cheese for him before we left home," said the mother, taking a little
cream cheese from her basket, "and I am sure he would like the pear . . ."

"Josephine," said the Doctor, "he is just dying."

       *     *     *     *     *

"Open the blinds, open the blinds! Why don't you open the blinds?"
called out the soldier next to him. "Won't it be daylight soon? What
o'clock is it? The night has been so long; won't you open the blinds?"

"These are the only words he says; he repeats them the whole time ever
since he came," said Josephine.

"He has both his eyes blown in by a shell and both his legs torn away
above the knee," explained the old Doctor.

"We also had a young officer here with his eyes blown in. We found him
in a ditch beside the road; he looked quite dead, and it was only by his
breathing that we understood he was alive. He remained quite dazed the
first day, but yesterday morning he became conscious, and almost the
first thing he did was to ask for a candle. It was broad daylight, so I
knew he was blind. You could see nothing wrong with his eyes except that
they were a little bloodshot. I put a bandage over them at once and
told him they were inflamed, and that he must keep the bandage on for a
day or two. He had at first some difficulty in articulating the words,
but soon he began to speak quite well. He had not a scratch on his whole
body, and only complained of a sharp pain in his head. He told me he was
standing in the middle of the road when the shell passed close by him.
He said the blast of air was as terrific as if an express train had
dashed past him at arm's length, but a hundred times more so. He felt he
was lifted from his feet and the tremendous displacement of air flung
him in the ditch where we found him. He seemed to be doing so well that
I really thought he was the only one here that was going to live. He
asked several times to have the bandage taken away, as he couldn't stand
the darkness. I said he must keep it on till to-morrow, to gain time to
prepare him. We had so many to look after that it was impossible to
watch him the whole time. A moment later Josephine came to tell me that
he had torn off his bandage. After that he never uttered a word and he
lay there quite still. When I came to look at him in the night I found
he was dead . . . maybe better so for him!"

"Yes, better so for him!" said the other. "Better so for him!"

       *     *     *     *     *

"The Englishman is awake," reported the nun.

As the Doctor came up to him the man turned his head to the wall for
another nap.

"Hallo, Tommy! How are you getting on?"

"Thank you, sir, very indifferently," said the soldier, without moving
his head.

"Can I do anything for you?"

"No, thank you, I just want to sleep, that is all."

"I hope you don't suffer?"

"Awfully," said the soldier with a loud groan.

"You bear up well though; it is indeed lucky it doesn't affect your
sleep. It did me good to hear you snore awhile ago. I am equally glad to
know your appetite also remains satisfactory," said the Doctor, looking
at the empty marmalade pot. "Don't you think we had better have a look
at the wound in your back while you are awake, and try to cleanse it out
for you. My colleague says it needs it badly."

"I am so weak," said Tommy, "and it hurt me so much the last time that
I don't think I can stand having it touched again."

"Suppose you have a drink first," suggested the Doctor.

"A drink?" said the soldier turning his head a little.

"I have still some whisky left in my flask, and you are very welcome to
a drop of it."

The soldier stretched out his hand for the flask, his head still turned
towards the wall.

"I am glad to see there is nothing wrong with your swallowing," said the
Doctor, putting the flask back in his pocket. "Now tell me a little
about yourself! What are you? I can't see anything of you but your
greatcoat."

"Rifle Brigade," said the soldier.

"How on earth did you land here amongst the French? Where do you come
from?"

"I don't remember the name of the place, I get so mixed up with the
names."

"Menonville?" suggested the Doctor.

"That's the place," said the soldier.

"I have just come from there myself; rather a hot place, not very
'healthy,' as you Tommies call it. You will be glad to hear for your
comrades' sake that they are soon going to clear out from there. I just
happen to know that the whole Brigade is to take up another position."

"Where?" asked the soldier, with unexpected eagerness. "And the guns?"

"I do not remember, I get so mixed up with the names," said the Doctor.
"I understand you were taken prisoner. How did that happen?"

"I was left alone in a trench with ten other men. We fought to the last,
all the others were killed, and they took me prisoner, but I shot seven
Boches first."

"Well done. Did you say seven?"

"Yes, seven."

"How did you escape?"

"I am so tired," complained the soldier, getting very feeble in the
voice.

"Have a smoke," said the Doctor, taking a cigarette from his pocket. "It
is true we are in a church, but smoking has now once for all been
accepted in all ambulances, and I take the responsibility of letting you
have a puff at a cigarette."

"No, thank you."

"Can't a Woodbine tempt you?"

"What?" asked the soldier.

"A Woodbine. You don't mean to say you don't know what a Woodbine is? If
so you are the only man in His Majesty's Expeditionary Force who doesn't
know it."

"I do not smoke," said the man.

"Don't you?" said the Doctor, his eyes on the big burnt hole in the
man's coat sleeve.

"What part of England do you come from?"

"I am a Canadian."

"Ah! that is where you get that slight Americas twang from. You were
indeed lucky not to fall in with any Uhlans. They would have shot a
khaki man at sight. There are lots of Uhlans about here. I had a hell of
a time myself to get across from Menonville. Where did you meet the
French?"

He did not answer.

"You are not very communicative; have another drink."

The Doctor bent over his face as he emptied the flask. "You need a shave
badly," said he; "that hunchback standing over there is an excellent
barber, and if you like I will tell him to give you a shave and a
brush-up. You need it indeed. Your face is so covered with dirt and
powder one can hardly see what you look like; one might take you for a
minstrel on the beach at Margate. I know what you men like best, as soon
as you are out of the fray and even while you are in it. And won't you
be glad if I can manage to get you a cup of tea? I still have a small
packet in my haversack."

"No thank you. I just want to sleep."

"All right. I see it is no good tempting you with anything; you want to
be left in peace. You have deserved well of your country, and do have
another nap, as that is what you want."

       *     *     *     *     *

"Won't you come and look at him, Monsieur le Docteur?" said Josephine;
"he is so pale, and his hands are so cold."

They knelt down on each side of a young German soldier. His eyes were
soft and light blue; his hair was curly and very blond, and the delicate
moulding of his pale cheek was almost girlish. He looked barely
eighteen.

"I am sure he is the same age as Jean," said Josephine. "I didn't know
the Germans could look like this; he doesn't look as if he could do harm
to anybody. I tried to give him a little milk, but I fear he cannot
swallow," said she. "Do speak to him in German. I am sure he is
conscious; he tried to say something, but alas! I can't understand his
language."

A faint flush came to the boy's white cheek as he heard the first word
in his own tongue whispered in his ear.

"Listen to me, but do not try to speak or you might spit blood again,"
said the Doctor. "We want to help you to get well and strong, and you
will then return home again."

"Home?" whispered the boy.

"Yes, home--to your own home. Wouldn't you like to write home as soon as
you are a little stronger? You will tell me what to say and I will write
the letter for you and send it off. Perhaps we can write it to-morrow."

There came almost a smile on the lips of the boy.

"Now," he whispered.

"No, I think we had better wait till to-morrow."

"Now," he whispered again.

The doctor looked at him attentively and saw he was right. Josephine
rushed to fetch a pen and paper in the sacristy, and in an almost
inaudible whisper the boy began:

"_Meine liebe Mutter . . . !_"

Josephine's big shining mother's eyes filled with tears, for they had
understood what her ears did not.

"_Meine . . . liebe . . . Mutter . . . !_" whispered the boy once again
with still fainter voice. A slight shiver passed over him. His head
turned towards Josephine, and it was all over.

"I wish I knew his Christian name!" said Josephine, wiping her eyes.

       *     *     *     *     *

Two big bloodshot eyes had never left off watching the Doctor while he
was busy with the dying boy. The eyes were all one could see of the man
lying next to the boy; his whole head was a big bundle of blood stained
towels and rough bandages, and his gigantic body was covered by the long
cloak of a Bavarian soldier. The nun brought the Doctor some linen, torn
off a sheet to replace the bandage dripping with blood. He almost wished
he had not attempted it. The whole face and throat was one enormous
wound: the jaw had been shot away and the tongue was torn. A sinister
rattle accompanied his short and irregular breathing. All their efforts
to give him some food or drink had failed, said the nun, and not even a
drop of water had they succeeded in making him swallow. They cleansed
his frightful wound as well as they could; tried to remove the clots of
blood obstructing the air passages, and raised his head to make him
breathe a little more easily. With infinite trouble they succeeded, with
the help of the village Doctor, in improvising a sort of tube through
which they gave him a little wine and water. He was quite conscious,
and maybe had been so ever since he was struck by the shrapnel. His eyes
implored help. The Doctor sat at his side, feeling as though he almost
wanted to beg his pardon for being so helpless. And he did it. He spoke
slowly and as distinctly as he could, and he saw that the eyes
understood his words. He said that they would soon get him a better
bandage and a proper tube to feed him with. He told him he would then
feel much better, and he promised to help him to get some sleep. He
would soon feel stronger and breathe more easily, and he would soon
begin to get well again. He spoke to the giant almost as one would speak
to a child, slowly repeating the same words again and again:

"You will soon feel better, much better, you are so tired; you will soon
feel better, your eyes are so tired, tired, your eyelids are feeling so
heavy, so heavy, you are so sleepy, your eyes are closing, closing . . .

"Close your eyes!" said the Doctor, touching the eyes with his fingers.
"Close your eyes!"

The unequal struggle between the strong, sound will and the exhausted
brain tortured by pain lasted only a minute or two. The eyelids remained
closed, the breathing became gradually deeper and more regular, and the
restless hands lay there quite still.

The nun looked on in silent wonder.

"It is the first sleep he has had since he came," said she.

The Doctor sat at his side for a long while, not daring to move lest he
should wake him. Josephine had come back, and he sat there watching her
busy at work with the dead boy.

She washed his body clean from blood and mud and put a clean sheet under
him. She dressed him in one of her own son's shirts she had evidently
gone home to fetch; put a crucifix in his joined hands; lit a candle at
the foot of his bed and laid a little bunch of flowers at his head.

"I am sure his mother would like me to do it," explained Josephine.




  II


"I wish you had been here the first day to help us with the German
major," said the Mayor. "You evidently know how to handle the Boches
better than we do; it seems as if you could do whatever you liked with
them. I fear though that even you would have had some difficulty in
tackling him. I ought not to say anything against him; he is a dying man
if he is not already dead, but I must say he was rather troublesome. He
was shot through the shoulder, and I fear he was in great pain; but he
certainly was one of the least badly wounded here. He did not speak
French very fluently, but he could quite well say anything he wanted. He
was first lying next to the blind French soldier you have just seen; but
he complained that he disturbed him, and it is true that the poor man
never ceases night or day calling to have the blinds opened. So we moved
the major to the corner over there next to his own men. An hour later
Soeur Marthe came to say that he was very angry and excited, and that he
wanted to speak to me. I knew he was in pain, and I told him I was very
sorry I could not do more for him; and I begged him not to think it was
because he was a German he was left in that state, but that, alas! all
the wounded were in the same terrible plight. Pointing to his Iron Cross
he said it was an outrageous shame to neglect an officer like that, and
that he must have an injection of morphia at once. I told him again that
we had no morphia and that I had sent a messenger to St. ---- for
medicine and dressing-material, and I hoped surely to have some morphia
for to-night, but that he must try to be patient till then. Soeur Marthe
brought him a _tisane_ of camomile--it was the only thing we had--but he
threw it on the floor and said he must have morphia at once, and began
to abuse us all first in French and then, as he grew more and more
excited, in what sounded the vilest German. I might have told him that
after all it was a German shell that had wrecked the chemist's shop; but
I said nothing. I did not know what more to say, so I left him, and told
the nun to try again by and by with the _tisane_. So far he was in the
right in a certain measure; we all knew he was in pain and nobody minded
his abusing us. But you could never guess the reason why he sent for me
again in less than half an hour. When Soeur Marthe told it me I said she
had misunderstood what he meant, and I had to hear it with my own ears
before I could believe it. Do yon know what he shouted as soon as I came
up to him? He said he was a superior officer and that he must have a
room to himself, and could not lie mixed up with his own men. His voice
trembled with rage, and he worked himself into such a state of fury that
he could no longer find words in French. Pointing to the German soldiers
next to him he shouted the whole time a word in German which I did not
understand; but I fear it was not complimentary, for I noticed that the
soldier next to him looked at him angrily. This man is not mortally
wounded either and is quite conscious, and speaks good French. He has an
intelligent and rather refined face, and is, I believe, an educated man.
He told me he was from Southern Germany, and that he was a Socialist and
hated the war. Considering the state of excitement in which I had left
the major, I was not very much surprised when Soeur Marthe came to
report a little later that he had convulsions, and I admit I thought at
first that his rage had ended in a sort of _crise de nerfs_. It was only
in the afternoon that I began to suspect, from the stiffness of the
throat, the fixedness of the jaws, and the increasing difficulty in
swallowing, that the poor man had tetanus. I have never seen a case of
lock-jaw before, but I knew of course that he had to be isolated, and as
we had nowhere else to put him we had to carry him into the charnel
house. He indeed had tetanus, and tetanus in its most acute and violent
form. In the evening he began having the most terrific attacks of tonic
spasms, and the attacks have been increasing in intensity ever since. I
need not tell you I have no serum, and even if I had I am sure it would
be too late in his case. If I only had some chloroform, or ether, or
morphia to help him a little in his worst attacks! All I could do was to
darken the room and put straw on the floor to deaden the sound of our
steps, as I have read that even a light or a sudden sound can, by reflex
action, bring on an attack.

Early yesterday morning the South German trooper next to him began to
show the same signs that had aroused my suspicions with the major, and
we had to carry him also to the charnel house. The trooper, however, has
so far only had some localized cramps in the jaw, and I have the
impression that his case is much less severe. Nobody here has, of
course, ever seen a case of this fearful illness, and it is difficult to
make anybody stay with them. Soeur Marthe is there now and I have
promised to relieve her at Ave Maria. The bells will ring in a few
minutes and I must go there."

"What a frightful disease!" he went on, as they walked across the
cemetery; "and that they generally remain conscious to the very end
makes it even more terrible to witness."

The place was quite dark but for the dim little oil lamp on the floor
behind the heads of the two men who lay on each side of the room. The
nun stood as near the door as she could.

"I am so afraid in this darkness," she whispered. "They are both quite
still now; I had not heard the officer breathe for awhile," said she,
"and I thought he must be dead. I read two Pater Nosters and it gave me
strength to take the lamp and go up to him to put the crucifix in his
hands. As I bent over him I looked at his face, and . . ." she burst
into tears and put her hands before her eyes, "look at him!" she
whispered with awe, "look at him!"

The Mayor took the lamp, and as the light fell on the dead officer's
face he drew back in terror. The head was bent backwards in a last
violent spasm, and the rigid muscles of the face stood still in a
hideous laugh.

"_Risus sardonicus!_" said the Doctor.

"I have read about it in books, but I have never seen it before, and I
hope I shall never see it again!" said the Mayor, wiping the cold
perspiration from his forehead.

"Is he dead?" asked the soldier from the other side of the room.

"Yes, I am afraid he is dead," said the Mayor, endeavouring to steady
his voice. "It is no good trying to hide it from you. We had no hope
about him from the beginning; but your case is quite different, and you
will get all right if only you try to be calm, lie still, and do not
speak."

"I am glad he is dead," said the soldier. "He commanded my squadron; I
have lived in fear of him night and day for these two months. He has
kicked me many times, and the last time he struck me with his whip
across the face was the day before I was wounded. I am glad he is dead;
it is no fault of his if there are still any of his men left alive, but
if there are any I should like to live to be able to tell it them!"

"You must not speak," said the Doctor; "it is necessary that you should
lie quite still and silent if you are to get well."

"You say it does me harm to speak; I say it does me good. I am going to
have my say this time, they cannot stifle my voice any longer; I am a
free man at last. You had better listen; it is the last speech of a
German Socialist that you are going to hear. My companions are silent,
so far, but the day will come when they also will speak out, and with a
far stronger voice than mine. I thank you for what you have done for me;
it is not much, but I suppose it is all you could do. I heard you say to
him that we wounded were better off on our side. Maybe it is so once we
are in the ambulances, but before we are there we are worse off than on
your side, for with us they pick up the officers first and leave us to
the last. Did you hear what he called us when he told you he would not
lie next to his own men? He could not find the right word in French in
the fury he was in, but he found it all right in his own language. He
called us _Schweine_, swine--that is how a Prussian officer speaks to
his men! We obey them, cowards as we are, because we fear them; but we
hate them as much as we fear them. Yes, he called us swine, and he was
quite right, and we ought to be grateful that he did not call us worse
names. He might have called us thieves and murderers, and he would still
have been right. Two months ago I was an honest man; I had not willingly
offended either the laws of God or man, and I could look my wife
straight in the eyes without fear or shame. Now I am a thief, a
murderer, and a villain. I know I am damned, I know where I am going
to, and I know who has led the way. It was he who led us through the
burning streets of Louvain and through the smoking ruins of what was
once railed Aerschot; it was a peaceful town when we entered it and it
was a blazing furnace when we left it. It was he who made us shoot the
women and children at Dinant, and sprinkle their houses with petroleum
and light them with our torches. It was he who made us loot and plunder
Termonde and, drunk with wine and blood and lust, break into their
houses and outrage their women. I rolled off to sleep that night with a
bottle of champagne in my hand on the steps of the high-altar in one of
their churches . . . so you had better spare your priest coming to see
me through! Do not trouble about me, you Red Cross people, for I have
shot lots of your wounded at Tamines! Don't read any Pater Nosters for
me you, Sister, for I raped one of the nuns of the Sacr Coeur, whose
prayers did not help her more than your prayers can help me. Well may
you lie there and laugh at me, Major von Decken, for having been such a
cowardly fool as to obey you so long. You were no coward--you! You were
as brave as a man can be, but you were as cruel as a man can be: cruel
to us, cruel to your enemies, cruel like the man-eating tiger! They say
you can harm no more. I am not so sure of that; you had better not go
too near him lest he might strike again. I have seen him laugh like that
before. I know what that laugh means. It means that somebody is going to
die."

The man's whole body stiffened in a frightful spasm, but his eyes
remained lucid and calm, and the attack was soon over.

"Well, maybe it is only I who am going to die this time," he went on in
a fearful voice. "Your impassible eyes will have to witness for once the
death of a guilty man."

He lay silent for awhile, looking straight at his officer.

"But maybe it was not you alone who led us on; maybe you, too, brave as
you were, lived in fear of somebody, somebody more strong, more cruel
even than you! Maybe you were only the tool in a stronger hand than
yours, as we were the blood-dripping tools in your hands. Whose hand was
it? Colonels, Generals, Field-Marshals, Princes, Kings, and You!
Emperor! To hell with you all for what you have made us do! You are
sending me there now--I know it well--as you have sent thousands of your
men there before. I die without fear, for death can have no new terror
to spring upon me that life has not revealed to me during these last
months. I am not afraid of hell, for no tortures the devil ever
inflicted upon the damned can be more terrible than the torments you,
with the name of God on your lips, made us inflict upon righteous men
and harmless women and children--in fact you have added to the list; you
have proved a first-rate expert in inventing instruments of torture--the
devil will have a lot to learn from you!

"You willed the war, sinister Emperor! You wanted to become the world's
greatest ruler; you have become its greatest criminal. The sun is
setting blood-red and menacing over the tottering walls of your
world-power; your short day of triumph is drawing to its close, your
long night of expiation is about to begin. I have seen your restless
eye--the fear of death is already there. But better no gallows for you!
Better to suffer you to live on with that fear in your eye! Better to
let you die in your bed assisted by your acquiescent Court-Chaplains
trying in vain to silence your cry of anguish with their litanies, and
surrounded by your bowing Court doctors working their hardest for you to
hold on a few hours longer to your dishonoured crown and to rouse you
from the invading torpor that you may hear to your very last breath the
maledictions of your victims.

"You are fond of travelling in pomp. Better to let you start in state
for your last show, your last journey, to the sound of merry chimes from
all the ruined belfries of Flanders and the bells of Rheims calling
France to Mass to offer thanks to God! Better to let you go to hell with
all the honours due to your rank as the greatest slayer of life, the
greatest destroyer of happiness the world has ever known!

"We who are going before you to our doom--we shall all be there to
welcome you, to close round you as your bodyguard, ready to die for our
Emperor once more if ever heaven would dare to storm hell to try to
reconquer your soul!

"Do you hear the clatter of their horses' hoofs? Do you see their
lance-tips glistening in the dark? They are coming, they are coming!
Hurrah! It is my squadron--it is the Death's Head Hussars! It is all my
dead comrades riding to hell! Help me to the saddle!"

The bells began to ring Ave Maria. As the sound struck his ears his
hands instinctively made the sign of the Cross. His jaw closed, his
whole body grew rigid with a terrific spasm, and the heart stood still.




  III


"This beats anything I have ever seen or heard," said the old village
Doctor as they walked across the churchyard. "And this last rigid spasm
of the muscles of laughter, this hideous _risus sardonicus_, do you mean
to say it often occurs in tetanus?"

"Often enough," said the other, "I have seen it several times. There
have been, as you know, an appalling number of cases of tetanus, both
with the English and the French. I am sorry that this man is dead. I
wish he had been spared to his country, a dozen Socialists as far gone
as he are worth a whole brigade for breaking down the stronghold of
Prussian militarism. Did you see the glare in his eye when he started
cursing the War Lord? If, as he said, they are to meet in another world,
no doubt he will see to it that the Kaiser gets a warm reception on his
arrival in that place. I wonder who he was; for all we know he may have
been one of the leaders of his party; his flowery and rather theatrical
way of speaking points to his being accustomed to address a larger
audience than he had to-day."

"I shall never go back to that charnel-house again," said the old
Doctor, "not even Balzac could have conjured up a more ghastly scene."

"It makes me think of Dostoievsky," said the other. "It is just what he
would have liked. But fiction is indeed a tame business compared to
reality, and Life is, after all, the most daring and the most original
writer of startling tales the world has ever produced. Your Balzac was a
great reader of medical handbooks, and so was Dostoievsky, and no doubt
they could have described such a death scene--_risus sardonicus_ and
all--accurately enough. But would either of these great masters have
dared to put in the mouth of their dying German soldier that long
harangue about the Emperor? I doubt it. They would have thought it far
too melodramatic to be true to life. Why is it that people in a
semi-delirious state not infrequently speak with a wealth of ideas and
an exuberance of imagery which often makes them quite eloquent? Mad
people are often most brilliant and witty in their conversation, and as
to their power of argument . . ."

"The sharpest lawyer I ever heard of was a lunatic, and nobody thought
anything of him as long as his mind was sound," said the old Doctor.

"The Englishman is awake," reported Soeur Philippine at the door of the
church.

"I am delighted to hear it," said Doctor Martin. "We are both in need of
a little diversion, my dear colleague; I want to have another talk with
that Englishman of yours, and I would like you to be present at our
conversation."

"He knows no more French than I do English," said the Mayor, "so I
shouldn't understand a word."

"I think you will understand this time."

"I hope he did not complain and that you told him how sorry we are not
to have been able to do more for him. We all like the English so much.
We had lots of them billeted in our village last month when the English
were holding the line here. They used to give the children chocolates
and jam, and carry them on their shoulders and play all sorts of games
with them, whenever they were not drinking tea or washing themselves
under the pump, which they did most of the day. They paid almost double
its value for everything they took, and always thought first of the
welfare and comfort of their horses and then of their own. All our
women-folk were crazy about them, and no wonder, for a smarter-looking
set of men I never saw, all tall, clean-looking chaps, and so merry.
They were always laughing, several of them were wounded, and not
slightly, but they hobbled about laughing just the same. They didn't
speak a word of French, no more than this one does in the church, but it
was extraordinary to see how they got on with the children; they
understood each other quite well. Anatole also says he understood them,
but I am not so sure about that. He says he had never had such a time in
his life--they always wanted shaving. They were here over a Sunday, and
lots of them came to church, and the Cur delivered a special sermon for
them, and he said he had never had a more sympathetic or responsive
congregation, although they evidently did not understand a word he said.
The others held divine service on the Green; one of their officers read
a short sermon and all the men sang a hymn and knelt for their prayers,
and I must say it was most impressive."

"Did you look at this one's face?" asked the Doctor.

"Yes, yes . . . we all like the English over here."

As they came up to the Englishman Anatole was just helping him to a
glass of wine, with some friendly remarks in an unknown tongue
constructed out of his previous dealings with his friends _les
Anglais_.

"I love the English," said Anatole, "but somehow I do not get on as well
with this one as I did with the others; they spoke better French than he
does."

"I am not so sure of that," said the Doctor, "I think it is only that he
is rather shy. Don't be so shy, Tommy," he continued in French, turning
to the soldier. "Surely you don't want to disappoint your kind friends
here by forcing me to carry on our little conversation in a language
they don't understand. We know you were somewhat stunned when the bridge
was blown up; maybe it is that which made you forget your French. Now
that your head is quite clear again you will see it will all come back
to you quite nicely. But do pull down that collar of your greatcoat, so
that we may look at your face while we talk; we all like the look of an
Englishman who has killed seven Boches. Now tell me a little more of
your glorious past; I don't expect you to tell the truth, but you might
try. We will talk about the future by and by. Where did you pick up that
excellent French of yours?" The man's eyes wandered restlessly round the
church.

"He doesn't speak a word of French," explained Anatole.

"Answer!" said the Doctor, his dark eyes rivetted upon the soldier.

The man looked uneasily from one to the other of those around him, till
at last, with a quivering of his eyelids, he faced the doctor:

"It is all up," said he in perfect French.

"Answer!" said the Doctor.

"I have been in Belgium these last two years."

"What became of you when the war broke out?"

"I became dispatch-rider to the General Staff, but had to give it up on
account of my weak heart."

"How long were you with the English?"

"Since after Mons."

"In what capacity?"

"I served first in the Transport service, and then as chauffeur with a
Red Cross motor ambulance."

"You were then a Belgian refugee, I suppose?"

"Yes."

"And you were an English straggler when you were with the French? You
did good work?"

"I think so, for I was promoted."

"Who had you to report to?"

"To my nearest superior, who was interpreter to the General
Headquarters."

"You had no difficulties?"

"No, it is easy with the English."

"More difficult with the French?"

"Yes, by far."

"I daresay your khaki uniform was very useful to you."

"Yes, rather."

"I have just been admiring your greatcoat, it almost looks like an
officer's; you are a great swell! Did you kill your man, or did you rob
the dead--hyena fashion?"

"All our khaki uniforms are made in Dsseldorf," said the man with a
certain pride.

"Now my dear Fuchs, or Katz, or whatever may be your name--shall we call
you Fuchs, it fits you nicely. Now my dear Fuchs, let us come to the
little accident in your career which gave us the pleasure of your
acquaintance."

The man groaned loudly.

"No, Fuchs, I wouldn't try that groan again if I were you; it brought
you such bad luck last time you tried it. When a clever man like you,
Fox, gets himself up as a Tommy he ought to know that an Englishman does
not groan when the doctor dresses his wound; he never utters a sound, he
clenches his teeth if it comes to the worst--but that is all. Nor would
any self-respecting Tommy ever dream of growing that dirty red beard of
yours; he would have had it shaved off, and had a wash long before he
ate that pot of marmalade. You were quite right about that marmalade
though, and you were also quite welcome to the drink considering the
circumstances; but be careful, Fuchs, don't overdo it! You made an awful
mess of it when you did not stretch out your dirty fingers for that
Woodbine I offered you, and that you did not feel like a cup of tea was
an equally bad shot, my poor Fuchs. I have yet to live to learn that
there exists a Tommy who resists a Woodbine or a cup of tea. Your
greatcoat was all right, but, my dear Fuchs, it was your head which got
you into trouble, and you were quite right to duck it under your collar.
Look, Anatole, at your friend Fuchs, you who know _les Anglais_, did you
ever see an Englishman walk about, with such a head?"

Anatole's eyes had become quite small, and crouching like a big cat
ready to spring, he drew nearer and nearer to the spy.

"No, Anatole, not yet," said the Doctor. "We know, my dear Fox, that you
are storing a French bullet somewhere in your anatomy which might have
killed an honest man, but by some oversight of the devil did you but
little harm. I have an uncomfortable sensation that you intended to take
up your profession again in a very short time, and that you would in all
probability have succeeded had I not had the advantage of meeting you
here. Had the soldier who sent that bullet into your back discovered one
minute before that there was a traitor among them, there would be no
wounded in this church to-day. You had just time to light the fuse which
blew up the bridge and your two fingers as well. You knew that it meant
the lives of all those men whose bread you had shared and who no doubt
had offered you their last cigarette, and whatever little comfort they
may have had, as homage to the uniform you wore--you say it is all right
so; it is what you call war, isn't it so, Fox?"

"It hurt my feelings to do it, but I had to carry out my instructions,
and it nearly cost me my life."

"Did you say nearly?"

The man's face grew ashy grey under its layer of dirt.

"No, Fuchs, you needn't worry. We do not kill wounded men in an
Ambulance, not even a wounded spy. I am sure you will be given ample
time to collect your varied impressions of these last months. You have
indeed shown yourself worthy of your promotion."

"If you spare my life I will give information to your authorities for
which your Secret Service would pay a fortune."

"I am glad you told me this, Judas Fuchs; it was nice of you, it
facilitates matters for me personally a lot. I have, like you, a
sentimental nature; it hurts my feelings to cause a man to be shot and I
was almost beginning to feel sorry for you, my dear Fuchs."

The spy succeeded in getting his eyes away from the Doctor's, and he
cast a rapid glance at the door.

"Yes, you are quite right, Fox, the doors are left open the whole night;
but you are wrong in thinking that you might wriggle out like a venomous
reptile in the dark. Listen well to what I now tell you! You will never
come out alive from this church. If man does not kill you, God will."

Fear shone in the eyes of the spy and his whole body began to shiver.

"Are you certain he won't escape?" said the Mayor as they turned away.
"I have heard of a man with a bullet through his body being able to walk
in less than a week's time. It may besides be true what Soeur Philippine
told me, that she thought she saw a shadow moving last night towards the
door. Who else could it have been but he? I dare not rely on anybody to
watch him during the night. We are all worn out; we must keep the doors
open, the stench is too terrible, and we have besides all the dead to
carry out during the night. Who can guarantee that he does not crawl
out through the window?"

"Why not put him in the charnel-house?" said Anatole. "It's the very
place for him."

"No," said the Mayor, "I think we will not put him there; we will like
it better so when our heads are cool."

"Quite so," said the Doctor, "and I take the responsibility before you,
Monsieur le Maire, that he shall not escape. He is welcome to try; I
know he cannot do it. I know I can hold him; he is not only a spy but he
is also a coward, which is, I believe, a rare combination in his
dangerous profession. I saw a spy shot a week ago, and I could not help
admiring his courage to the very end. This scoundrel, who wanted to
betray his own country after having already betrayed three other
countries, is quite harmless now; he is shaking all over with terror,
and he will die of fear if of nothing else.

"He is not fit to lie here amongst these brave men," said the Doctor as
they walked down the nave. "I have felt ever since I entered your church
as if service were going on the whole time, and there is something
blasphemous in his being here. But I have a feeling that it won't be for
long."

       *     *     *     *     *

"Did I show you the big Uhlan over there, _mon cher confrre_," said the
old village Doctor pointing down the side aisle. "He was shot through
the spine and I fear he suffers terribly. Luckily for him I believe the
end is near; it looks to me as though he would not be here, to-morrow."

"Yes, I know him well," answered his colleague, "he is the only Boche
here who is able to speak; I had a long talk with him this morning; we
are great friends. I do not know if he is a Uhlan or not; he is so
covered with blood and mud that it is impossible to make out what his
uniform is. All I know of him is that he took part in the massacres of
Dinant."

"He looks like it," said the old Doctor. "We found him down on the river
bank under some willows; he was almost lying in the water. He is the
biggest man I ever set eyes on; Anatole says it was quite a job to lift
him. He had a collapse when we took him from the stretcher and put him
on the straw; in fact, I thought he was gone. As I bent over his face to
see if he was dead he opened his eyes, and he startled us all with such
a terrible scream that one could hear it all over the church. He screams
whenever one comes near him. I never saw such a wild-looking man. They
are all rather afraid of him here. Anatole thought he was going to
strike him when he wanted to lift him; he has the fists of a giant. Did
you ever see such a ferocious face?"

"_Il n'est pas mchant_," said Josephine, who was standing behind the
Uhlan so that he could not see her, "but he does not want anybody to
look at him. I believe he is afraid of somebody."

"You are as clever as you are good, Josephine," said Doctor Martin; "you
are quite right, he is afraid of somebody. It is nobody here."

"He has been following you with his eyes the whole time," said she. "Do
talk to him; I am sure he is longing to speak to you."

"Thank God you have come back," said the Uhlan, as soon as he heard the
Doctor's voice. "Did you see anybody as you came?" he added in a hurried
whisper.

"No."

"Are you sure?"

"Quite sure."

"She always goes away when you come," he murmured.

"Who?"

He closed his eyes. "The old woman," he said with a shudder. "I was
afraid you were not coming back."

"I promised you I would come back."

"Yes, but since I told you this morning about the old . . ." He closed
his eyes again.

"I have forgotten all about her," said the Doctor.

"I want to tell you," the soldier went on with an unsteady voice. "As I
bent over her face to see if she was dead . . ."

"I do not want to hear anything more about her," said the Doctor
sternly; "you may tell me anything you like, but I do not want to hear
anything more about the old woman."

He looked quite disappointed. "But you said you had forgotten. As I bent
over her face to see if--for God's sake let me tell you," he pleaded
eagerly, as the Doctor tried to stop him again, "for God sake let me
tell you! I cannot bear it alone any longer, I feel as if you might help
me if you knew all about her. I am sure you can help me, she went away
when you spoke to me this morning; it is the only time she has left me
since I came here. As I bent over her face to see if she was dead," he
went on with unmistakable relief . . .

The Doctor saw he was powerless to spare the man his self-inflicted
torture. Helpless and silent he sat by the soldier's side listening
once more to the gruesome tale of the massacre of the eight hundred
civilians at Dinant. He knew the terrible story through the depositions
of the few survivors; he heard it now from the trembling lips of one of
the executioners.

It was all carried out with order and precision; the officers were there
to see that the work was properly done, and that it all went off without
a hitch--the men were rather more drunk than was good for them. One of
his comrades was shot dead by an officer as he threw down his rifle when
orders were given to fire on the defenceless crowd. They slaughtered the
men first, several hundreds of them, mostly old men, but many mere boys.
Then the women by hundreds, mothers and wives, daughters and sisters,
young and old. How many he had shot he did not know, he did not
remember, nor did he seem to worry much about it. It was all about the
old woman. He saw her running down the street, but she could not run
very fast, she was a very old woman--"_Eine sehr alte Frau_," said he.
He stabbed her as she was entering a house; she fell on the threshold.
As he bent over her face to see if she was dead, she opened her eyes and
looked at him with the same eyes as his grandmother had looked at him
the day he started for the war and bid her farewell in their village
church--the same sad, humble eyes. The old woman was holding her
prayer-book and her spectacle case in her hand, just as his grandmother
was holding her prayer-book and her spectacle case in her old hands. She
was quite dead, but she kept on looking at him.

He ran to join his comrades and they all sat down round the bonfire in
the midst of the square to a hearty meal with an extra ration of sausage
and potatoes, and many good things they had looted from the shops, and
as much wine as they could drink, and all the dead bodies lying round
them as they had fallen. The officers dined outside the caf close by,
and the tables were laden with champagne bottles--it was all very jolly,
"_Sehr lustig_" he called it. The men sang "_Deutschland ber Alles_,"
and at the end, "_Nun danket alle Gott_." He got quite drunk again and
felt very happy. Just as he was dropping off to sleep that night the old
woman came and bent over him and looked at him with the same eyes as his
grandmother. Since that day she came regularly every night as he was
going off to sleep and bent over him and looked at him, just as his
grandmother used to come and look at him when he was a boy--for he had
never known his mother. He stood it for a week, but then he got so
exhausted from want of sleep that he could hardly walk, and he was
reported to the doctor. The doctor gave him a pill which made the old
woman come a little later at night and also in the day as soon as he was
alone. Then he was put under arrest for something he had done he did not
remember, and for two days and nights the old woman never left his side
and kept looking at him the whole time. He then thought he would speak
to the army chaplain. He was a very good chaplain--a God-fearing man
much liked by all the men. The chaplain cured him on the spot. The
chaplain said it all came from the stomach, that he had nothing to worry
about, that he was defending the Fatherland, and that the old woman
would probably have gouged out the eyes of one of his comrades had she
lived--if she had not already done it. The kind chaplain managed to get
him out of prison and the next day he was quite fit again, and never
once did the old woman come back to look at him during their whole
advance through Belgium and France. The night he was wounded she came
back again and looked at him with his grandmother's eyes. He tried to
crawl away from her and hide under some willows, but she followed him
there and for the whole day and night she kept on looking at him. He
begged her for God's mercy to fetch him a drop of water from the river,
but she never moved and never took her eyes off him. He did not know how
many days and nights they remained there, but he remembered quite well
that one of the men who came to carry him away on the stretcher was a
hunchback. The night was dark, but he could see the old woman distinctly
as she walked at the side of the stretcher, her white hair flowing in
the wind and her clothes dripping with blood. As they carried him up the
church steps the bells in the old village church began to chime their
well-known chime, and at the door stood Hans, the old beadle, who used
to chase him and the other boys away when they were too noisy during
Mass; and Hans nodded to him as he passed. He saw his grandmother in her
white cap and her black shawl kneeling on her old knees in her usual
place by the side altar. He was not very surprised to see her there, for
he knew she would come every evening to pray for him. He wanted to go up
to her, but he thought he had better wait till she had finished her
prayer. The old woman from Dinant was gone. He looked at his
grandmother; he knew he was safe, he knew he was released, and he would
have thanked God had he dared. As they lifted him out of the stretcher
all the lights in the church went out, and it became dark as death
around him. He had ceased to suffer, so he thought he had ceased to
live. And again he wanted to thank God had he dared. A wild cry of
distress woke him from death. It sounded far, far away, but he thought
it was almost like his own voice.

He opened his eyes and he saw moving lights around him. He looked for
his grandmother, but she was gone. He was lying on the straw-covered
floor of another church, and around him were groans and shrieks and
blood and dying men. He closed his eyes again. A shadow fell over him.
The old woman from Dinant stood bending over him and looking at him.
Since that day she had never left him; night and day she was there at
his side.

"Did you see anybody as you came?" he whispered with a shudder. "For
God's sake stay with me; she will come back if you go away. Don't go
away; for God's sake stay with me!"

He lay there timidly fumbling about with his hand in search of the
Doctor's, as if afraid he might not be allowed to hold on to his hand.
He was sinking rapidly. His eyes were growing dim.

"Look!" said the Doctor, pointing down the side aisle towards the altar.
"Look! your grandmother has come back! Look! she is there in her white
cap and her black shawl kneeling on her old knees in her usual place!"

He raised his head eagerly and stared with his dim eyes towards the
altar.

"It is getting so dark," said he, "I cannot see!"

"Look! she is lighting a candle to show you the way! Now she is kneeling
again, don't call her! She is praying for you! Can't you see her now?"

He tried to raise his head once more. "The candle, the candle, yes, I
see the candle, the . . . Grannie! Grannie!" he called almost with the
voice of a child. "Grannie!" he whispered again quite gently, so as not
to disturb her whilst she was praying.

He lay there silent for awhile, looking steadfastly at his grandmother.
His wild features grew soft and still, and big tears rolled down his
cheek.

He had not suffered enough. Once more the horror of the past gripped at
his weary brain, once more he turned with fear-filled eyes towards the
Doctor.

"Do you think I am going to hell?" he whispered with awe.

"No," said the other. "I believe God is listening to your grandmother's
prayers and that He will have mercy on you and let you go to heaven."

He looked at his grandmother again. A few moments later the terror went
out of his eye and such a peace fell over his anguished face that the
Doctor believed he was right.




  IV


The old village Doctor, worn out by his long watch, had consented to let
his young colleague take his place for the night, and Josephine had also
been persuaded to go home for a little rest. The two nuns sat already
huddled together in their usual place fingering their rosaries, and
Anatole was to share the night watch with the Doctor and call the Cur
in case of need. The Doctor had noticed that a mattress had been brought
over from the Presbytery and placed in a corner of the sacristy, and he
had seen Anne, the Cur's old cook, come and put bread, cheese, and
grapes, and a flask of wine on the table under the ominous cupboard.

The nuns lit the candles on the altar and a couple of oil lamps in the
side aisles. Kneeling before the Madonna's shrine Soeur Philippine read
out the prayer for the night:

_Priez pour nous pauvres pcheurs maintenant et  l'heure de notre
mort!_

It grew darker and darker in the church.

With a small oil lamp in his hand the Doctor went his round. Now and
then a shrill shriek of pain or a deep sigh pierced the gloom, and
terror spoke to him out of wide-open eyes, and the desperate grasp of a
hand implored him for help.

Night came at last with its blessed hush of silence.

He bent over the white faces on the floor, and as often as not he did
not know where this silence meant sleep and where it meant death.

Some of them looked as if they did not know it themselves, as if unaware
that their sleep was the sleep of eternity. The _luthier_ lay there with
the crucifix in his hands, calm and serene as if listening to the
vibrating voice of the beloved violin his long, delicate fingers had
just moulded out of some piece of dumb wood. The other, who had been
lying there for three days and nights staring out of his darkness for
the sun to rise at last, now looked as if he could see better than
anybody else, as if he saw straight into heaven. Close by lay
Josephine's boy hero on his white sheet, immaculate from pollution and
blood, immune from bullets and wounds, beautiful and flower-crowned like
a young god!

"Where is the German officer who stole the greatcoat from the soldier
next to him?" said the Doctor to the hunchback.

"I have not heard his cursed voice for awhile," said Anatole, taking
the oil lamp in his hand and leading the way to the side aisle. He lay
there the last in the row close to the side entrance. His marble-white
forehead was high and clear, his strong features were manly and bold,
and his wide-open, still eyes looked straight and fearless at his
accuser.

"I do not believe that story about the greatcoat," said the Doctor to
Anatole.

       *     *     *     *     *

The two bloodshot eyes under the bundle of bandages opened as the Doctor
bent over the Bavarian giant.

"Thank God you have had a little sleep! Now we are just going to cleanse
your mouth and syringe your throat from all that nasty stuff which is
choking you. If you lie very still whilst I do that you are going to
have a drop of wine and water like last time--or would you rather have
some milk?"

The nun whispered that there was none, but luckily the Bavarian had
already chosen the wine and water, according to how the Doctor read his
eyes.

"Wasn't I right that you preferred wine and water? There, you see that I
can understand by your eyes what you want to say, so it is quite
useless for you to try to speak, which is very bad for you. I understand
you and you understand me, and that is all we want--isn't that so?"

The giant nodded, and his eyes twitched with the pain as he did so.

"Don't nod, I know you just wanted to say you are pleased you have found
a man you can talk to like this, and if you are very patient and still
while I put that tube down your throat, I will tell you what you and I
are going to do to-morrow morning after you have had another snatch of
sleep."

The eyes signalled that they wanted to know at once.

So the Doctor told him that they were going to help each other to write
a letter home to tell his wife he was getting on quite well and would
soon be home again. The giant nodded so that the whole bundle of
bandages shook, and the eyes half closed with pain.

"I told you not to nod," said the Doctor as severely as he could, and
the eyes begged pardon at once.

"Won't he suffer too much to have that hard tube down his throat again?"
said the nun timidly.

"No, he will stand it much better this time, and he longs besides for a
little water down his burning throat, and he badly needs a few drops of
wine too. Try to get us some milk for to-morrow if you possibly can.
That he is still alive means that he intends to make a hard fight, and
he will let us do with him anything we want. He is as docile as a lamb,
and he will go off to sleep again as soon as we have cleansed his throat
and fed him a little."

"How can you make him go to sleep so peacefully?" said the wondering
nun.

"I know no more than you how I can make him sleep, Sister, but I know
that I can do it," said the Doctor gravely.

       *     *     *     *     *

He had finished his round closely followed by the hunchback, who did not
seem to want to leave his side for a minute. Overpowered by fatigue and
almost faint from the terrible stench which rose like a deadly mist from
the floor, the Doctor sat down on the bench near the entrance door
looking into the starlit night for the dawn which seemed never to want
to come.

"It does my eyes good to look at the stars," said he.

"Will this night never come to an end!" groaned the hunchback.

"What's the matter with you, Anatole? You look quite ill, and you are
shaking all over."

"Did you see how he stared at me? I can't get over those dead eyes!"
said the hunchback, his voice trembling with fear.

"Why don't you go home for a couple of hours' sleep? There will be
plenty to do for us all to-morrow, and I can manage quite well here with
the two nuns."

"I dare not go out in that black night," said Anatole; "for God's sake
let me stay with you till it gets light, if it ever will. I have,
besides, nowhere to go to. Don't you know that my shop was knocked down
by a shell, and my wife was killed on the spot?"

"No, my poor Anatole, I did not know, or I would not have told you to go
home. Of course you stay with me; I am very glad to have you here. I
don't feel, either, as if I wanted to be here alone."

In order to distract Anatole from his gloomy thoughts, the Doctor then
began to ask about the last days' fighting around the village. Anatole
told him how the battle had been raging all around them for several
days, how during a whole afternoon shells had been falling over the
village, how though outnumbered by five to one a battalion of their men
had held the bridge-head for the whole day.

"When orders were given to retreat, the Boches had already succeeded in
blowing up the bridge, and the whole battalion was massacred. Our troops
made a last stand on the ridge of scattered pines up there overlooking
the village; you can see there are hardly any trees left now, and the
whole slope was thickly covered with wood before. At daybreak the Boches
made a furious bayonet charge and there was a desperate hand to hand
fight, but they were repulsed. At noon they began to shell the hill
again until there was hardly one of our men left alive. Nobody in the
village went to bed that night. We expected the Boches to come at any
moment; but they never did, or I should not be here to tell the tale.
They kill everything, women, children, and cripples. The next morning a
wood-cutter came down and told us that the whole wood was full of dead
lying in heaps one upon another, and that he had found a soldier still
alive outside his hut. He had crawled there during the night, and he
said he was sure there were others still living among the dead. We
improvised some sort of stretchers, and I went up there at once with the
Cur and the Doctor and the few old men still remaining in the village.
During that day and the following night we carried down, I think, nearly
two hundred men who the Doctor said were still alive, although most of
them looked quite dead, and many were actually dead when we got them
down here, and many have died since. I don't think there are more than
about half of them here now. We also found several Boches alive. We
wanted to carry down our men first, but both the Cur and the Mayor said
we must take them in turn as we found them. I wish we had not done as we
were told; if it had not been for that, poor Jean would not have been
lying there now amongst all the dead Boches. I shall never dare to tell
the truth to Josephine, for she will never forgive me. Jean's body was
one of the last we found. It was I who found him with a bayonet thrust
clean through his chest. When I came back to fetch his body the others
had already buried him by mistake. The Mayor had said that all the dead
must be buried the same night, and they had all been heaped together in
the big abandoned trenches and earth shovelled over them. I shall never
dare to tell Josephine the truth, for she will never forgive me. Maybe
it is not so in your country, but with us our women folk want to know
the spot where their sons are lying and want to put a cross and some
flowers on their graves. And poor Josephine will never know where to put
her flowers and where to pray, for the whole wood is full of dead, and
there are all those Boches amongst them, and nobody knows where Jean
lies. He was everything to her and he was so good to her. And if you
knew what a fine lad he was, tall and strong like his father and with
his mother's big brown eyes. She will never forgive me, I know she
won't."

He sat silent awhile. His restless eyes kept wandering round the dark
church and suddenly stood still, staring fixedly towards the corner
where Josephine's candle was burning.

"Do you see that candle? Do you know who killed Jean?" he whispered
suddenly.

"No," said the Doctor with unsteady voice.

"It was that young Boche she has been nursing night and day who killed
her son," said he fiercely. "Jean was lying under a tree a little way
from the others. The bayonet had entered his left side near the heart,
and the point was sticking out under his right arm-pit. The Doctor said
he must have been killed instantaneously. The Boche lay beside him in a
pool of blood with both his hands still on the butt-end of his rifle.
The Doctor said I must pull out the bayonet, but my hands shook so that
I could not do it. The Doctor said he could not do it either, so I had
to do it. As I took hold of the rifle the Boche grabbed at it and we saw
he was still alive. He had been shot through the chest the same instant
he thrust his bayonet through poor Jean. The Doctor said the bullet had
pierced both his lungs near the heart, and that he had lost so much
blood that it was a marvel he was still alive. Both the Cur and the
Doctor said it was not right or Christian to leave him there, so we were
made to carry him down first, and when Pierre and I came back for Jean
they had already buried him. I shall never dare to tell Josephine the
truth, for she will never forgive me."

       *     *     *     *     *

"Listen, Anatole," said the Doctor. "I see you are all right again and
don't mind sitting alone for a few minutes. I just want to go outside
the porch for a moment and smoke a cigarette. You remain sitting where
you are and call me at once if somebody wants me."

He went out of the church and stood for a long while in the middle of
the chausse. He felt as if he could not understand, would not
understand, and as if he wanted to ask for an explanation. He looked up
to the stars that had explained to him so many riddles, but their cold
glitter flashed no message to his dark thought. He looked towards the
Eastern hills for some light to come to his anguished soul, but there
was no sign of any dawn. Were they, then, all blind, those shining eyes
overhead, or how could they look so indifferently on all the wounds, all
the tears, and all the horror of the night? Was there, then, no pity in
the sun that was soon again to purple yonder hills with blood, soon
again to light the track for Death to stalk his victims from valley to
valley, from cliff to cliff? What had this fair world done to be thus
torn asunder by the sinister birds of prey of evil, what had these poor
men done to be driven to murder those they were meant to love!

       *     *     *     *     *

A sound of unspeakable terror came hissing through the poplars along the
chausse, splitting the darkness with lightning speed as it flew past
him. A terrific blast of air lifted him off his feet and hurled him
senseless against the wall.

       *     *     *     *     *

The sharp pain in his head roused him at last. He got on his feet and
tried to walk, but his knees shook so that he had to lean against the
wall to avoid falling. Holding on with both hands to the wall he dragged
himself to the porch.

Stumbling over heaps of brick and plaster and broken glass he staggered
into the church.

The nave was dark, but early dawn lit up the choir. On the steps which
had led to the high altar, stood the priest in his chasuble celebrating
morning Mass in his ruined sanctuary. Tall and erect his figure stood
out against the reddening sky. "_Gloria in excelsis Deo!_" came from his
lips amidst the moan from the straw-covered floor.

_Gloria in excelsis Deo!_

As he lifted the chalice over his head the sun rose through the broken
vault of the apse to reveal to the day the dark deed of the night.




  II




  V


They came. Preceded by a couple of dusty motor-cyclists with carbines
slung upon their backs hunter-fashion, they entered the village at an
easy trot, tall and strong on their magnificent horses, their pennons
floating in the breeze and the sunlight gleaming on their lance-tips.

The Mayor in his tricolour scarf, with the Cur at his side, stood in
front of the church, but no notice seemed to be taken of them as the
Uhlans rode past. Five officers, all wearing the Iron Cross, followed in
the rear, and dismounting, one of them saluted stiffly and informed the
Mayor in quite good French that he and his officers were to be billeted
in the Presbytery and that the Mayor was to provide within two hours
food for the men and forage for the horses. The Mayor answered that all
eatables and forage had been requisitioned for the retreating French
troops, that there was hardly any food left for the few old men, women,
and children remaining in the village, and that all the hay had been
used to lay under the wounded in the church.

"I give you six hours," said the officer.

"How many wounded have you got in there, and are there any officers
amongst them?" asked another. "I will come and inspect them in half an
hour; see that the doctor in charge is there to receive me."

They saluted and all five leisurely entered the Presbytery.

Punctually half an hour later two officers followed by an orderly came
to the church.

"Are you in charge of the ambulance?" said one of them to Doctor Martin,
noticing the brassard round his arm.

Before the Doctor had time to explain their terrible situation to his
colleague--for he had by now realized that he had a German army-surgeon
before him--the two officers had already begun their inspection.

"Show me the officers first," said the surgeon.

He pulled off their blankets, giving them each a rapid glance, and then
passed along the row of soldiers, shrugging his shoulders significantly
as he looked at each of them.

"Nothing for you, my dear Adalbert," said he in German, turning to the
officer at his side.

"Where is the General?" he asked abruptly. He was told there was no
General amongst the wounded.

"I know your commanding General was badly wounded up in that wood. Where
has he been taken to? Where is your nearest clearing hospital?"

He got no answer.

"You won't say?" insisted the German.

"No."

"I fear you will go away from this place with an empty bag, my dear
Adalbert," said the surgeon to his comrade. "Not one of these people is
worth your trouble, not one of them would reach the frontier alive, they
are all as good as gone. As for the village, there are only some old
women and children left as far as I could see--unless you want to bag
that hunchback who was hanging about outside the church," he added
laughingly.

"How much chloroform have you got?" asked the surgeon.

"None, and no medicine, no disinfectants, and, as you can see for
yourself, no dressing-material either."

"What a show! And what a stench, eh!"

"_Kolossal!_" replied Adalbert, holding tightly to the handkerchief over
his nose.

"Indeed they have had a narrow escape," said the surgeon, looking
towards the choir. "Had the shell struck the church only a few yards
higher up the main vault would have fallen in and the whole fabric would
have crumbled like a pack of cards and buried them all."

"Or one of those big wooden rafters might have caught fire and burnt
them alive," suggested Adalbert. "Anyhow it is not bad as it is at ten
miles range," said he, examining the broken vault through his monocle.
"I am sure those old walls are over two mtres thick. They talk the
whole time at the top of their voices of their famous '75's, but they
are nothing but toy pistols compared to our long range guns! When I was
at Potsdam . . ." He stopped short as he noticed the Doctor's eye upon
him.

In a futile attempt to be polite he continued in French, turning to the
Doctor:

"I was just saying to my comrade how lucky it was that the shell struck
so low. Reading about it in a newspaper nobody would believe in such
luck--a twelve-inch shell making a hole as big as a transport waggon,
smashing the high-altar and passing clean through the nave out of the
rose window over the porch, without doing any damage. It is very
interesting. When I was at Potsdam . . ."

"Were you in the church when the shell struck?" asked the surgeon.

"No, I was standing outside in the middle of the chausse, and the shell
must have passed only a few mtres over my head, judging from the height
it struck the wall."

"You must be born under a lucky star," complimented Adalbert, "and not
even your eyes blown in. It is most interesting."

"Was anybody killed in the church?" asked the surgeon.

"No, they were all covered by falling plaster and broken glass--you can
see there is not a single pane left in the windows--but none of our men
were killed. They are evidently all born under the same lucky star as
I."

"It is to be hoped that in the state of collapse they all are in they
did not even realize their danger," said the surgeon.

"Quite so, they have nothing more to fear from life, they are safe under
the protection of approaching death."

"I am very glad to hear it," said Adalbert politely. "It was one of
those unfortunate accidents unavoidable in war. It must have been a
stray shot whilst our battery was getting the range--I suppose you know
that Fort Vendme was bombarded just before daybreak. I hope you
understand that we don't bombard churches."

"I thought you did," said the Doctor. "I was at Rheims."

The surgeon bit his lip.

"I wish you could help us to get a proper bandage and a drainage-tube
for the Bavarian soldier over there," said Doctor Martin, with a
superhuman effort to keep his nerves in hand.

"Why didn't you tell us you had a German here?"

"You have not given me time to tell you anything," answered Doctor
Martin.

The surgeon looked unmoved at the terrible wound, and sent the orderly
to fetch his instrument case and necessary dressing material, talking
the while on indifferent matters with his comrade without saying a
single word to the wounded man.

"_Potzdonnerwetter!_ There he brings me the wrong scissors again!"
shouted the surgeon, as the orderly with a stiff salute handed him the
instrument case. "And what the devil am I to do with these two small
rolls of bandages for a man who has his whole head almost blown off! And
do you call this a drainage-tube! You d----d fool!"

"Damn you!" said Adalbert.

"It is no good wasting our time with this confounded ass," said the
surgeon, throwing the rolls of bandages at the orderly's head. "I shall
have to go myself to fetch what I want or I shall never get it! I shall
be back in a minute. Promise, my dear Adalbert, not to talk any
nonsense," he added in a low voice in German as he walked out of the
church, followed by the orderly, who looked quite placid and
unconcerned.

"So you were at Rheims!" said Adalbert to the Doctor. "I must say I envy
you having been there. It must have been a wonderful sight to see the
huge cathedral in flames, one of those sights one can never forget."

"Never!" said the Doctor.

"Pray pardon me," said Adalbert, looking at the other through his
monocle, "may I ask what that red ribbon is on your tunic? I am very
much interested in decorations. Surely it is not, it cannot be, the
Legion of Honour?"

"I daresay the name sounds unfamiliar to your ears, but that is what it
is called."

"Really! I did not know it was so easy to get the Legion of Honour,"
explained Adalbert. "I thought it had been invented as a sort of
equivalent, I mean substitute, for our famous Iron Cross; but with us,
of course, this glorious decoration is only awarded on rare occasions
for high personal valour in serving the Fatherland or for conspicuous
gallantry--or both," he added, nonchalantly toying with his Iron Cross.

"Isn't that rather a good picture?" said Adalbert, staring through his
monocle at an old Madonna over the side altar. "I am sure it is German;
it looks like a Drer."

"Flemish late seventeenth century, I should say," rejoined the Doctor.

"Why play with words," laughed Adalbert. "Flemish or German is all the
same now. You must have very good eyes to see the date it was painted in
this dim light," he added wittily.

"Yes, I have very good eyes; they are the best thing I have."

"I am sure it is a valuable picture; pity it is so large!" said Adalbert
meditatively. "We are very fond of old pictures in Germany. When I was
at Potsdam . . ." He suddenly grew very pale and put his handkerchief to
his mouth. "I think I must have some fresh air," he said,
apologetically. "I am not feeling very well. Let us continue our
conversation outside the porch till my comrade comes back, if you do not
mind. I like to talk to you."

The Doctor, who had by now classified his man as a rare and precious
specimen well worthy of further study, followed the German with a
twinkle in his eye. Leaning against the door Adalbert breathed the fresh
air with evident delight.

"I am all right again," said he.

"So glad," said the Doctor, seating himself on the bench.

"I suppose you know who I am," said Adalbert, placing himself before the
Doctor.

"I have no idea."

"I am _Graf Adalbert von und zu Schoenbein und Rumpelmayer_," announced
the German. "Pray be seated," he added, with a benevolent wave of the
hand. "My name must be known to you."

"Would you mind saying it again and a little slower," begged the Doctor,
lighting his cigarette. "Ah! yes, of course, Rumpelmayer. I have often
had tea at Rumpelmayer's, both in London and in Paris, such good tea and
such excellent cakes! A very good business, I am sure! Any relation of
yours?"

Adalbert blushed terribly.

"Our family name is closely connected with modern German history,"
announced Adalbert solemnly. "My father, His Excellency _Graf Huldimg
Adalbert von und zu Schoenbein_, was _Oberkchenmeister_ to his Imperial
Majesty William I."

"My name is Doctor Martin," said the Doctor, "my father . . ."

"Ah! Now I understand the feeling of sympathy I felt for you from the
first, and that vague air of distinction I did not fail to notice in
your appearance; of course you are of German origin, your name is pure
German, and what is more you are the bearer of an old name, my dear
Doctor _von_ Martin. You bear the illustrious name of one of the
Generals of Frederick the Great, and there is also amongst the civilians
our famous Martin Luther . . ."

"Sorry to have to correct you, Graf Rumpelmayer"--Adalbert frowned a
little--"but I have never heard of any German ancestry of mine, and
there is no handle to my name; it is plain and simple Martin. My father
. . ."

"I beg your pardon," said Adalbert; "it is of course force of habit that
makes me add that so significant little prefix to the names I generally
mention, all my friends being noblemen."

"My rather was a blacksmith," said the Doctor.

Adalbert looked round, horrified lest the sentry should hear them.

"Never mind, Martin, who your father was," he said bravely. "I am glad
to see that his son has nevertheless succeeded in making himself an
honourable position in life--of course, you could never have become a
German officer. To go back to what we were saying," he went on, "I am
glad you mentioned Rheims. Here we have again an example of what I so
appropriately called an unavoidable accident of war. I am aware that a
great deal of fuss has been made about this accident by the hostile
press, and I have thought a good deal about it. Luckily for us we are as
innocent with regard to the bombardment of the cathedral of Rheims as we
are with regard to the disturbance we unhappily caused you and your
wounded last night in this little church. Our conscience is quite clear.
Civilians cannot understand that the position of a battery is perforce
determined by the formation of the surrounding country. The unfortunate
situation of the cathedral in the very firing line of our heavy guns
made it unavoidable that the old building should receive a scratch or
two from the claws of the German eagle--a rather striking metaphor, it
you allow me to say so. Besides, Gothic architecture has had its day,
and, as the _Frankfurter Zeitung_ so cleverly pointed out, the
disappearance of these old monuments will only hasten the birth of new
and astounding creations of German genius and _Kultur_ far
outdistancing these well-meaning efforts of bygone times.

"Wait till you see our new cathedral in Berlin," Adalbert went on
enthusiastically. "I shall never forget the majestic impression it made
upon me when I saw it the day of its consecration. It was consecrated by
the All-Highest, who made a stupendous speech . . ."

"What!" exclaimed the Doctor.

"I say it was consecrated by the All-Highest, and never has his Imperial
voice sounded more omnipotent and sublime than that day."

"Well I never . . ." said the Doctor.

"I must say I like to talk to you, Martin," said Adalbert. "I was
reading the other day in Bernhardi . . ."

"You read a lot?"

"I am always reading."

"Doesn't too much reading interfere somehow with your thinking?"

"Thinking!" exclaimed Adalbert. "A German officer has to act and not to
think; our thinking is done by our General Staff, which has been called
so aptly the brain of the army."

"And what about your feeling?"

"We don't feel anything. Clausewitz says that it deteriorates the
discipline of an army, and besides it sets a bad example to the men."

"How is it that you do not belong to the General Staff?"

"That is a question I have often asked myself; but I hope I shall one
day."

"So do I," said the Doctor fervently.

       *     *     *     *     *

"What a lovely idyllic country this is," said Adalbert, looking out over
the smashed house-tops of the little village at his feet towards the
devastated ridge of scattered pines, down to the river with its blown-up
bridge and a black cloud of smoke slowly drifting across the valley from
Fort Vendme in flames. "What a charming landscape; there is something
truly German about it. I have had the good fortune to explore this part
of France under the most favourable conditions," Adalbert went on. "You
know there is nothing like visiting a new country on horseback. I must
say I do not wonder the French like their country. So do we. Good food,
excellent wine, and these stately chteaux so conveniently scattered
about for our billets, so home-like and comfortable, so abundantly and
thoughtfully provided with all that makes life worth living. Yes,
indeed, life would be ideal here were it not for one single drawback we
all feel very keenly, though I hope it is only a temporary evil. You
know the people here do not like us; it is useless to try to shut one's
eyes to this regrettable fact. We Germans do not dislike the French, in
fact we rather like them. My detachment has just been on a punitive
expedition to several small places round here, and I must say that
everywhere I was painfully impressed by the sullenness of the
inhabitants. Our attitude towards the French has invariably been
correct. Look at me, for instance. I think I may say, without boasting,
that you can look upon me as a typical German officer . . ."

"I wish to goodness you were!" exclaimed the Doctor, completely off his
guard. "I wish to goodness you were, for if so the war would be over in
a month."

"I thank you sincerely, Martin, for these words," said Adalbert
solemnly; "it does one good to be appreciated by a loyal adversary. I
was saying look at me and answer me this question: Have I not treated
you, who after all I must look upon as an enemy, with unfailing tact and
forbearance; have I not candidly avoided touching on any of the topics
which might hurt your feelings; have I not shown you my sympathetic
interest in the inconvenience we unfortunately caused you last night in
this little church; have I not, in one word, behaved towards you in the
manner you would expect of a Prussian officer and a German gentleman?"

"You have indeed," said the Doctor.

"I thank you, Martin; I thank you. I must say I like talking with you.
Well, Martin, I have behaved in exactly the same way to everybody I came
across since I entered France--to those few of my own class as well as
to those of yours. And what have I gained by my urbanity? You must
realize my feelings of bitterness, not to say painful resentment, when I
tell you that so far you are the only person who has understood my true
nature; who has listened to me without malice and has been impressed by
my arguments. That is why I like to talk to you, Martin; I tell it you
frankly. Why do they all dislike us? We were told that French women were
rather coquettish, and not at all disinclined to a little flirtation as
a pastime. I cannot say that I find them so," said Adalbert gloomily.
"It is quite true they are pretty, and that there is a certain
coquettish air about them, but it is not to be depended upon; they are
not at all responsive. The other day I saw a rather attractive girl
standing in her doorway. As I went up to give her a kiss, she snatched,
with incredible rapidity, her _sabot_ from her foot and hurled it at my
face! Luckily for her it did not hit me--you know what the punishment
is for striking a German officer! Well, nine men out of ten would have
had this girl shot. I did nothing of the sort--I forgave her. All I did
was to have her house put on the list of those to be burned down, and as
we left I even gave her a pleasant smile as I rode past her in the
street."

"Did she smile at you?" asked the Doctor.

"Not at all," said Adalbert indignantly, "she shouted a word at me I
have never heard before, and which I cannot for the life of me
remember."

"I wonder what it can have been," said the Doctor, looking attentively
at Adalbert.

"They tell me the women of the upper classes are more amiable," Adalbert
went on, "but, alas! I never see any; they are all gone away. I assure
you, Martin, it makes one almost sad to wander about alone in those
magnificent chteaux, to lounge in their luxurious drawing-rooms, to
sleep in their soft beds, to sort all their innumerable little trinkets
and souvenirs, to explore their wardrobes and drawers and handle their
lovely dresses and all the dainty secrets of an elegant Frenchwoman's
toilette. As one sits there alone packing some lovely _lingerie_ all
covered with real lace, a yearning comes over one too strong for words:
one feels that one was made for love as well as for war, and that one
could forgive the fair owner everything were she only to come back! Why
did she ever go away? She does not know what she has lost by her
absence!"

"She will know it when she comes back!" said the Doctor.

"Alas! it will be too late--too late! I shall already be gone. I shall
be in Paris!"

Overflowing with tenderness Adalbert sat silent, stroking his little
porcupine moustache.

"Why do you look at me like that?" he exclaimed, waking from his dreams.

"I was thinking about that word the girl with the _sabot_ said to you.
It suddenly struck me . . . wasn't it _crapaud_ that she said?"

"Yes, that's the word; how clever of you. What on earth does it mean?"

"It means a Toad," said the Doctor, rising from his seat.

But nothing happened.

"The vulgar insults of a peasant girl cannot reach Count von
Schoenbein," said Adalbert loftily. "I have forgiven her once and I
forgive her again. Paris! Paris!" he went on in rapture. "What a
fascination in the very name! Paris with its gay boulevards, its
theatres, its cafs-chantants, its Maxim, its Moulin Rouge--what a
place for a garrison! Do you know Paris well?"

"Yes, fairly well. I lived there for over ten years."

"I have decided to give you my card," announced Adalbert, handing with
an indescribable air of protection his card adorned by an enormous
crown. "You will find it both useful and agreeable to know a German
officer during your stay in Paris, and I shall be very pleased if I can
do anything for you."

"I understand there has been a certain delay . . ." said the Doctor.

"Yes, our solemn entry into Paris has been somewhat delayed," admitted
Adalbert, "and we know that it is the English that we have to thank for
this. I told you that we liked the French, but we have always hated the
English, and they have always hated us. To-day we hate them more than
ever for having dared to interfere with our determination to crush
France.

"Ah! perfidious Albion!" he burst forth with unexpected pathos, "how
haven't you cheated us; how haven't you deceived us! You made us believe
that you were fast asleep and would not hear the thunder of our guns
across the Channel, and behold the mere sound of tearing a scrap of
paper made you spring to your feet! You made us believe you had no men
fit to fight anything but niggers, and at your bidding forth comes a
whole army of polo players, clerks, and schoolboys, smilingly playing
the game of life and death on the fields of Belgium and France as coolly
as though playing a game of football or a cricket match on the lawns of
their club at home! But, mark my words, it is their last game they are
playing, these smiling youngsters in their ugly, dirty-brown khaki, who
have the impudence to go on smiling even when face to face with the
veterans of the Prussian Guard. Yes, it is brown now, their famous
khaki, but we will see to it that it will be dyed red before long!

"Listen to the voice of the poet! Listen to our great Lissauer, whose
Hymn of Hate is sung in thousands of homes in the Fatherland to-day, and
is recited in the schools by our children!"

"Fine!" said the Doctor, "I like it very much. I know it well; I have
often heard it sung in the London music halls.

"I have listened to your eloquent speech with great interest, Count
Rumpelmayer," the Doctor went on. "I take for granted that you know
Germany well, and that it is the true feeling of your country you have
laid before me. But when you speak of England's feeling towards Germany,
I believe you are on less safe ground. You have told me that the
English hate the Germans; but I venture to tell you that I do not
believe they do."

"Do you really believe they like us?" said Adalbert, his face lit up by
an unexpected hope.

"No, they do not like you; but they do not hate you. They loathe you."

       *     *     *     *     *

The surgeon was coming up the steps leading to the church, with the
orderly at his heels.

"Sorry I have been so long; I was delayed by the Major," said he with an
uneasy glance at the two men.

"You were quite mistaken about him," said Adalbert in a low voice in
German to his comrade as they walked into the church. "He is, of course,
rather common, as I saw at once by his looks, and he is rather dense,
but there is no harm in him. You are quite right that he showed some
inclination to be insolent when we spoke to him at first; but he climbed
down at once when I got hold of him. He soon found that he was no match
for me. He was immensely flattered by my talking to him, and you would
have been surprised to hear how he agreed to almost everything I said. I
am sure that as a matter of fact he likes us."

"My dear Adalbert," said the surgeon quite unceremoniously as they
walked up to the Bavarian's bed, "I have a strong suspicion that you
have again been making an ass of yourself."

The surgeon cleansed and disinfected the soldier's wound with
experienced hands, and with extraordinary rapidity and skill he applied
a proper dressing, whilst Adalbert climbed on to the side altar to take
careful measurements of the Madonna.

"Don't move, and don't try to speak," said the surgeon as he was leaving
the Bavarian, "for if you do you will bleed to death."

       *     *     *     *     *

"Poor woman!" said the surgeon, with a softness in his voice which his
colleague would not have thought natural to its register. "Is it her
son?"

"No, it is one of your men who died last night; but she could not have
nursed him more tenderly had he been her own son."

Poor Josephine stood beside the dead boy whose face she had covered with
a handkerchief--to protect him against their evil eyes, as she explained
afterwards. Adalbert started as he bent over the boy's delicate
features, eagerly examined the buttons of his tunic, and tearing open
the coarse shirt searched for the identity disc round his neck. Holding
up between his fingers a black silk ribbon with a little image of the
Madonna attached to it, he exclaimed in an angry voice:

"Who has taken away his identity disc and put this ribbon on him
instead?"

Josephine, very white in the face, said it was she who had put the
medallion round his neck; but that she had taken nothing from him.

"You have," roared the officer; "you are a thief. You have stolen his
identity disc with its chain, which you thought was of silver, as it
very possibly was, and very likely he may have worn something else of
value as well."

"I give you my word of honour that he had nothing round his neck. I
noticed it myself," said the Doctor sharply.

"Search her!" said the officer in German, turning to the soldier behind
him.

The Doctor put himself before Josephine.

"I forbid you to touch this woman," said he also in German to the
advancing soldier.

"You have no orders to give here," shouted Adalbert, crimson in the
face.

"And I have none to receive either," said the Doctor, rapidly losing
control over himself.

"That is what we are going to see," retorted the officer, putting a
whistle to his lips.

The surgeon took him by the arm, and turning their backs on the others
they spoke together in a low voice for a minute or two at the foot of
the Bavarian's bed.

"I give you till to-morrow morning to find the identity disc," said the
officer with a haughty look at Josephine, and putting his arm under the
surgeon's they walked towards the door. He turned round once more, and
looking sharply at the Doctor, said:

"Why didn't you tell us you spoke German? Have you already been in
Germany?"

"Since you were kind enough to inquire a moment ago," said the Doctor,
addressing himself to the German surgeon, "if anybody had been killed by
your bomb, I think I had better tell you before you go that as a matter
of fact one man was killed here. Unlike your comrade, I have so far
failed to discover anything interesting in the wreckage of this church,
but I admit that this particular case is rather interesting. I have not
been able to make a regular post-mortem examination, but what I have
seen confirms me in the opinion both my colleague and I had formed about
him before. He cannot have died from his wound, which was,
comparatively speaking, slight. Nothing but plaster and some broken
glass struck him. I should be glad to have your opinion about this
case," said he to the surgeon; "I wish you would have a look at him.
According to my opinion the man simply died of fright."

"An Englishman!" exclaimed the surgeon, looking with surprise at the
khaki-clad soldier, who lay there with his collar still turned up over
his ears.

"An Englishman!" chuckled Adalbert. "No, I do not think there is any
need for a consultation about the cause of this man's death. We quite
believe you have had ample opportunity to study these sort of cases, and
we accept your diagnosis as the right one. This is not the first
Englishman who died of fright when a German shell passed over him; nor
will it be the last, I am sure. You are quite right: it is indeed a very
interesting case!" he added with a fresh giggle, screwing in his monocle
to have a look at the hated foe, hated unto death.

"The colour and the material are well copied," said Doctor Martin,
pointing to the khaki greatcoat, "but the cut is deplorable. When the
war is over you will have to send your Dsseldorf tailors back to London
to improve their style. You are quite welcome to secure this man for
your 'bag'; he is not fit to be here, either dead or alive.

"You had better have a look at him," he added, pulling down the collar
which hid the face of the spy; "maybe he is an acquaintance of yours."

"Fuchs!" murmured Adalbert, and his jaw dropped.




  VI


Worn out by anxiety and fatigue, the Doctor sank down on the bench in
the sacristy. The long effort to keep himself in hand had taken away his
last strength, and the words of the German officer burnt like fire in
his weary brain.

He wondered how the surgeon had succeeded in bringing his irascible
comrade to his senses, and he tried to feel grateful to his colleague
for his intervention. He almost smiled as he remembered the only word he
had managed to overhear in their conversation at the foot of the
Bavarian's bed. Little did this odious German know, thought he, that by
calling Josephine's defender _der Englnder_, he had paid him what he
considered the greatest compliment of his life.

He began to wonder how the poor Mayor and the Cur were getting on, and
was just on the point of despatching Josephine for news when the nun
came and reported that the Bavarian was very restless and agitated.

The Doctor found him quite altered. The expression in his eyes was
altogether different and he no longer seemed to understand what the
Doctor said to him. His pulse was extraordinarily rapid, and it was
clear that the poor fellow was in a state of great excitement. He put
his trembling hands repeatedly to his mouth as if he wanted to speak,
and then pointed to the door. There was a fixed, determined intensity in
his eyes, and it was evident that those eyes had something to say. The
Doctor tried to concentrate all his thoughts upon reading their mute
message. His own brain was too tired, and notwithstanding all his former
boasting to the nun, he had to tell her that he knew no more than she
did what the man meant.

"He has been like that ever since the Germans left," said Sister
Philippine.

In vain the Doctor touched his eyelids, telling him he was getting so
tired and his eyelids were getting so heavy, heavy, and that he was soon
going to fall asleep. In vain did he order him with firm voice to close
his eyes. The eyes continued to stare wide open and wild at him with the
same intense fixity. In vain did he, as a last resort, remind him that
the German surgeon had said he must remain very still and quiet--this
last argument seemed to excite him still more, and a half-suffocated
groan issued from his lacerated throat. After a while the Doctor
reluctantly came to the conclusion that his presence seemed rather to
agitate his poor friend than to soothe him, and he thought it wiser to
leave him alone, hoping he would calm down from sheer exhaustion.

He had hardly had time to sink down again on the bench in the sacristy
when Anatole rushed in wild with excitement.

"_Ah! les assassins! les assassins!_" cried he, "they have murdered
Pierre. He was brought in by a patrol an hour ago; they found, sewn in
the lining of his waistcoat, a letter to the Commandant of the Fort, and
they said he was a spy communicating with the enemy, and they shot him
in the Square in front of his mother's house. _Ah! les assassins, les
assassins!_ Now they are going round searching every house for food.
Their Commandant says that if they don't get what they want the Mayor
will have to pay a ransom of five thousand francs to-morrow morning.
They have found a cask of wine in the cellar of the inn and they are all
getting drunk. The Mayor asked me to tell you he dared not go away and
begged you to speak to the German surgeon for him."

"Come quick!" called the nun from the door.

The Bavarian had torn away his bandage and blood was streaming from his
frightful wound. The Doctor bent over him, trying in vain to compress
the artery with his fingers.

"Save yourself! They are sending you prisoner to Germany to-morrow!" he
hissed out in a fearful effort to clear his throat from the invading
blood.

"Run for the German surgeon!" cried the doctor to Josephine. "No,
don't!" he called again before she had reached the door, as a torrent of
scarlet blood burst forth from the lacerated carotid artery.

"Thank you," said the Doctor, stroking him gently over the eyes. The
soldier looked steadfastly at him. They understood each other again,
these two. There was not even a struggle. The Bavarian closed his eyes.

"_Ah! le sang, le sang! Que Dieu punisse celui qui fait couler tant de
sang!_" cried Josephine.




  VII


Anatole had been despatched to ask the
Mayor and the Cur to come as quickly as
they could to talk matters over, and the
Doctor had thrown himself on the mattress
in the sacristy whilst waiting for them. His
head was weary and he felt as though he
could neither think nor act. What was he
to do?

The afternoon sun shone in through the
little window, and the glare on the white wall
made him close his tired eyes for a moment.

"_Have--you--already--been--in--Germany?_"
He started violently as he heard
the voice, and opened his eyes.

The room was quite dark, but for the little
oil-lamp on the table, and on the bench sat
the Mayor and the Cur talking in a low voice.

"I did not hear you come," said the
Doctor, springing to his feet.

"We did not want to wake you," said the
Cur, "you looked so tired. You have slept
like a child for a good half-hour but I am
afraid you were awakened by a nightmare."

"You have a long night's walk before you,
and you were well in need of the little sleep
you got," said the Mayor with his kind voice.

They said they were very sorry he was
leaving, but would not hear of any other
course. Everything was already arranged
for his start: provisions had been put in his
haversack and a boy was to take him a short
cut across the hills. They were to leave as
soon as it was still in the Presbytery, and he
ought to reach St. ----, still believed to
be held by the French, early next morning.
He said he felt almost ashamed to leave his
two kind friends and those poor wounded in
the church.

"You know well that in a day or two there
will not be one of them left there," said the
Mayor, "and as to us two old men, they
won't do any harm to us."

"We are in God's hands," said the Cur.

"And Josephine?" asked the Doctor.

"I have already sent word to my wife
she is to sleep in our house, and stay with us
as long as they are here."

Seeing his hesitation, the Mayor took out
of his pocket a sealed envelope and said in a
low voice:

"It is of the utmost importance that this
letter from the Commandant of Fort Vendme,
which was brought to me an hour ago
by an old woman, should be delivered as soon
as possible to the General in command. I
have nobody to send; you know what has
happened to poor Pierre, and God knows
what has become of the two messengers I
sent before. Will you undertake to deliver
the letter?"

This settled the question, and the Mayor
called out for Armand. A bright-eyed,
charming-looking boy appeared at the door.
After having ascertained that he was quite
familiar with the road, the Mayor told him
to go down to old Anne to get a good supper
and wait in the kitchen till he was sent for
without saying a word to anybody.

"Have you got a revolver?" asked the
Mayor.

"No, and I don't want one," said the
Doctor. "I have seen so much blood this
last week, and so many wounds, and so many
deaths, that I do not think I would feel like
using it even if it came to the worst. Besides,
as long as I wear this"--pointing to his
Red Cross brassard--"I prefer not to carry
arms. If I have to choose between the two
I believe I am safer with the brassard than
with the revolver. As for the boy, he is too
small to carry a weapon and I believe that
he also is safer unarmed."

"You are right as far as the boy is concerned,
but you are wrong with regard to
yourself," said the Mayor. "You know as
well as I do that the Germans do not respect
the Red Cross either on the arm of a doctor
or when flying over an ambulance. The
proofs against them now are too numerous
to leave any doubt as to their wanton violation
of the Geneva Convention. I saw with
my own eyes up in the wood a Red Cross
doctor lying dead with a bayonet through
his chest by the side of a soldier he was
evidently just attending to--he was still
holding a roll of bandages in his hand. As
to the Red Cross flag, it is not many days
since they shelled the ambulance in Rheims,
killing seventeen wounded and three nurses.
The building stands all by itself and was most
easily distinguishable with its big Red Cross
flag from Nogent de L'Abbesse, where their
battery was placed. We all know that
in modern artillery it is easy with map and
compass to bombard a town quite systematically
and drop the shell exactly where you
want it. It was the same with our village;
there were no troops here and only women
and children left. They dropped the shells
on us just the same for mere lust of murder
and destruction. That the church escaped
is no merit of theirs, for one of their shells
dug a hole four mtres deep in the cemetery,
and short of hands as we were we had to use
it as a grave for burying our first dead.

"You heard how I scolded Anatole for
abusing the Boches, but I can tell you that
I could have shot one of them myself, and I
am not a bloodthirsty man. Did Anatole
tell you? Well, I am glad he has kept his
word. I asked him not to tell it, as it would
only embitter our people still more. I have
read in the papers stories like this, but I
have tried not to believe them. I think I
had better tell it you, so that you may know
what the Boches are, or at least some of them.

"We found him lying under the willows
at the edge of the river; he had crawled
there to get water, I suppose. He was so
covered with blood and mud that it was
impossible to see anything of his uniform,
but he wore the Red Cross brassard on his
arm. I told Anatole he might be a doctor,
but I must say for the honour of our profession
that as I bent over his face I said to
myself that he was probably nothing of the
sort, not even an orderly, but that it might
be one of their usual devilish tricks to
deceive us. He was big and heavy of build,
with a round, close-cropped head; his face
was black with smoke, powder, and dirt;
he had very pale blue, almost white, angry
eyes, large ears, a thin, treacherous lip and
an enormous jaw--in fact, he looked the
brute he was. I admit that, helpless as he
lay there, he gave me a sensation of fear
from the moment I saw him. He had been
shot through the thigh and was bleeding
a lot, and the fingers of his right hand
were also shot away, luckily for us.
Anatole gave me his leather belt and
I wound it tightly round his leg to compress
the artery whilst we were waiting for
the stretcher to bring him down. He was
quite conscious, but did not seem to understand
our French. He muttered something
in German which we could not make out,
but we thought he wanted us to raise his
head, so we lifted him up and leaned his
back against a stone. It was evidently
what he wanted, for he nodded and grinned
as we did so. I noticed that he was fumbling
about with his left hand as if in search of
something, but I could not make out what
he wanted. I was kneeling with my back
towards him, and Anatole was holding his
leg whilst I was putting on the bandage.

"The bullet passed just over my head.
He was still pointing the revolver at us when
Anatole snatched it from him. I have never
been so near death, and I must say that it
fairly took the wind out of me. I had
hardly time to realize what had happened
when another shot rang out and Anatole
let fall the smoking revolver from his hand.

"He had shot the Uhlan clean through
the head and the brain was all over his face.
Of course, Anatole was wrong to take the
law into his own hands, but surely the man
deserved his fate. I suppose he knew
that he was liable to be shot before any
court-martial for having been caught with
the Red Cross on his arm and a revolver in
his pocket, and that he thought that he
might just as well have a go at us before."

"Are you certain he was not delirious?"
asked Dr. Martin.

"I wish I could believe that he was, but
I am sure he was as clear in his head as you
or I. He knew his business quite well; he
wanted us to raise him up in order to get
better aim at us."

"It is an ugly story," said the Doctor.
"I almost wish you had not told it to me."

"The sooner you know the truth the
better for you," said the Mayor. "The
truth is that these people are not the same
as we are; they are nothing but Huns and
barbarians."

"I now know," said the Doctor, "they are
not the same as we are. It has been more
difficult for me than for you to learn this
bitter lesson of the war; for me who have
lived in their country amongst righteous
men and kind-hearted women; who have
drunk their wine and sung their songs. I
know now that you are right, that they are
not the same as we. I have done with the
Germany of to-day, but not with the Germany
of the past, nor, I hope, with the Germany
of the future which will rise one day purified
and softened from its _Gtterdmmerung_.

"The country I was born in says it can
maintain its peace without the loss of its
honour, and be it so. But I am at war; for
the individual there is no neutrality between
right and wrong. Yes, I know now what
they are. I have read it in letters of flame
and blood in the proclamations of their
Generals on the blackened walls of your
peaceful villages. I have heard it cried out
in prayers and curses from the lips of their
victims. I have seen it in the burnt faces
of a little row of angels' heads amongst the
debris of the high-altar of the Cathedral of
Rheims.

"You call them Huns and barbarians, I
call them cool-headed, scientific criminals,
guilty of horrors which have not as yet got
a name in our language.

"Listen to what I saw not many days ago
in a house they had just hurriedly left.
Let me tell it you as I saw it, as I felt it,
with its small details and its great horror.
Maybe you will say I am sentimental, and
maybe you are right; I suppose I was made
so and it is now too late to mend.

"A broken-down motor-car of theirs
still stood before the garden gate. In the
hall stood two packing-cases ready for the
pictures already detached from the walls.
In the drawing-room the big Venetian mirror
was smashed to pieces, and there was not
one single chair that had not its legs broken,
its brocade ripped open. In the dining-room
the big table was loaded with empty
champagne bottles, and the floor was strewn
with broken glass and china and playing-cards.
In the bedroom of the mistress of
the house all the wardrobes and drawers stood
wide open, with all their contents flung in
heaps on the floor, dresses and cloaks of
muslin, silk and velvet, all torn to rags as if
some sort of savage satisfaction had been
derived from the harsh sound of the very
tearing. Two carefully sorted piles of
_lingerie_ lying on the table revealed the presence
of an officer--as usual the temptation
to secure fine underlinen had proved irresistible
to the head of the band.

"'_La chambre des enfants_,' said the old
caretaker as she opened the door to the
children's nursery on the top floor. The
room was large and airy, the walls were
white, and the setting sun shone in through
the big window facing the garden. Near
the door stood a rocking-horse on three legs
stripped of its saddle, its mane and tail
torn off, its back and flanks hacked by deep,
angry cuts from some sharp instrument.
In the corner of the room stood a large doll's
house with its red-tiled roof smashed in,
and half buried amongst the wreckage lay
its tiny inhabitants amidst all sorts of broken
toy furniture, diminutive chairs, sofas and
cupboards, lilliputian kitchen utensils and
crockery. On a low table under the window
stood a musical box all knocked to pieces.
In a child's swing sat a huge felt monkey
with outstretched arms, stunned by a violent
blow that had almost severed the head from
the body. The polished floor was strewn
with lacerated sheets of children's picture
books and dolls and toys of every description,
tin soldiers, mousquetaires, harlequins,
elephants, sheep, dogs, cats and rabbits,
motor-cars, aeroplanes, and captive balloons,
all smashed to atoms. The gaily coloured
prints on the white walls were splashed with
ink. Leaning against the pillows of a little
settee sat a big teddy bear with his stomach
ripped open. In a dainty brass bed with
blue curtains, well tucked up under her
embroidered counterpane lay a smart Paris
doll with her own baby doll clasped in her
arms, murdered in her sleep by a well-directed
blow which had battered in her face.
At the foot of the bed lay a gallant little
_Chasseur d'Afrique_ in his wide red trousers
and gold-braided tunic with both his arms
torn out of their sockets.

"Over the settee where the dead teddy
bear sat was a large picture of three lovely
children with long curls and delicate, refined
faces. Holding each other by the hand they
smiled happily upon their fairy world. On
the pale blue rug before the settee was the
big, dirty mark of an enormous foot.

"There is a name for the treacherous
invasion and the merciless pillage of a peace-loving
land, and thousands of arms are
raising the gallows where some day the guilty
shall swing. But what is the name for the
hatred that stole into this nursery, what is
the expiation that awaits the unclean
monster who came here to crush the laughter
of these three little children under his cloven
foot? How am I to classify the murderer
of a doll? What unknown power of darkness
led him here to this white room? Animal
instinct? Certainly not, for not even the
infuriated ape, sinister forerunner of primitive
man, would have simulated murder in
carrying out his work of wanton destruction!
Human instinct? Certainly not, for not
even the Hun would have destroyed the
little belongings of these fugitive children,
left by them in trust, in trust to what is
sacred to every living man.

"'Were they drunk?' I asked the old
caretaker.

"'No, I cannot say they were, at least
not the men. They all drank a lot, as you
may judge from the empty bottles all over
the house, but I cannot say they were
actually drunk. They did no harm to the
house until an hour before they left, when
they began to smash everything; there is
hardly a single chair left unbroken.'

"'Did they steal anything?'

"'The two miniatures of the great-grandparents
of Monsieur le Comte, said to be
very valuable, are missing.'

"'Where is the Count?'

"'He was dangerously wounded at Rethel
and Madame la Comtesse is with him. I am
her old nurse,' said she.

"'And these children?' I asked, pointing
to the picture.

"'They were taken out of their beds just
after midnight when the shell struck the
pavilion, and dressed hurriedly by me and the
English nurse. A second shell burst with a
horrible glare in the stable yard just as we
put them in the pony trap. They were not
at all afraid; they thought it was fireworks,
and they were quite happy because they
thought they were going to their mother.
They absolutely wanted to bring their
teddy bears, but there was no time. The
Countess had given orders to the nurse
that the children were to be taken to the
nuns at Ste Genevive in case of any danger,
but nobody dreamt then that the Germans
would come here. I didn't want them to go,
but the nurse said she must obey the
orders of Madame la Comtesse. It is a
good hour's drive from the village to the
Convent. I was so anxious, and I came up
here and sat in the nursery, where I felt as
if they were nearer to me. I sat looking
at their picture, when suddenly I thought I
saw a red glare on the wall. I rushed to the
window and my knees bent under me as I saw
the whole village in flames, and further down
the valley big fiery shells bursting over the
bridge and all along the road. I stayed
there till daybreak, praying God on my knees
to have mercy on my little children. In the
morning the son of our gardener came up
from the village and said everyone had fled
during the night and that hundreds had been
killed on the road by the falling shells. He
started at once on his bicycle for Ste
Genevive, but came back an hour later; the
Boches were holding the bridge and they
had shot at him as he tried to pass. He said
the whole sky was black with smoke in the
direction of Ste Genevive, and he had heard
that the town had been set on fire in the
night. In the afternoon the Boches came
here and took possession of the house; four
officers, all wearing the Iron Cross, and lots
of soldiers. I asked an officer for God's
sake to send somebody to inquire if the
children were safe with the nuns. He did
send somebody, and I could see he was
ashamed when he told me next morning
that Ste Genevive was in ruins and the
Convent had been destroyed by fire. I
begged him to help me to send a telegram
to Madame la Comtesse, but he said all the
wires were cut. He said it was a folly to
send the children away that night and that
no harm would have come to them
here.

"'Since then everybody in the Chteau
has been out in search of them, but nobody
has seen or heard anything of them, nobody
knows if they are dead or alive.'

"The sun had gone down and twilight was
falling over the nursery. I looked at the
three children on the white wall. A weird
sensation came over me that I knew these
three children, that I had seen them
somewhere before. Where had I seen these
faces with their long curls?

"'Where are you, my poor children?'
cried the old nurse, bursting into tears.

"'I shall never see my darlings any more,
my angels, my angels!'

"I looked at them again as she spoke.

"Suddenly I recognized them, as I heard
them called by their name. The same long
curls encircled their brows, but their faces
had become so white and grave in the fading
light of the day. It was the little row of
angels' heads from the Cathedral of Rheims
that looked at me from the wall of the
nursery."




  VIII


The Mayor opened the drawer in the table
and took out a five-chambered Browning
revolver. "The country swarms with Germans,
one never knows what may happen,
and if your hand is as steady as your head
is cool it will always help you to account for
five of them if it comes to the worst."

Yielding to the insistence of the Mayor the
Doctor reluctantly took the revolver and put
it in his hip-pocket.

The old Doctor had just begun to explain on
the map the road his colleague was to take
when Anatole came to say that a soldier was
at the door with a message that the Mayor
was wanted by the Commandant. He took
a hearty farewell of Dr. Martin, wishing him
God-speed in case he should not be able to
return before the start.

The Mayor having left, the Doctor took the
Cur aside and told him that he would
rather have Anatole than the boy as his
guide.

"You do not like Anatole?" said the Cur.

"Not particularly."

"That is why you prefer to take him?"

"Yes."

"Anatole is better than you think," said
the Cur, "but maybe you are right."

Anatole was delighted, and having successfully
passed a rapid examination as to his
knowledge of the road, he was sent down to
the kitchen to get something to eat and to
tell the boy he was not needed.

       *     *     *     *     *

The Doctor went into the church for his
last round.

The lugubrious work, delayed by all that
had happened, had been going on while he
was asleep in the sacristy, and the death-harvest
for the night and the day had been
gathered. The _luthier_, the blind soldier,
Josephine's boy, the gardener who was such
a hand at flowers, the Bavarian giant who
had given his life in exchange for a kind
word--they were all gone, these and many
others who had surrendered at last to the
Invincible Foe.

"Good-bye Josephine! I have only
known you for thirty-six hours, but I shall
never forget you! I feel as if I wanted to
give you something, Josephine, but I have
got nothing to give. This is no longer of
any use to me," said he, taking the brassard
from his arm and handing it to her. "If
ever anybody had the right to wear the Red
Cross it is you, Josephine; you have in any
case infinitely more right to wear it than I
have. I have learnt a lot from you, Josephine,
and I thank you for it!"

"How could you learn anything from me,"
said she, "I know so little, I can barely
read and write, and you know so much, you
know everything. Sister Philippine says
that you even know what one thinks."

"Yes, Josephine, now and then I do know
what one thinks," said the Doctor with a
smile. "I am not a soldier, and in no need
of an identity disc round my neck, but I am
badly in need of your prayers, so why don't
you give me that little image the German
threw back at you, and which you are now
holding between your fingers."

Josephine got quite red in the face.
"How did you know, how could you know?
I wanted so much to give it you, but I had
not the courage to tell you. How could you
know?"

"I did not know that I knew," said the
Doctor simply.

       *     *     *     *     *

Soeur Marthe sat fingering her rosary at
the little shrine near the door, lit up by a
solitary candle.

"Who is that candle for?" asked the Doctor.

"For the greatest sinner here," said the
nun. "He stands now before his Judge. His
heart was full of hatred, his hands were
stained with innocent blood; he needs our
prayers more than anybody else if God is
ever to forgive him his terrible sin."

"Yes, Soeur Marthe, he needs your prayers,
but whether he needs them more than anybody
else in order to be forgiven, is not known
to us. God judges not in the same way as
we do. He alone knows who is the greatest
sinner."

"He died with the name of the Evil One
upon his lips," said the nun.

"There is, I believe, a far greater sin than
that: to live and sin with the name of
God upon your lips. That is, I believe, the
only sin which cannot be forgiven. This
man dared not speak to God; he knew that
he had abandoned his God, and he believed
that God had abandoned him. It is this
fearful thought, the thought that God
has abandoned us, that we call Hell. There
is no other hell.

"All the rest is God's beautiful earth,
and the whole earth is all filled with His
presence. Under the earth sleeps the
spring amidst the seeds of the flowers to come,
and deeper down, under the roots of the
friendly trees, under the beds of the mighty
rivers and in the hollows of the cloud-capped
mountains, are nature's vast factories and
storehouses, where thousands of humble
lives are toiling night and day for the glory
of God. Over the earth are the stars, and
over the stars are still other stars, and over
them is Heaven. There is no room for hell
anywhere. It is in our darkest thoughts only
that the devil has his realm. No, Soeur
Marthe, this man won't go to hell; he has
already been there, and God in His mercy
has taken him out of it. He did not die;
it was the devil in him we watched dying
in that charnel-house."

"I do not understand," said Soeur Marthe
timidly. "I have never heard anybody
speak like that; I do not know if I ought to
listen to you. How can you not believe in
hell! Don't you know that even Our Lord
descended into hell to save us from our sins.
Are you . . . are you . . . a Protestant?"
said she, drawing back a little.

"Dear Sister, I do not know what I am,"
said he, "I only know that I believe in the
same God as you, and that I love your
Madonna."

"Don't you pray?"

"Alas! not so often, and not so well as
you, kind Sister. I used not to believe in
any other God than the God of Mercy. How
could I believe in the God of Wrath--I,
who have been forgiven so much and so
often? Now I have lived to learn to believe
that there is and must be a God of Vengeance
as well. I feel as if I could not live on if
I were to lose my faith in Him. Soeur
Marthe, if I were to pray to-day it is to Him
I would pray:

"_Stern God of Israel, whose voice amongst
the thunders and lightnings upon the Mount
made all the people that was in the camp
tremble! Why do you tarry? There is not
one of Your Commandments they have not
trodden under their feet, there is not one of the
gentle messages of pity Your Son gave to the
world that they have not scorned. Is there
not enough broken faith in their torn pledges
to You and to Man, is there not enough blood
on their hands? Are there not enough homeless
children calling out to their fathers, are
there not enough tears in the women's eyes?
You used to strike hard in the days of old,
avenging God of Judah, at the false prophets
who said their words were Your words!
Why do You remain silent now while they are
calling out that they are the Chosen People of
the Lord, while they are bringing down Your
temples in the name of their God who is not our
God, while they are wrecking Your altars with
the name of another Messiah on their lips,
a Messiah who cannot be Your Son who taught
us to love and to forgive!_

"_King of Kings! Why do not You let
the thunder of Your voice be heard once more!
Why do not You send down once more upon
our bleeding earth that Angel of Yours 'who
went out at night and smote in the camp of the
Assyrians an hundred four score and five
thousand, and when they arose early in the
morning behold they were all dead corpses'?_"

"God chooses His time," said the nun.

       *     *     *     *     *

The Doctor went back into the sacristy
and sat down on the bench beside the Cur,
waiting for the hour to start. All was still,
and the silence was only broken by the never-ceasing
moan from the church.

"I feel as if I ought not to leave these poor
dying men," he said.

       *     *     *     *     *

A roar of laughter rang through the night.

"Do you hear them?" whispered Anatole
under the window. "They are having their
supper in your dining-room. They are all
five sitting round the table in the midst of the
room; their faces are as red as turkey-cocks,
and they never cease to laugh except when
they empty their glasses at one gulp and put
them down on the table with a bang. They
all talk at the top of their voices and don't
hear anything. I crept up close under the
window; I was as near them as I am to you,
and could have heard every word they said
had I understood the Boche language.

"Do you want to see them?" said the hunchback
in an uncanny whisper, as a fresh roar
of laughter struck the Doctor's ears like the
cut of a whip across the face.

They walked cautiously over the grass,
and as they entered the garden gate he heard
his own voice say:

"Five, they are five."

"Hush!" whispered the hunchback.

They crept alongside the hedge and stood
still under a tree in front of the window.
The room was strongly lit up by half a dozen
candles on the table, laden with bottles and
the Cur's Christmas turkey in its midst.
Round the table sat the five officers, all young
and strong, their fares flushed with wine.

The last story must have been a good one,
for a terrific outburst of laughter shook the
window-panes. One of the officers stood up,
bowing with grotesque gravity as though
before an invisible large audience, and the
voice that had called Josephine a thief
began:

"When I was at Potsdam . . ."

Yells of _Hoch!_ and _Prosit!_ curtailed the
peroration, and the speaker sat down amidst
a fearful banging of instantaneously emptied
glasses.

Then another rose with a stiff bow and
with equal gravity the voice, that maybe an
hour before had ordered Pierre to be shot,
began:

"_Gott strafe England!_"

The Doctor looked on fascinated. Compelled
by an invisible force he drew nearer
and nearer till at last he stood motionless,
leaning against the window-sill. His eyes
stared wide open and still on the five men.
He heard their words as clearly as if he had
been in the room, but he no longer understood
their meaning.

One--two--three--four--five--yes, they
were five, just five. The candles on the table
were also five--why five? The buttons on
the surgeon's tunic were also five. Why just
five? The swords standing there in the
corner, were they four or five? Why didn't
they wear their swords? Why didn't they
have their revolvers in their leather belts?
Why didn't somebody come and tell them
quick to get hold of their revolvers? Why
didn't Anatole go and tell them?

"Why do you want them to fetch their
revolvers?" he heard a voice, his own voice,
say. "Do you think that Pierre had a
revolver to defend himself when they came
to kill him?"

Something sinister and evil flashed suddenly
through his unconscious brain like the
big shell that had passed him in the darkness
hurling death through the night. He felt
the same grip of unspeakable fear round his
throat, and with a violent effort he drew his
clenched hand from his pocket and sprang
out of the garden. As he opened the gate
the window was flung open and a rich and
melodious voice sang in the night Schubert's
immortal serenade:

  _Leise flehen meine Lieder_
  _Durch die Nacht zu dir,_
  _In den stillen Hain hernieder,_
  _Liebchen komm zu mir._
  _Flsternd schlanke Wipfel rauschen_
  _In des Mondes Licht, in des Mondes Licht._

"Where have you been?" asked Josephine
in the porch, anxiously scrutinizing his face.
"You are so pale."

"Where--have--I--been?" said he,
slowly repeating her words as if trying to
understand their meaning.

"Josephine, I have been in hell!" said
he, staggering into the church.

       *     *     *     *     *

The Cur and the Doctor sat silent on the
bench in the sacristy. The priest's head was
bent, and his eyes were fixed on the floor
where the nuns had reverently deposited the
broken limbs of the crucifix.

"They have killed your Christ," said the
Doctor bitterly. "Is God also dead?"

"How dare you speak thus," said the
Cur, lifting his head with shining eyes.
"Yes, Christ was put to death by the evil in
man, and His side was pierced by the soldier's
lance; but He has risen again to save the
world. God lives forever: His life has no
beginning and no ending. He is Eternity.
He is Life Itself. You and I will die, maybe
to-day, maybe to-morrow; but Life cannot
die--God cannot die. He is watching over
us as long as we live, and when we are dead
He is watching over us still. He is with us
now; it was He who stayed your hand . . ."

The other shuddered from head to foot.

"How did you know?" said he, wiping
the cold perspiration from his forehead. "I
did not know you were there."

"I stood by your side at the window."

"Did you . . . ?"

The two men looked at each other. The
priest's face was livid. He bent his head
again towards the crucifix on the floor.

"Did you . . .

?"

"Yes--may God forgive me," said the
priest.

       *     *     *     *     *

"The wind is rising," said the Cur, looking
out through the open window; "the stars
are coming out; the night will be cold and
clear."

"I am glad the stars are coming out, I
shall feel less lonely on the road," said the
Doctor.

"Listen to the wind sweeping down from
the hills and rushing through the poplars
along the chausse! It sounds like the voice
of a mighty river rolling on towards us."

"Are you sure it is the wind? It sounds
like . . ."

They heard rapid footsteps on the grass, and
Anne's voice called out under the window:

"They are off! The Boches are off!"

They rushed out and reached the porch in
time to see the five officers spring to their
saddles and gallop down the village street.

They stood still and listened.

The storm came thundering along, nearer
and nearer, gradually growing into a rhythmic
roar like angry waves breaking against the
rocks. Suddenly the night resounded with
the furious beating of thousands of horses'
hoofs against the hard pavement of the
chausse!

"Cavalry! Cavalry!" cried the Cur,
lifting his hands to heaven.

       *     *     *     *     *

The Mayor in his tricolour scarf, with the
Cur at his side, stood in front of the church.

"_Vive la France!_" he called out, as line
after line of stalwart cuirassiers galloped
past _ventre  terre_, their steel breastplates
glistening in the dark and their black
_crinires_ floating in the wind.

"_Vive la France!_" the men joyously called
back, leaning forward on their foaming
horses.

"Yes! _Vive la France!_"

       *     *     *     *     *

The Doctor went back into the church.

"No, nobody has stirred," said the nun,
"they are all just the same; they don't seem
to mind anything. The trooper over there,
whom you said would not live through the
day, just opened his eyes as the bugle sounded,
but he closed them again. The lance-corporal
is spitting blood, a whole pailful,
and it is all over his bed. Josephine is sitting
with him."

"_Ah! le sang, le sang! Que Dieu
punisse celui qui fait couler tant de sang!_"


  GARDEN CITY PRESS LIMITED, PRINTERS, LETCHWORTH


  =Transcriber's Notes:=
  original hyphenation, spelling and grammar have been preserved as in
    the original
  Page 4, "cur" changed to "Cur" [Ed. for consistency]
  Page 31, "Did you say seven?'" changed to 'Did you say seven?"'
  Page 42, 'must go there.' changed to 'must go there."'
  Page 87, "insisted the German" changed to "insisted the German."
  Page 93, "wave of the hand" changed to "wave of the hand."
  Page 93, "blushed terribly" changed to "blushed terribly."




[End of Red Cross & Iron Cross, by A Doctor in France (Axel Munthe)]
