Part 18

We folded the blankets and stacked them carefully. Some of them were clammy and slippery to the touch. Others were hard and stiff. The rank smell of stale, clotted blood was sickening.

The clothing we carried to the pack store, a large marquee, where we sorted it, putting great-coats, tunics and shirts on separate heaps. I was holding a shirt when I became aware of a tickling sensation across one hand. I hurriedly dropped the garment and lowered the candle so that I could see it distinctly. It was swarming with lice.

We walked out into the darkness and made for our own marquee. As we passed the prisoners' ward an orderly called out from inside:

"'Ere, just come in a minute. 'Ere's a Fritz been 'ollerin' out all the evenin'--come an' tell us what 'e wants."

We went in. The prisoners were lying on stretchers in two rows. Most of them were asleep, but one was tossing about and crying in piteous tones:

"Hab'ich noch'n Arm, oder hab'ich keinen?"

"'E's bin at it for 'ours, pore bloke. Arst 'im what 'e wants--I 'xpect it's somethin' ter do with 'is arm what they took orf early in the evenin'."

I asked the man what he wanted and noticed that his right arm had been taken off at the shoulder. He was silent for a moment and looked at me with haggard eyes. Then suddenly he wailed:

"Kamerad, sag mir doch--Comrade, tell me--is my arm still there, or is it gone?"

"He wants to know if he's still got his arm," I said to the orderly, who turned to the prisoner and exclaimed: "Arm bon, goot!"

"Aber ich fuehl ja nichts--But I can't feel anything--for God's sake tell me if it's still there!--Ach Gott, ach Gott, ach Gott."

He buried his face in his pillow and sobbed hysterically.

I explained to him that it had been necessary to remove his arm, but that he would live and be well treated and see no more fighting.

He turned round and stared at me and then shouted jubilantly:

"Jetzt weiss ich's--Now I know--thank God, I shall live, live, live. O du lieber Himmel, das Gluck ist zu gross."

He gave a deep sigh of relief and satisfaction and closed his eyes and turned on his side to go to sleep.

Somehow it seemed strange that there could be any happiness left in the world.

"Thanks awfully," said the orderly. "It must 'a' bin the uncertainty what upset 'im. I'm bloody glad yer came in. Yer've done 'im a world o' good. I took to the pore bloke some'ow--I allus feels pertickler sorry fur wounded Fritzes, I dunno why. I 'xpect 'e's got a missis an' kiddies just like meself.... Good-night!"

"Good-night," I answered, and added mentally:

"Your profession of soldier, the most degrading on earth, has not degraded you. You are engaged in the most infamous and sordid war that was ever fought, and yet you have remained uncontaminated--there is no honour or decoration in all the armies of the world good enough for you."

We entered our marquee and made our beds.

All at once I noticed how utterly tired I was both in mind and body. I crept under the blankets and closed my eyes and saw a vast confusion of red and yellow patches, of severed limbs and staring eyes and blue, distorted faces of suffocating men. They thronged the darkness in ever increasing numbers and then they arranged themselves into a kind of gigantic wheel that began to turn slowly round and round. And suddenly I became conscious of a grief so intense that it seemed almost like physical pain, but weariness soon mastered every other sensation and I fell into a dreamless sleep.

WALKING WOUNDED

"The war is doing me good as though it were a bath-cure."

(FIELD MARSHAL VON HINDENBURG.)

Some had dirty bandages round their heads. Some had their arms in slings. Others had hands so thickly swathed that they looked like the huge paws of polar-bears. Many were caked with mud and wore tattered uniforms. Some limped or hobbled along. Others could walk unaided. Some leaned heavily on our shoulders and some we had to carry on our backs.

As each one entered the waiting-room--a little wooden shed opposite the swing-doors of the operating theatre--we took off his boots and tunic and made him sit down in front of the glowing stove. From time to time an orderly would shout across from the theatre:

"Next man!"