Part 32

At length we completed his bandaging and I left Madame Guix to add the finishing touches and went to the kitchen where Soeur Laurent was standing over a huge range, ladling soup from two immense copper boilers. There were men, women and children holding out cups and mugs, a half-dozen dusty cavalrymen were skinning two rabbits in one corner, and as many other soldiers were peeling vegetables which they threw into another pot full of boiling water.

This was no time to ask permission. The poor sister was already half distracted by the demands of the famished refugees and combatants, so taking a ladle from the wall, I dipped into the pot and strained some bouillon into a few cups that I found in a cupboard. I intended giving this to our patients should they wake and call for drink, and I was just lifting my tray to go when a loud thumping on the front door made me set it down in haste.

I looked at Soeur Laurent, who was preparing to answer the summons, much to the dismay of the soldiers.

"I'll go," I called, and hurried out into the vestibule and down the wide white marble steps. As I threw back the huge oak door someone brushed past me, calling "Two men and a stretcher," and there in the brilliant moonlight I beheld the most ghastly spectacle I had as yet witnessed.

Thrown forward in his saddle, his arms clasped about the horse's neck, was the form of a dragoon. The animal that bore him had once been white, but was now so splashed with blood that it was impossible to tell what color was his originally. Both man and beast were wounded, badly wounded, and how they had come here was a miracle.

The alarm had reached the kitchen and hurrying forward, the troopers soon lifted their comrade from his mount and carried him in. A lance had pierced his thigh and the horse's flank, which meant that it had been a hand-to-hand fight, and the blood still flowing freely, proved that the combat was not an hour old!

Madame Guix and I were doing our best when the white face's of my notary and his wife appeared at the door of the dispensary.

"Madame Huard, we've come to tell you you must go!"

"Go?"

"Yes, it is two o'clock and the general who was quartered on us slept four hours and has gone. When leaving he warned us that the battle would be on here by morning. We who have a motor are safe, but you who have but horses must flee at once!"

"But I can't leave the wounded!"

"But you must. The worst that can happen to them is to be made prisoners--more than likely they will be carried away by one of our emergency ambulances. But think of all the young people who look to you for protection! You cannot desert them; you must go!"

I looked at Madame Guix.

"Go, Madame Huard, you must. You owe it to the others. None of you need me and I can be of service here, so if the sisters will keep me I'll stay."

Reluctantly I shook hands with my nurse, and hastened down the steps. Maitre Baudoin and his wife took leave of me at the comer, and I elbowed my way between the horses of a cavalry regiment, whose riders were sound asleep on the hard cobble pavement beside them.

On the further side of the square noisy rolling sounds told me that the artillery was crossing the city, and mounting a doorstep, I beheld battery after battery of the famous Seventy-fives clattering out of sight over the road we had come by in the morning. When I got down, I found my way blocked by the 18th Chasseurs a cheval, who, four abreast and lance in hand, were setting out for battle. They were anything but a beaten army--most of them were softly humming some popular song, while others were calmly filling their pipes and still others catching forty winks in their saddles. One or two I noticed wore no caps, and their heads were bound in blood-stained bandages.

There seemed to be no end to them and I was beginning to get anxious about our departure. Plunging my hand into my coat pocket I touched a piece of stale bread and a bit of chocolate, forgotten since the day before, and hunger having seized me, I began gnawing my crust.

"Say, sister, give us a bite," called one young chap from his horse as he passed.

"Are you really hungry?"

"You bet!"

Without hesitating I offered my crust.

"Hurray for the girl with the red scarf!" called another. "Come on with us. We'll make room for you." "We need a mascot," and other similar jolly phrases passed from mouth to mouth as gaily the flower of young France went forth to death.

When finally they had disappeared I rushed across the street to find George and Emile (H.'s messenger) engaged in a conversation with the driver of an army supply wagon drawn up within an inch of the bakery steps. Beside him on the seat sat a huge dragoon, his bead done up in a blood-stained towel.

"We're lost," he was explaining. "Been cut off from our regiment for three days."

"Poor regiment!" I murmured, and calling the boys, I told Emile to wake the others and come down quickly to help hitch the horses. He was only gone a second, and I could hear him calling.

"Allons, allons, Madame part de suite."

Then he reappeared carrying a lantern.

"Where the devil did you get the light?" growled George.