THE FIRST CANADIANS IN FRANCE (continued 3)

"But you will be starved out, if you're not beaten otherwise," Reggy continued.

The shortage of food in Germany was one of our early delusions about the war. The Prussian laughed amusedly—not by any means a pleasant laugh.

"If we do not grow a grain," he replied scornfully, "we have sufficient food stored away to last us for three years. For the past ten years every city in Germany has kept a three-year supply stored, and only the oldest crop has been used annually." An illuminating confession!

"But you will run short of men," Reggy persisted.

His patient smiled again at our innocence. "We have ten million trained soldiers in reserve, who have not yet been called up," he answered calmly.

We were not prepared at the time to dispute the veracity of these statements, although later events seem to have corroborated them.

There was a grim heroism about this cold-blooded man, for when he was placed upon the operating table, although he must have suffered greatly while the deeply embedded bullet was being extracted under cocaine, he permitted no groan or complaint to escape his lips. However much we may hate the Prussians, or loathe their materialistic and unsentimental attitude toward their fellow human beings, if this man was a sample, they are as well prepared to suffer as to inflict pain. Proud, disdainful and bitter, one could not help but feel that he hated us so thoroughly that should the opportunity have occurred, he would have killed his attendants without a qualm of conscience.

The contrast between this prisoner's mental attitude and that of one of my Bavarian patients was striking. The latter had had his left arm cruelly shattered, and on dressing it I discovered a large ragged wound above the elbow. He spoke no English, so that I was obliged to use my indifferent German.

"Wie geht es dieser Morgen?" I asked him.

"Ganz gut," he replied, as he looked up with a grateful smile at hearing his native tongue. He continued in German: "The nurses have been very good to me, but my arm pains greatly."

We carried on a more or less desultory conversation while the dressing was proceeding, but, by dint of getting him to speak slowly, I managed to understand him fairly well. Wishing to estimate his frame of mind as compared with the Prussian, I remarked:

"I presume you feel badly over being taken prisoner?"

"No," he replied slowly; "I am glad. To us Germans this war means a fight to the death; there are only two ways of escape: being crippled for life—or this. You will wonder at my confessing that I am glad, but I have left behind me in Heidelberg all that I love best on earth—my wife and two little children——" His voice choked and tears came into his eyes, but after a moment he sighed: "God knows whether I shall ever see them again—for me the war is over—it is just as well."

Do you blame one for forgetting that this man was an enemy? "One touch of sympathy" in spite of the horrors of war, still "makes the whole world kin." We may hate the Germans en masse, but heart cannot help going out to heart, and in the weeks that followed I confess, without apology, that I learned to look upon this man as a friend.

It was about four o'clock the following afternoon that Wilson approached me, and, pulling himself up to attention, said:

"Th' nurse on Saskatchewan ward, zur, ses as that German corporal ain't had any feed t'day."

"Why not? I asked him.

"Dunno, zur, but he ain't, an' she's ast me to bring th' Orderly Officer to see him."

We had laid it down as a principle that German patients, in every instance, were to be treated the same as our own Tommies, so that it was annoying to hear that one of our men had been guilty of Hun tactics. Although I despised this corporal more than any of the others, neglect, even of him, could not be countenanced in a hospital. I hastened up the stairs to investigate. The nurse corroborated Wilson's statement. The German had complained to her that he had had only a light breakfast and no dinner, although the other men in his room had received theirs.

I called the ward orderly. "Why did you not give this man his dinner?" I asked him sternly.

"The meat was all gone when I went for it, sir," he replied, without looking me in the eye, "but I gave him a dish of custard."

Evidently the orderly had made up his mind to punish the Bosche, and while I sympathised secretly with his antipathy to the individual, I couldn't condone his disobedience or the principle.

"Come with me," I commanded, "and I'll ask him myself."

We entered a room which contained only three beds. In the farthest was a burly giant of a Highlander, in the middle the wretched German corporal, and nearest to us was a Munsterite of prodigious muscle and who was but slightly wounded in the leg.

I asked the German in English, which I well knew he understood, whether he had received his dinner or not. He affected not to understand me, and answered in German. As my German is not as fluent as my French, and I knew that he also spoke this language and might have some secret reason for not wishing to speak English, I tried him in French. He pretended not to understand this either. My opinion of him sank even lower. I tried him then in German, and he replied quite readily in his own tongue.

"I did not have any meat, but I was given a dish of pudding."

"Did you eat it?" I asked him.

"I had no chance to do so," he answered.

"Why not?" I queried.

He turned his head slowly and looked first at the big Highlander and then at the equally big Munsterite, and shook his head as he replied: "I don't know."

There was some mystery here, and not such a deep one that it couldn't be unravelled. I asked the Munsterite:

"Did you eat this man's pudding?"

"No, sir," he answered readily, but with a queer smile. The Highlander also answered in the negative. There was still a mystery.

"Do you know this German?" I asked the man from Munster and whose bed was nearest.

"Do I know him, sir!" he replied, with a significant look directed at his enemy. "I've seen that swine several times. He's a sniper, and used to go about with another tall swine who wore glasses. We never could kill the blighter, but he picked off three of our officers and wounded a fourth. Do I know him, sir?—my eye!"

Under the circumstances I couldn't reproach him. I felt morally certain he had stolen the German's pudding, as he could easily have reached it from his bed. I didn't care to probe the matter further, but warned him that such a breach of discipline must not occur again. After reprimanding the orderly also for his negligence—more from a sense of duty than desire, I admit—I ordered that some food be brought up at once, and saw that it reached its destination.

We could not have punished the German worse than to leave him in that room. One could easily understand why he pretended not to understand English, for I am sure the remarks which passed across his bed in the days he was there made his ears tingle and his miserable flesh creep.

After I had retired that night, Tim came up as usual to see that I was comfortable. Sometimes, when I was in the humour, I told him a story; not so much with the idea of enlightening him as to hear his comments as I proceeded and from which I gained much amusement.

"Did you ever hear of the mammoth whose carcase they found in Siberia, Tim?" I asked him.

"Wot's a mammoth, Maje?" he queried, as he seated himself upon my box and, crossing his legs, prepared to listen.

"A mammoth, Tim," I replied, "is an extinct animal, similar to the elephant, but which grew to tremendous size."

"How big?" he enquired tentatively—his head on one side as usual.

"Oh, taller than this house, Tim; often much taller. His teeth were nearly as big as a hat box, and his leg bones almost as big around as your waist."

"Go on—go on, I'm a-listenin'," he growled dubiously.

"Well, this mammoth had tumbled over a cliff in the mountains of Siberia, thousands of years ago, and falling upon a glacier was frozen solidly in the ice, and, as it never melted, his body didn't decay. A few years ago they discovered it, and dug it out practically intact."

Tim's eyes were wide, and his mouth had fallen open during this description.

"Wot more?" he demanded quizzically.

"Only this," I continued, "that everything had been so well preserved by the ice that even the wisp of hay was still in his mouth."

"Dat'll do—dat'll do," he cried, as he rose abruptly to his feet. "Don' tell me no more. I sits here like a big gawk listenin' to dat story wit' me mout' open an' takin' it all in like a dam' fool. An' I stood fer it all, too," he continued, with remorseful irritability, "till ye comed to dat 'wisp o' hay' business—dat wos de las' straw."

"Hay, Tim," I corrected.

"Hay er straw, it's all de same to dis gent. Gees! you is de worse liar wot I ever heard."

Tim's humiliation at the thought that he had been taken in was so comical that I had to laugh. He turned hastily for the door, and as he passed out cried:

"Good night, sir. Don' have no more nightmares like dat."

The first faint light of day was stealing into the room as I felt myself tugged gently by the toe. I opened my eyes and dimly saw Tim's dishevelled head at the foot of my bed.

"What is it, Tim?" I asked, in some surprise.

"Look'ee here," he said huskily, "tell me some more about this yere biffalo." And with a soft chuckle he tiptoed out of the room.

When the time came to send the German prisoners to England little Sergeant Mack was detailed to guard them. After a comfortable stay for two weeks in hospital, and with a keen recollection of kindly treatment throughout, it was hardly likely they would attempt violence or brave the dangers of escape. But Mack, seated in the ambulance with a dozen healthy-looking Germans, who could easily have eaten him alive had they been so disposed, clutched in his coat pocket a little .22 revolver which Reggy had lent him. He seemed to appreciate the possibility of a catastrophe and, judging by the uneasy expression on his good-natured face, he had little relish for his precarious duty.

Even the ill-famed corporal looked his disappointment at leaving us, and the others seemed to feel that they would rather stay with captors whom they knew than fly to captors "whom they knew not of."

The Pole had, remarkable to relate, learned to speak English with a fair degree of success during his two weeks' stay, and quite openly expressed his regret at leaving. The others were merely silent and glum. Perhaps they felt that now that their wounds were healed, like well-fed cattle they were to be taken out and killed. The ambulance driver and Sergeant Honk were seated in front, but little Mack was alone inside, and they had twenty miles to go.

Nothing of moment happened until the ambulance, threading its way between the railroad tracks at Boulogne, pulled up upon the quay at the Gare Maritime. Here unexpected trouble arose. No German prisoners could be taken upon the hospital ship; the Embarkation Officer refused to let them aboard. He said they must be taken back to the Canadian hospital until a proper boat was ready for them.

During this discussion it got whispered about amongst the populace that there were Bosches in the ambulance, and in an incredibly short space of time it was surrounded by an angry mob who shook their fists and swore savagely at the occupants. Apparently they only needed a leader to urge them on, and the Germans would have been torn from their seats. The prisoners remained quiet, but the pallor of their faces showed that they realised the seriousness of their position.

Sergeant Mack drew his little revolver and shouted to the driver to make haste and get away. The driver needed no further urging; the danger was too obvious. The car started with a jerk and cleared the crowd before they were aware of Mac's intentions, but they shouted wrathful oaths after it as it sped up the quay.

"Blimey, if them French ayn't got a bit uv temper too!" Honk ejaculated, as he wiped the sweat from his excited brow; "five minutes more'n they'd 'ave 'ad them blighters inside by the scruff uv their bloomin' necks."

Imagine the surprise and dismay of the nurses as they saw the crowd of broadly smiling Germans coming up the hospital steps. The nurses, who had for two weeks repressed their natural antipathy to these men and had given them good care, felt considerably put out by their return. But the prisoners, like mangy dogs who had found a good home, were so glad to return to us that it was pitiful to see their pleased faces, and we took them in again with the best grace we could assume. The few hours they had had together in the ambulance had given them a chance to compare experiences. They were content. All we could hope was that our own boys under similar circumstances in Germany would be treated as tolerantly and well.

Three weeks afterward they all left for England, and even the Prussian was almost reconciled to us, for he said in parting: "Auf Wiedersehen!"

CHAPTER XIII

The colonel's seven-passenger Berliet was chug-chugging softly at the villa door, the drowsy hum of the exhaust hinting of concealed power and speed. The colonel, Reggy, Jack Wellcombe and I were about to commence our long-looked-for trip to that battered corner of Belgium which still remained in British hands.

Tim was standing at the door with his master's "British warm" thrown across his arm, waiting for the colonel to come out. It was a clear cold February morning, the air had in it just the faintest hint of frost, but not a breath of wind stirred the green foliage of the pines. Lady Danby's runabout stood across the road, and from beneath it peeped a pair of trim limbs encased in thick woollen stockings and ending in a pair of lady's heavy walking boots; telling Tim that her ladyship's dainty "chauffeur" was somewhere there below.

The "lady-chauffeur" was one of that eccentric, but interesting, band of mannish Englishwomen who invaded France in the early days of the war, and who have done wonders toward making Tommy's life in a foreign land agreeable. Intelligent, highly educated, remarkably indifferent to the opinion of the outside world, Miss Granville was a character worth more than a passing glance. Her toque was always pulled well over her ears, her thick, short grey woollen skirt had two immense pockets in the front, into which her hands, when not otherwise engaged, were always deeply thrust. A long cigarette invariably drooped from the corner of her pretty, but determined mouth, and she walked with a swinging, athletic stride. Romance might have passed her by unnoticed; but the world could not ignore her—she was too much a part of it. Some innate chivalry impelled Tim to step across and offer his assistance to the fair one in distress.

"Kin I be any help to ye, Miss?" he enquired, as he stooped down and peered underneath the car at the little lady who, stretched at full length upon, her back, was smoking a cigarette and at the same time screwing home an unruly nut.

"Oh! Is that you, Tim?" she remarked without removing the cigarette or taking her eyes off her work. "No, thanks, I think not—this is a woman's job."

"Ladies does queer stunts in France," Tim commented meditatively; "we ain't taken advantage uv dem in Canada de way we ought. See how de womens here, carries wood on dere backs, an', look at dem fish-women ketchin' skrimps in de sea. Gee, de gals to home ain't never seed real work!"

"You should train them, Tim. It's all a matter of up-bringing. Won't you have a cigarette?" she replied as she thrust a long open silver case out from under the car toward him. Tim extracted an Egyptian of a size such as he had never seen before.

"T'ankee, Miss—dat's a smoke fer a prince."

"That was the intention, Timothy," she remarked casually; and then came an unexpected question: "Do ladies in Canada smoke, Tim?"

Tim was visibly embarrassed. "Not sich as we calls ladies, Miss," he stammered; and then realising that he had made a faux pas he blundered on—"that is, Miss, I mean t' say—"

A rippling laugh from beneath the car cut short further explanation.

"Tim, Tim," she cried mockingly, "what a sad courtier you would make—you're too deliciously truthful."

Poor Tim was red with chagrin.

"I don' know wot a kertyer is," he replied defensively; "I'm a hod-carrier meself."

"Stick to it, lad," she laughed, "the hod lost one of its best exponents when you came to the war."

But the colonel now appeared at the door, and Tim, with a hasty adieu to his fair tormentor, sprang across the road. When we were all snugly tucked in the car, he stood for a moment looking ruefully toward the cause of his recent embarrassment.

"Dat's a queer gent, sir," he observed to the colonel, "dat lady-shoffer 'cross de way. It ain't on'y her boots wot's like a man's—de works in her belfry's queer too."

Reggy secretly sympathised with Tim's discomfiture, for it was only the day before, when he had made a graceful but unavailing whack at a golf ball, that he had turned to see her watching him intently—hands in pockets, cigarette in mouth.

"Rotten stroke, Miss Granville?" he remarked, to cover his annoyance; and she had coolly blown a cloud of smoke through her nostrils and replied:

"You're dead lucky to have hit it at all."

As the car moved off Reggy exclaimed: "That's the sort of girl who never gets a husband."

"Why not?" queried the colonel.

"Too much brain," Reggy returned. "It's too humiliating for a man to have a wife cleverer than himself."

"All depends upon the man," the colonel commented drily. Reggy ventured no reply to this ambiguous retort, but for the next few miles seemed lost in thought.

An hour's uneventful run brought us to the barricade on the outskirts of Boulogne. It consisted of two large waggons placed at an oblique angle across the road, at the foot of a steep hill. It was so ingeniously arranged that a motor car could not pass except at low speed. We were stopped by the French guard who stood with fixed bayonet—that long slender wicked-looking instrument, the sight of which makes cold shivers run up and down the back. The officer emerged from his little hut, and saluted with all the grace peculiar to the true Frenchman.

"Votre 'laisser-passer' monsieur, si'l vous plais?" he demanded politely.

The colonel unfolded the large blue pass, duly signed and stamped. It was scrutinised closely, the name and number of the car were recorded, and the officer, once more saluting, motioned us to proceed.

Running a barricade in France is not a healthful exercise. We did it once, by mistake, but an immediate rifle shot brought us to a halt. The sentry takes nothing for granted; if one goes through six times a day, the pass must be produced each time. Even the small towns of northern France cannot be entered or left without this ceremony.

We lunched at Mony's—every English and Canadian officer in France knows the spot—a small Italian restaurant close to the theatre, where substantial but delicious meals pop up from the cellar's depths. In this small room with the sawdust-covered floor and the little glass partitioned stalls, the full-stomached Signor Mony beams upon a clientele such as no other like café in the world can boast.

French, Belgian, English; yes, at times Italian, Russian, Serbian and even Japanese officers of high rank and ladies whose fame in charitable and Red Cross work is international, dine in this unique café. The little bar is in the dining room, and above its mahogany top you may see the head and shoulders of the proprietor's youthful daughter—a girl of such rare and artistic southern beauty that men and women too stare in admiring wonder.

But the military and the nobility are not the only guests. The crowded café distils a broad Bohemianism which startles one. At one table we see two dark-eyed "ladies-of-the-street" boldly ogling a couple of young subalterns in khaki who have just arrived from England. Brushing shoulders with the finest in the land the demimondaine quaffs her green liqueur, powders her nose and dabs again the painted cheek that riots in its bloom. At another table two French generals, oblivious to the hum about them, are planning schemes of war too deep for thoughts of giddy girls who seek to catch their eye.

Above the glass partition curls the smoke of cigarettes, and the laughing voices of Englishwomen tell us who are there. Upon the leather-cushioned bench which skirts the wall, a handsome Belgian, well past middle age, rests his chin upon the shoulder of a beautiful young Russian girl, and gently puts his arm about her waist. And as we look with passing interest at the pair, she takes the lit cigar from her companion's lips and places it between her own, blowing the clouds of smoke into his face. Every table but one is filled. The blended murmur of a dozen different tongues, the popping of champagne corks, the rippling laughter of the women, all combine in one strange sound in stranger France. One thing only reminds us of the outer world. The mani-coloured uniforms of soldiers of the several nations represented tell us all too truly that only a few miles away is the great grim battlefield and—death.

At 3 p.m. we started once more on the road and climbed the steep hill to that broad highway which leads to Calais. But now we reached another barricade, and an unexpected obstacle arose. The sentry regretted with a shrug of the shoulders and both uplifted hands, but the road was under repairs, and none might pass that way.

Jack came to the rescue and appealed to him in his inimitable French. Monsieur le Colonel with him was urgently needed at the front. The shortest and quickest route was the only one for such an important man—great speed was essential to the completion of pressing duties.

We could see the sentry wavering. Jack repeated: "Mon Colonel est bien pressé—bien pressé!" The sentry capitulated—of course if the Colonel was pressé, there was nothing else for it. He let us pass. As we whirled along the road, Jack laughed in that boyish manner of his and exclaimed:

"If you're ever held up by a French sentry, you must always be pressé—it's a great word! If you're only pressé enough you can get anywhere in France."

There wasn't another vehicle but ours upon that splendid highway, and we bowled along at tremendous speed through green fertile valleys and through leafless forests, rounding the curve which runs to the southeast from Calais and skimming along the crest of a low smooth mountain for mile upon mile.

We soon were on the road to St. Omer. From time to time the noisy whir of an aeroplane overhead helped us to realise that we were gradually drawing nearer to the real battle line, and once on looking up we could see the giant human bird at a great height, sailing above us. He came lower, so that we were able to see the pilot distinctly, and directed his course straight above the road. At the time we were travelling about fifty miles an hour, but he passed us as though we had been standing still—a moment later he became a mere speck in the distance, then faded into the mist beyond.

As we approached closer to the front we had expected to find the towns deserted except by troops. In this we were agreeably disappointed. As we entered St. Omer we found motors and waggons by the hundreds coming and going in a busy rush; every store was open too, and business was thriving with a thrift unknown before the war. Women and children, soldiers and civilians, crowded the busy streets, and the hum of industry was heard on every hand. Here not many miles from the trenches, we could see again the undaunted confidence of France, implicit reliance upon her troops, unswerving loyalty to her ideals—unutterable contempt for the possibility of further German invasion. It was a revelation in faith and a stimulus to merit such whole-souled unbreakable trust.

We had just drawn up at the curb in the city square when a big Rolls-Royce turned the corner and stopped close to us. It contained a man who wore the uniform of the British Red Cross Society, and who well matched the car in size; he descended and hastened over to our car.

"Jack!" he cried delightedly, "old Jack Wellcombe; by George, I'm glad to see you!" As he spoke he shook Jack warmly by the hand. "You and your friends must come over to the 'Bachelor's Own' with me."

Jack performed the round of introductions, and Mr. Harman, who proved to be an American from Texas, reiterated that we must come and dine with him.

"Thanks, Harman, old chap; we really must get along, we have to make Poperinghe to-night," Jack protested; but his American friend refused to take "no" for an answer.

"For," he concluded, parodying a line from a once popular opera, "'you really must eat somewhere, and it might as well be here.' Don't be in a hurry to get to Poperinghe," he continued. "I was over there this afternoon when a German aviator came to call. Just as a preliminary, and in order to show his good faith, he dropped a bomb on the church—Some crash, I tell you. It trimmed one corner off the tower and spattered the door rather badly."

"Was any one hurt?" Reggy enquired anxiously.

"Not at the moment," Harman replied, "but a few hundred fools, including your humble servant, rushed into the square 'to see what made the wheels go round.' He hovered over us gracefully for a few moments, waiting to collect a good crowd of spectators, then he dropped a big one right into the centre of the mass."

"Good Lord!" Reggy exclaimed in a horrified whisper, "what happened?"

"Nothing as bad as we deserved, but there were eleven killed and as many more wounded—it was a horrible sight! You'll see the effects of it still when you get there, in the broken windows and pieces of stone knocked out of the buildings for fifty yards around."

We decided to stay for dinner. We motored down a side street and pulled up at his "Bachelor's Own." It was a comfortable French house of the better class, with floor of coloured tile and long glass doors connecting all the down-stairs rooms. A piano and a grate-fire, around which a few leather easy chairs were placed, gave the "lounge" an appearance of homelike comfort—moreover, one might sit there and, by merely turning the head, see everything of interest on that floor. We noticed in the next room the table being spread for numerous guests, and a Belgian servant bustling about at his work.

Harman motioned us to be seated, and after offering us some cigarettes, told us to "make ourselves at home" as he must warn his butler (save us!) of our arrival. When he returned a few moments later, beaming with smiles, like the true host he proved to be, he remarked deprecatingly:

"You mustn't expect too much of an old bach's table in these rough war-worn days; but as far as it goes this is open house to every man in uniform."

Later in the evening, when guest after guest "dropped in," until there were eighteen of us in all, we grasped the significance of his remark, and realised what his genial hospitality meant to the lonely officers who passed that way.

We didn't expect too much—in fact we didn't expect half of what we got. We hadn't looked forward to grilled merlin, roast chicken, tender lamb, Jerusalem artichokes or delicious cantaloupe, nor to Gruyère cheese served with crisp cream-wafers. In our modesty we had forgotten to expect the mellow flavoured wines which clung to the sloping sides of glass as delicate as a spider's web, or rich Havana cigars and real Egyptian cigarettes. No, strange as it may seem to the casual reader, we hadn't expected any of these things; we were prepared for Bologna sausage and a can of sardines, but in these we were disappointed. A whirlwind of plenty rose at Harman's magic call, and cast us adrift upon a sea of luxury.

Towards the close of this splendid repast, I took occasion to ask our benevolent host to what particular branch of the Red Cross work he was devoting his energies.

"Just what you see," he answered with a laugh. "Cheering up dull dogs like Wellcombe here, as they pass upon their weary way—that's about all."

"He's talking bally rot!" cried Jack from his end of the table, "I'll tell you what he does, as he won't tell you himself. He feeds the hungry and the poor; he gives all kinds of delicacies, from pickles to pheasants, to the wounded and sick soldiers in the Field Ambulances and hospitals for miles around; he carries food and drink to the wounded Tommies in the trenches and the Dressing Stations. I've seen him steal out upon the battlefield in a perfect hell of machine gun bullets and shrapnel—places where the devil himself wouldn't venture or expect to get out alive—and carry back those poor shattered lads in his arms. He—"

"Jack, Jack," Harman cried in protest, "for heaven's sake have a little pity—I can't live up to a rep' like this!"

"Don't interrupt, please!" Jack commanded. "One word more and then I'm through. He's been a perpetual Santa Claus to every boy at the front, and a godsend to every man in the rear—a damn good fellow and a man." He had risen to his feet and struck the table with his hand in his earnestness. "Here's a toast for you, my comrades in arms," he cried in conclusion: "Here's to Harman—Harman the Red Cross hero of St. Omer!"

As one man we rose to our feet and drained our glasses dry.

After dinner we crowded into the lounge, and Jack sat down at the piano. With nimble fingers he drew soft music from the keys. We soon discovered we were in a nest of artists, drawn together by a common tie.

Little Watkins, another Red Cross driver, who, as we afterwards learned, had risked his life a score of times to help some wounded fellow on the treacherous road, sang for us. It seems but yesterday that we sat there in the smoke-filled room, listening with rapt attention to his silvery tenor voice. The flames from the fire lit up his face as the throbbing notes poured forth. Je sais que vous etes jolie; we know now why he sang so well—he was in love. Poor Watkins has many months since passed to the "great beyond," but the sweet pathos of his voice still lingers in the ears of those he charmed that night.

Kennerly Rumford was then called upon—yes, the world-renowned Kennerly Rumford, in khaki in a little room in St. Omer—and in that magnificent baritone of his filled the house until it rocked with glorious sound. Rich, deep, rolling melody welled up from his great chest, until the wonder of it struck us dumb. I looked about me; pipes rested unused upon the table; cigarettes had been cast away, and the cigars, forgotten for the nonce, were dead.

We were loathe to leave this house of entertainment, but time was pressing, and we still had many miles to go.

The streets were black as pitch; no lights were permitted in the war zone, but at last we found our way out of the town, and started.

CHAPTER XIV

As we sped along the road to Poperinghe, the headlights of our car made a lone streak of white against the utter blackness of the outer world. Occasionally on the wings of the wind came the boom of the big guns, followed a moment after by the sharper crash of the bursting shells. The barricades became more numerous, and from time to time we were halted by a British sentry and our passes were scrutinised with especial care.

It was about ten p.m. when we crept softly through the outskirts of the little Belgian town which marked our destination for the night. We pulled up at a small hotel, less than a hundred yards from the spot where the German aviator had wrought such havoc that afternoon. The stone walls of the buildings about were marked with holes, which showed up plainly in the light from the car, and the cobblestones for several yards around were splintered.

As is the case with most small hostels in northern France and Belgium, the door through which we entered opened directly into the bar. The blaze of light within, well screened off from the street by heavy curtains, dazzled our eyes, and the crowded room with its round marble-topped tables was heavy with smoke. The ever-smiling bar-maids were having a busy time. Bottles of whiskey and soda, beer or wine, stood upon every side, and the clink of glasses intermingling with the clatter of foreign tongues, fell upon our ears. The soft, sibilant French, the cockney English and the guttural Flemish warred with one another in an unintelligible babble.

Jack seemed as much at home here as ever. The pretty blonde bar-maid, the daughter of the house, came forward to greet him, and shook him warmly by the hand. She assured him, and us, that "M'sieu le Capitaine was ton jours le lien venu." In fact, we were made so welcome that we were shown forthwith into a private room, the better to avoid the noise and smoke of the bar.

"What are the prospects of a bed or two for four?" Jack asked the Belgian lassie.

Mademoiselle was desolé, but she feared the prospects were bien mal—in other words, nil. She would enquire across the way, however, and see if any of the houses round about could still boast an empty bed. She returned shortly, more desolé than ever. What with the thousands of Belgian, French and English troops billeted in the town, there was not a vacant room left. She would give up her own room for monsieur, but hélas, it was so petite there was only accommodation for one.

Reggy laughed. When Reggy could laugh at the prospect of no bed for the night the situation must have been amusing. "Colonel, you'll have to take the bed," he cried, "and the rest of us can sleep in the car."

"No, no," Jack protested; "We must all be together. We'll take a run up to the convent and see what Sister Paulo has to say."

"Good Lord!" laughed the Colonel. "You don't suppose a nun is going to house four strange officers for the night, do you?"

"All things are possible—in Belgium," Jack returned. "You don't yet know the size of the Belgian heart. Sister Paulo and I are old friends. I had the pleasure of bringing her and several other Sisters of Charity out of Ypres one night last fall, during the bombardment. The Bosches had killed some of them and shot their poor convent full of holes. Sister Paulo gave me this silver crucifix as a memento of the occasion." He held up for our inspection an exquisite little cross. "I have always carried it since—she's a good sort; more woman than nun."

"If I should die and by mischance arrive in Hades," cried the colonel, "I hope you'll be in heaven, for I'm sure you'll have enough pull with St. Peter to get me up!"

As we crossed the dark square, crowded as it was with troops of the three nations on their way to and from the trenches, we could hear distinctly the rattle of artillery and the bursting of the German shells, not many miles away. A mischievous gun might have dropped a shell into that square at any moment—we wondered why it didn't. There could be only one reason. No humanitarian consideration ever deterred the German; but the town was so full of spies that it would not have been good business to bombard it. A few months later, when the spies were all eliminated, the long-range German guns soon made short work of Poperinghe.

We arrived at a two-storey brick building, and after a lengthy pull at the bell-rope the door was slowly opened a little way. Jack enquired for Sister Paulo, and upon giving his name, the door was immediately thrown wide and we were ushered into a small waiting-room. We had scarcely seated ourselves when a tall nun, with saint-like face and frank smiling eyes entered the room. She recognised Jack at once and, holding out both hands in greeting to him, exclaimed in excellent English:

"My dear Capitaine! How glad I am to see you once more—you are as welcome as your name."

"These are some very dear friends of mine, Sister Paulo," Jack cried, after he had introduced us individually, "and we have come to you in distress—we poor sons of men have no place to lay our heads."

"Ah!" said Sister Paulo, with a gracious smile, "perhaps we shall now have an opportunity of doing you a little kindness for your many, many goodnesses to us." She turned to us and continued: "You see, Capitaine Wellcombe risked his life to save ours. He came to our Convent in Ypres during the night of that frightful battle, when the shells were falling in thousands about us, and the city was in ruins. One big shell tore through the wall and fell into the building—I shall never forget the horror of that night! The streets were lit up by fires, and the noise was awful beyond words. We were distracted—we seemed to have been forgotten by every one, when suddenly Captain Wellcombe came like an angel from above and climbed in through the rent in the wall. One by one he carried us out in his arms and put us in an ambulance. He took us through those dreadful streets and brought us here to safety. He is a brave man, and every night we pray for his protection."

For once in his life Jack looked embarrassed, and blushed like a school-girl. "Sister Paulo exaggerates, I'm afraid," he said, in some confusion. "It seemed more dangerous than it really was."

"You may make light of it, if you wish, my dear Capitaine," Sister Paulo replied, holding up a reproving finger, "but you can never make it to us less than the act of a brave and noble man!"

She left us for a space, but shortly returned to tell us that our rooms were ready and that we were thrice welcome to what accommodation their poor house afforded. We were ushered upstairs and along a narrow hall in which we met several Belgian officers, who bowed low as we passed. Jack was given a small room to himself.

When Reggy and the colonel and I arrived at the room which was pointed out as ours for the night we met a tall Belgian officer coming out of it. We grasped the situation on the instant. These officers, who had been hastily aroused, were, with their remarkable courtesy and native hospitality, actually giving up their beds to us. The others had already disappeared down the stairs, and this officer too would have passed us with a bow, but we arrested him and protested that he must on no account deprive himself of his room.

"But you are not disturbing me in the least," he replied in French; "you are doing me a great pleasure by accepting my bed."

We assured him that we should be able to find accommodation somewhere, and that we felt very guilty for having been the cause of so much inconvenience.

"My dear sirs," he protested feelingly, "there is but a very small corner of Belgium left to us; there is so little opportunity for us to offer hospitality to a guest, that when such an occasion as this arises where we have the honour of accommodating our English friends—it would be unkind if you denied us this poor privilege."

We could not doubt his sincerity, and felt that he would be hurt if we made any further protest. Where he was to sleep we did not know; but we thanked him, and after bidding him bonsoir, passed inside. There was a single and a double bed in the room. The tables were strewn with swords, revolvers, field glasses, prismatic compasses and all the usual accoutrements of military officers. It was evident the room had been vacated hastily.

The single bed naturally fell to the lot of the colonel, while Reggy and I, being a trifle smaller than he, clambered into the other—a high, old-fashioned one. Reggy sank wearily into the feather mattress and fell asleep as soon as his head touched the pillow. He had the happy faculty of being able to sleep anywhere and at any time.

We were to make an early start, and six a.m. came all too soon. A light French breakfast was prepared for us when we descended. About an hour later, after expressing our deep thanks to our gracious hostess, we got into the motor once more and started on the road towards Ypres. There wasn't a cloud in the sky. The sun shone brightly, and not a warlike sound broke the stillness of the clear, cool air as we sped along between the tall poplars which lined the road. One thing only reminded us that we were approaching close to the battle line—the reserve trenches dug on either side. These we passed from time to time; but they were half full of water and uninhabited, and it was apparent there was little thought of their ever being needed.

Here and there a few horses were tethered in poor canvas-covered shelters, and in the farmyards near-by we saw numbers of French military waggons which looked like gipsy carts. Occasionally we overtook a battalion of French or Belgian troops marching quietly towards the trenches. Their apparent absence of any definite marching formation struck us with surprise. They did not walk in line, but ambled along of their own free will; some with loaves of bread or rolls strapped to their knapsacks, and one carrying a roast of beef under his arm. They seemed to have foraged for themselves, and carried along any extras which appealed to their individual fancy. But they were a tall, stalwart-looking body of men, and we felt sure were much better trained than their irregular march would indicate.

We had reached a point about midway between Poperinghe and Ypres. The morning was still soundless, save for the whir of our motor.

"Looking at this blue sky and the quiet fields, who would ever believe there is a war so near?" Reggy remarked.

These words had no sooner fallen from his lips than the air was suddenly rent with the blast of gun after gun, so close on our right that we were startled and instinctively jumped towards the left of our car. The sharp bursting of shells over our heads impelled us to look up, and there directly above us was a German aeroplane.

Shell after shell burst below him, leaving rounded clouds of white smoke hanging in the still air, and as each exploded the aviator rose higher and higher. The range of the guns grew longer; some shells burst above him; some to right or left. Round after round of shrapnel followed his every movement. We looked in vain for the battery. They were so carefully hidden that although we could not have been fifty yards away, there was not the slightest visible sign to indicate their position.

At the same time the whirring rat-tat-tat-tat of a machine gun close beside us on the left made us turn our heads sharply in that direction. At first we could not see this gun either, but guided by the sound we soon discovered it on a platform halfway up the outside of a farmhouse, against the wall, and manned by a French soldier. We watched the aviator with the same interest that a quartette of hunters might view some great bird, hoping to see him winged. But he seemed to bear a charmed life, and dodged shrapnel and machine-gun bullets alike, soaring higher and higher until he became a mere speck in the heavens. Then the firing ceased as abruptly as it had commenced.

Our car had been stopped during this one-sided battle, but now that it was over we started on again. The cobblestone road had been torn up by shell fire in many places, and driving was rough and difficult. We passed batteries of artillery and long lines of army service waggons, wending their way Ypres-ward. There was no further firing for the present and we crossed the bridge over the Yser and entered the town without mishap. From the distance there was little change to be noticed in Ypres; but now that we entered the streets we soon saw the effects of the bombardment. For the most part the smaller houses had not at this time been destroyed; but every large building in the place was in ruins. Churches, convents, schools and factories had been ruthlessly crushed, and the railway station was levelled to the earth. The streets were almost deserted, shops were long since closed, and business was dead.

We arrived at La Grand Place—once the scene of a busy market, and stood beside the ruins of the famous Guild Hall. Its roof had fallen in; the walls were shattered; piles of stones and mortar had tumbled into the street. The clock tower alone, as if in defiance of the German gunners, stood erect and the clock remained untouched. A dead horse lying close by upon the pavement reminded us that we were now within easy reach of the enemy's fire.

We turned and walked across to the Cathedral of St. Martin; a short time since the pride of that beautiful city. Alas! it too was lost. We clambered over the ruins and got upon the window ledge to look within. The priceless panes were gone; the marble floor, except in patches here and there, was buried deep and the great supporting columns of the dome had toppled over; one lay across the nave, its round flat stones still clinging obliquely together and lying like rouleaux of coin side by side. The sacrilegious shells had burst into the chapel of the Holy Sacrament, had desecrated the altar and piled huge heaps of masonry upon the floor. The crucifix had disappeared, but the statues of the saints, by some strange miracle, remained intact.

From the torn paintings upon the walls the faces seemed to have turned appealingly toward the open roof, their gaze fixed as in a last pitiful prayer to heaven. They were lost—those wondrous works of Art which once with magic charm had held the world enthralled. Never again would humanity come to bow in humble admiration at that shrine of beauty, nor gather inspiration from the hallowed walls. And as we looked upon the wreck about us, now but the memories of an irrestorable past, our bitter thoughts travelled across the lines of trenches to that strange race to whom no neighbour's hall or home is sacred and to whom the work of centuries, the irreplaceable monuments of master minds, are naught.

As we looked again upon those time-honoured, tottering walls the great jagged holes seemed to cry out to us for revenge, and a sudden just but implacable anger against the perpetrators of these hideous world-crimes stormed within our hearts and choked our utterance.

With a sigh we turned from the contemplation of this scene of wanton destruction and started our walk through the desolate streets. Crossing the Menin road, we entered that little graveyard where so many of our brave men lay buried. The houses round about lay crumbled, but this sacred spot, by accident or design, had been spared. As we passed bareheaded down the path between rows of closely crowded graves, the new-made wooden crosses seemed to lift their white arms to us in mute appeal. Here and there the cap of some once gallant French or Belgian officer hung upon his cross—a crown of glory that no mortal hand dare touch. Some of these caps had rested there for months, rotted by rain, torn by the wind, faded by the sun—but dyed with a glory which time could never dim, and emblazoned with the halo of self-sacrifice. And as we stood there upon the threshold of the battlefield we saw the conflict in a clearer light—behind us faith and patriotism; in front patience and heroism, and at our feet self-sacrifice and deathless love.

A great wreath of purple leaves lay upon the grave of a young prince, clinging lovingly to the new-made mound. He rested there side by side with his humbler fellows—they had fought and died together. We sometimes forget that a prince is human; he seems so far above us—he lives in a different sphere and appears to be cast in a different mould. But when we stand beside his grave, we realise at last that he was but a mortal like ourselves; that he has lived his life like us—the same desires, the same ambitions and the same need for love. Only one word was entwined, in white letters, with the purple leaves; only one word, but it bridged two countries and two souls—heaven and earth were joined—for the small white flowers clinging together spelled the magic name of "Mother." We may fall unnoticed in the thick of battle, we may be buried with a host of comrades in a nameless grave, but a mother's heart will seek us out, no matter where we lie, and wrap our lonely souls about with the mantle of her undying love.

"You have seen both ends of a battle now—the hospital and the graveyard," Jack exclaimed, as we left the cemetery; "come with me and I will show you what it is like to be in the middle."

"Can't we take a little walk along this road, and see the first line trenches?" Reggy enquired. We were crossing the Menin road again at the moment.

Jack laughed. "Not if you wish to come further with us. If you step out of this shelter in daylight there won't be any Reggy to brighten our trip. No one goes out there in daylight—that is, if he wishes to attain old age."

"But it seems so quiet here," Reggy protested. "Apart from broken-down buildings, I can't see a sign of a war—there isn't a soul in sight but ourselves."

"Jolly good reason," Jack replied. "If you take a peep through the hedge there you'll see the trenches—we're as close as we dare go at present."

Reggy looked disappointed. "There isn't even a gun," he complained.

It seemed as if the invisible gunners had heard him, for suddenly the fields round about us sprang to life and belched forth smoke and shells. Some cannon in the dark shade of the bushes were actually so close that we could see the streak of flame from the muzzle light the shadow. The Germans were not slow to retaliate, and in a few minutes the roar of their guns and the howl and crash of shells added to the general clamour. Fortunately they did not appear to have our range, and the shells fell far afield.

"That's what you brought down upon us—you doubting Thomas," Jack remarked facetiously to Reggy. "You've started a nice row now that will last for hours."

"Isn't this great!" Reggy cried like a pleased child. "I wouldn't have missed this for a million."

"I hope Fritzie will miss you for less," laughed the colonel, "or we'll be short an ex-Mess Secretary."

Reggy vouchsafed no reply to this hope.

"We'd better get along out of this," Jack said; "the Bosches may discover their mistake before long and pour a little shower of hate on us."

We got into the motor and started towards the Dickibusch road. At Jack's request we stopped for a few minutes at the ruins of a large schoolhouse which had comprised one city block. The semblance of a building remained, but the walls stood only in jagged patches.

"These are the remains of our Field Ambulance," Jack explained. "Come inside and see; you will get a faint idea of what the 'Jack Johnsons' did to our hospital wards."

We passed into what had once been the main entrance. The doorway had received one great shell which on bursting had carried the four walls with it. We stumbled along the floor over heaps of brick and mortar; through piles of broken chairs and beds, and, climbing the ruins of the staircase, arrived upon a landing from which we could see the interior of what had once been a large room.

"This was my ward," Jack told us. "You see that big hole in the roof? A big shell came through there, and burst right here." He pointed to a wide, irregular opening in the floor. Every stick of furniture was smashed to atoms. Daylight came through great gaping holes in the walls and floor. The beds were merely nests of twisted iron. The greater part of the ceiling had fallen in and lay in a heap in the centre of the room.

As we walked about we saw that every other ward was in a similar condition. We went out into the schoolyard. There were five or six tremendous excavations in the ground, perfectly round and capable of holding a baby whale. There was no earth heaped up, for the big shells which made these hollows left nothing behind.

We were still standing there when suddenly there arose a noise like the muffled scream of a distant multitude. We stood rooted to the spot, wondering what grim horror this might be. It grew louder and louder, coming towards us at terrific speed.

"For God's sake," I cried to Jack, "what is that awful sound?"

"Look into the field—quick—you will see!"

We all looked. The sound became a roar—a crash, and then about a hundred yards away the earth sprang high into the air in a great black mass intermingled with clouds of smoke and stones.

"Permit me," Jack remarked coolly, "to introduce you to 'Jack Johnson.' Now you can understand a little how those poor boys in the hospital felt when he came crashing through the roof."

"If we stay here a few minutes longer," the colonel remarked, "we may have it brought even more dramatically to our attention."

Jack laughed. "Oh," he cried, "we're as safe here as anywhere—you never can tell where the next will drop."

We were soon to verify the truth of this remark.

CHAPTER XV

We had turned the corner of the road on which we had just witnessed the effect of the big shell—the hole was still smoking—when once again we heard the distant whine. This time there was no need to ask what it meant; we knew all too well, and for an anxious moment or two we wondered whether after its arrival the newspapers would speak well of us, or whether we should be blown into such small pieces that we should only be reported "missing."

It is recorded that sometimes those who are drowning are able, in a few brief moments, to rehearse the drama of their lives. Our lives must have been too complicated for such hasty revision, but as the sound changed from a whine to a shriek, an unearthly roar, and with a crash like the crack of doom the ground opened before us and shot a blinding storm of rocks and mud sky high—when all this occurred far, far faster than I can pen the lines, we had plenty of time to develop a nasty pain in the pit of the stomach, to which the mystic torment of an unripe cucumber is a joy. A great cavity yawned before us where once the road had been, and belched forth clouds of smoke as if the crust of hell were riven in twain. At the same moment, lest our tranquillity should be restored too soon, our own guns opened up with a vicious roar and hurled their screeching shells over our heads like myriads of fiends possessed. Reggy's face was a study in black and white—I couldn't see my own.

"Do you think the Germans see us?" he enquired anxiously of Jack.

"No, I think not," Jack reassured him; "it's customary for them to shell any good road in the hope of picking off a convoy."

"It's a damned uncomfortable custom," Reggy returned earnestly, "and I could forgive them for not observing it for the next ten minutes."

The chauffeur, who had stopped the car dead by using the emergency brake, now released it, and we started forward again. But we had considerable difficulty in navigating the ditch on the side of what had been the road.

We had just moved in time, for a second shell dropped where we had been a moment since, and tore the opposite side of the road away.

"Being between two lines of artillery is a little too much like battledore and shuttlecock," I remarked to Reggy, "with all the odds against the shuttlecock."

"Object to word 'battledore,'" Reggy retorted; "it's too frivolous and pun-like for the present dangerous occasion."

We were now making haste towards a small village a few miles ahead, and we were not sorry as we passed into the poor shelter its brick houses afforded. As long as we were on the open road it was quite impossible to rid oneself of the feeling that the car was in full view of the German gunners.

The streets of this dirty little village were filled with British Tommies, who, still covered with the mud from the trenches, were as care-free and happy as were those fifty miles from the front. They smoked and chatted together in little groups at the entrance or in the courtyards of the miserable hotels, one at least of which seemed to be on every block. As we drew up the colonel enquired of a sentry:

"Can you tell me where the 'Princess Patricias' are billeted?"

We had been informed that this famous battalion, which had reached France just six weeks after us, was somewhere in this neighbourhood. To discover their whereabouts was the real object of our journey. The sentry made reply:

"I believe, sir, there is a battalion of that naime 'ere somew'eres. Hi, Bill!" he called to another Tommy, who was leaning against a near-by door-post; "w'ere is them Canydians wot wos 'ere t'other day?"

"Bill" banked his cigarette by pressing it against the wall and came over on the double to the side of our car. He saluted with that peculiar Jumping-Jack motion so much a part of the real Tommy, and ejaculated:

"I 'eard they was at the next town, sir; it ayn't far from 'ere, but it's a funny naime—Runnin'-hell, er somethin' like."

"Would it be Reninghelst?" Jack enquired.

"Ay—that's it, sir; I knowed they was 'hell' in it somew'eres."

"Just since the 'Canydians' came, I'll wager?" Reggy interjected mischievously.

The Tommy grinned approval of this jest, and volunteered to show us the direction. He stood on the running board of the car and saw that we got started on the right road.

"Straight ahead now, sir," he said, as he saluted and sprang down.

The heavy shelling had died away, and for the next two miles the sun shone on a peaceful country. We had a chance to marvel at the well-ploughed fields, and wondered what venturesome farmers dared work in such a place. It was almost noon and we had begun to think that we had left the war behind us once more, when suddenly the rapid bark of German guns aroused us, and the sharp crack of shrapnel high above our heads caused us to look up. A new sight met our gaze.

Three of our own aeroplanes were hovering directly over the German trenches, and battery after battery of artillery were exhausting themselves in an angry effort to bring them down. The accuracy of the enemy gunners startled us. This time we were not the hunters, and our sympathies were with the aviators. As shell after shell burst, leaving their white clouds to right or left, we held our breath in suspense. Time and again, as the explosion occurred directly under one of our machines, the smoke hid it from view, and, in a tremor of anxiety, we feared to see it dive to earth. But when the smoke cleared away our three undaunted birdmen were still on high, swooping over the German batteries with a persistence and intrepidity which must have been maddening to the helpless Bosches.

It wasn't long before two enemy aviators rose to give battle, and as they approached our men the firing from below ceased. The five aeroplanes circled round and round, apparently sparring for position, and rose to such great height that we could hardly distinguish them. They were so close together that neither the British nor German artillery dared fire upon them. At last one of the enemy machines detached itself from the others and darted towards our lines with the speed of the wind.

Immediately our batteries opened up, and round after round of bursting shells followed its every movement; now to right, now to left; now above, now below, ever closer to their mark. Finally one well-directed shell burst immediately beneath the aviator. The machine was straight over our heads; we craned our necks to follow it. It swerved and fluttered like a wounded bird, slipped sideways, fell for a short distance, then seemed to stagger like a drunken man; righted itself at last and swiftly descended towards the German lines. That the aviator was wounded we did not doubt, but he had somehow escaped death. In the meantime we had lost sight of the other four machines, and when we looked for them again they had disappeared from view.

The streets of Reninghelst were crowded with soldiers when we reached that town, and among them we recognised, to our joy, some stalwart lads from the "Princess Pats." On the corner was a group of young officers, and in the crowd we espied the familiar features of Captain Stewart who had spent his last night in Canada with us. At the same moment he recognised us and hurried over to the car to greet us.

"Well, well," he cried delightedly, as he shook hands with us two at a time, "welcome to our city! Where the devil did you chaps spring from?"

We assured him that his question was quite à propos, as we had just passed through the infernal regions. He laughed as he replied:

"Interesting bit of road, that stretch between Ypres and here—been in the front line trenches ourselves for a week out there—caught blazes, too!"

His uniform still showed the effects of the trench mud. He was a tall, thin chap, prematurely grey. Like many others of the Princess Pats, he was a veteran of the South African War, a crack-shot, and all-round dare-devil. He spoke in short, quick snatches, starting his sentences with unexpected jerks, and could keep a regiment in shrieks of laughter.

"How is the trench life out here?" the colonel enquired, with a jerk of the head towards the battle line.

"Plain hell—with a capital H. Excuse the repetition of the word—nothing else describes it—a quagmire two feet deep, full of mud and filth."

"Couldn't you dig it deeper?" Reggy enquired with some concern.

"No chance—everywhere you dig—turn up rotting carcases—farther down you go the more water you have to stand in."

"The snipers are bad too, are they not?" I asked him.

He laughed again. "Were bad, you mean," he cried; "not many left around our trench. Poor Fritzie found us a nasty lot—played dirty tricks on him—organised a 'snipe-the-sniper' squad—put 'em out of business."

"How did you manage it?" I asked curiously.

"Stalked 'em—like red Indians—dug a tunnel out to a hill too—came up through the centre of it—hollowed it out inside—and put 'em to sleep one by one. Fritzie doesn't love us any more, but, by Gad, he respects us!"

After we had listened to a few more details of this wild and remarkable life, the colonel enquired:

"Where are your headquarters? We want to see your O.C. and the rest of the chaps."

"I'll climb in and show you the way. It's in another village a few miles from here."

Under his guidance we soon found ourselves in the town, and we stopped at the entrance of a small house which still claimed a patch of garden in front. The room we entered contained a barrack table strewn with field maps and papers, and on the tile floor were the sleeping bags of the four officers who made this their temporary home. Major Gault, a tall, handsome officer, with the bearing of the true soldier, rose to welcome us.

"It seems good to see some one from home again," he exclaimed, as we shook hands. "I thought we were the only Canucks in Belgium."

"You were the first Canadians in Belgium, but we beat you to France by some weeks," the colonel replied, "and we have come up here to tell you where we live, and to let you know that there is a Canadian hospital waiting with open arms to receive you when you call."

"That's splendid," cried the major; "when the boys get hurt be sure you'll hear from us."

It is just as well we cannot look into the future. We walk blindfolded, clinging to the hand of Hope, and trust to her for kindly guidance. None of us at that moment guessed how soon we were to "hear" from those brave men.

Later, when we were about to start for home, they all came out to the car to say au revoir.

"It's a good expression—'au revoir,'" Captain Stewart cried, as we were parting; "much better than 'Good-bye.'"

"Take care of yourselves," we cried, "but don't forget if you need us, we are waiting!"

"We'll remember," Stewart returned, "for I have a premonition I'll not be killed in this war."

He waved his hand as we left, and when we looked back the little group, whom we were never to see together again, waved their hands in a last farewell.

After about an hour's run we saw in the distance, set like a jewel of the Tyrolese Alps, the pretty town of Cassel, near which our own Canadian boys were shortly to be quartered. It was about twenty miles in a direct line from the trenches, and soon after our visit the long-range German guns dropped their tremendous shells on its outskirts.

When we reached the hospital a cablegram was waiting for the colonel. He tore it open hastily, fearing bad news from home. As he read its contents his mouth expanded in a broad grin, and he passed it silently to us. We read, and Reggy, looking over Jack's shoulder, had the grace to blush as he too saw his mother's message:

"Greatly worried about my son. No word from him for weeks. He was troubled with insomnia at home. Does he sleep better now? Cable my expense."

And the colonel sat down and forthwith wrote this soothing reply:

"Reggy splendid. Awake only at meal hours. Don't worry!"

Late one night, about a week after our visit to the firing line, we were at the railway yard assisting in the unloading of a train of wounded. About three hundred and fifty had arrived, and we were transporting them rapidly to the hospital. The Medical Officer commanding the train approached me and said:

"I have one car filled with wounded officers, and nearly all are stretcher cases. Will you come and see them?"

We walked down the line of cars and, mounting the steps, entered the officers' coach. We passed between the cots, and chatted with each officer in turn; they seemed quite cheery and bright. But one, who had pulled the blankets high about his neck, and whose face was partly covered with a sleeping-cap, looked very ill indeed. Unlike the others, he didn't smile as we approached, but looked up without interest. His face was white and he took no notice of his surroundings. I asked him how he felt. He answered slowly and in a weak voice:

"I'm all in, I guess—don't trouble about me."

Something in the voice and the jerky manner of speech seemed familiar. I looked at him more keenly.

"Stewart!" I exclaimed with involuntary dismay. "Good Lord, it's Charley Stewart!"

"Oh, is that you, Major?" he said, with a faint show of interest. "I've come to call, you see, sooner than I expected. It'll be a short visit," he continued grimly. "Short trip and a dull one."

"Surely it's not as bad as that," I said, as encouragingly as I could, but feeling very sick at heart as I looked down at his pale face.

"Hole through the stomach," he replied weakly. "Bad enough for a start."

"We'll take you up to the hospital—I'm sure we can fix you up all right," I said, with as much assurance as I could assume.

"Take me wherever you like," he replied dully; "it won't be for long."

I assisted in getting him into an ambulance, and cautioned the driver to go carefully, and after seeing the others safely transferred, sprang into a motor and followed. Imagine my surprise and chagrin when I reached the hospital to find that he had not arrived, and after due enquiry discovered that he had been taken, through some misunderstanding on the part of the ambulance driver, to Lady Danby's hospital. We concluded it would be unsafe to move him again that night, and after 'phoning the commanding officer to give him his very best attention, proceeded with the urgent work of caring for the hundreds of others who had already arrived.

In the meantime Captain Stewart was carried through the imposing portal of his new abode. As the stretcher was deposited with a slight jar upon the floor in the centre of a great hall, he opened his eyes and stared in wonder, first at the vaulted roof, then at the magnificent paintings on the walls, the stage at the far end of the hall, and last, but by no means least, at Lady Danby's beautiful face as she leaned over him to assist him. Her golden hair, her big blue eyes and flushed cheeks, and her graceful figure were too much even for a man half dead. He gave one more helpless glance at the stage, then his gaze returned to this vision, and, closing his eyes in a sort of drowsy ecstasy, murmured:

"Where's George Cohan and the chorus?"

"What does he say?" asked Lady Danby in surprise.

"He takes this for a theatre, and is asking where the chorus girls are," a sprightly nurse volunteered, with keen appreciation, and not a little amused at the shocked expression on Lady Danby's face.

"Dear me," she exclaimed, "it must be one of those dreadful Canadians!"

"I'm afraid he's not quite himself at present, your ladyship," the nurse protested, scarcely able to repress a smile.

Stewart opened his eyes once more and remarked coolly as Lady Danby hastened to another patient: "No—not quite all there—part shot away, excuse me." He then closed his eyes again and lay still until the orderlies removed him to his bed.

The Medical Officer came to examine him, and the nurse cut away the dressings from his side. He inspected the wound very carefully and finally said:

"Rifle bullet wound through the lower lobe of left lung. It might have been worse."

"How long do you think I have to live?" Stewart enquired, with some anxiety.

"To live?" cried the surgeon, with a laugh. "About thirty or forty years, with luck."

"What!" shouted Stewart, as he half sat up in bed with a quick jerk. "Do you mean to tell me I have the ghost of a chance?"

"You'll have a splendid chance if you keep quiet and don't shout like that. You'd better lie down again," the surgeon commanded, not unkindly.

"But, good Lord," Stewart protested animatedly, "here I've been trying to die for three days,—every one encouraged me to do it; and after passing through four surgeons' hands, you're the first to tell me I have a chance. It's wonderful. Now I will live—I've made up my mind."

"Who said you would die?"

"First the Chaplain at the Field Ambulance where they carried me in—more dead than alive. He came and shook his head over me. He was a good chap and meant well, I'm sure—he looked very dismal. I asked him if I would die, and he answered pityingly: 'A man shot through the stomach can't live, my poor fellow. Shall I pray for you?' I told him to go as far as he liked—he got on his knees and prayed like the deuce."

"But you said you were wounded three days ago," the surgeon remarked. "What kept you so long from reaching here?"

"I lay one whole day in front of the trench where I was wounded. The stretcher-bearers, against my wishes, came out to bring me in—just as the man at my head stooped down they shot him through the brain. I heard the bullet go 'chuck,'—he fell stone dead across me. I ordered the others back at once—that they must leave me until night. They refused to go at first, but I commanded them again to get back—at last when they saw I was determined, they went. Poor chaps! I know they felt worse at leaving me than as if they had been shot down."

During this conversation the surgeon had dressed the wound, and now, admonishing his patient that he must not talk any more, left him for the night. In the morning Lady Danby came to his cot and marvelled at his bright face and cheery smile.

"You're feeling better this morning, I see," she remarked brightly.

"Much the better for seeing you, madam," Stewart returned, with his customary chivalry; "and one does recover rapidly with such excellent nursing and care."

"I'm afraid we're going to lose you to-day," she replied, with a tinge of regret in her tone. "The Canadians insist on claiming you as their own, and I suppose we must let you go."

"I must admit," he returned, "that I am sorry to leave such congenial company—come and see me sometimes, won't you, please?"

Lady Danby smiled. "When I first saw you last night, I thought I shouldn't care to see you again—but you aren't really quite as dreadful as I thought. Some day soon I'll run in to see how you are getting on."

A few hours later, when Stewart was safely ensconced in our hospital, he observed reminiscently: "I'm awfully glad to be among old friends once more—but those English hospitals are not without their attractions!"

CHAPTER XVI

He was a mere boy, scarce nineteen years of age, a sub-lieutenant in the Territorials, and a medallist in philosophy from Oxford.

Who would have guessed that this frail, delicate-looking Welsh youth with the fair hair and grey eyes was gifted with an intellect of which all England might be proud? He might have passed unnoticed had one not spoken to him, and, having spoken, had seen the handsome face light up with fascinating vivacity as he replied.

One cannot attempt to recollect or depict the mystic workings of his marvellous mind; for, once aroused, gems of thought, clear cut and bright as scintillations from a star, dropped from his lips and left his hearers steeped in wonder.

It was then, you may well believe, no ordinary youth who walked into the hospital, with mud-covered clothes and his kit still strapped to his back. He dropped the kit upon the floor of his room, and, sinking wearily into a chair, brushed back with his hand the unruly hair which sought to droop over his high forehead.

His commanding officer, who had accompanied him to the hospital, had taken me aside, before I entered the room, and had told me privately his views about the boy.

"You look tired," I remarked, as I noted the weary droop of the head.

He smiled quickly as he looked up and said: "Done up, I think. Those six months in Malta were a bit too much for me."

"But you have been home before coming to France, have you not?" I asked him.

"Home!" he cried in surprise. "No such luck! We had expected a week or two in England after our return, but it's off. There were four thousand of us in Malta, but we're all here now, at Etaples, and liable to be sent to the trenches any moment. When I stood on the cliffs at Wimereux yesterday and saw the dear old shores across the Channel—" He stopped suddenly, overpowered by some strong emotion. "I'd be a better soldier farther off. Between homesickness and the pain in my chest, I'm about all in."

He did look tired and faint, and even the pink rays of the setting sun failed to tint the pallor of his cheeks. I told him I would send the orderly to help him undress and that he must get into bed at once.

When I returned shortly and examined his chest, I found that he was suffering from a touch of pleurisy; there were, too, traces of more serious trouble in the lungs.

"What do you think of me, Major?" he enquired with a quizzical smile, when I had completed the examination. "Anything interesting inside?"

"Interesting enough to call for a long rest," I replied. "We'll have to keep you here a while and later send you home to England."

"My O.C., who by the way is my uncle too, and a medical man, insisted on my coming here," he remarked. "He says I'm not strong enough for trench life. But the old boy—bless his heart!—loves me like a son, and I'm morally certain he wants to pack me off for fear I'll get killed. I simply can't go home, you know, until I've done my bit. It would be jolly weak of me, wouldn't it?"

"You might go for a time," I replied guardedly, "and return later on when you get stronger."

He started to laugh, but a quick stabbing pain in the chest caught him halfway, and he stopped short with a twisted smile as he exclaimed:

"I believe the old chap has been talking to you too! You're all in league to get me out of France."

This was so close to the truth that I could not contradict him, but shook my head in partial negative. His uncle felt, as I too came to feel later, that the loss to the world of such a brilliant mind and one with such potentialities would not be compensated for by the little good its master could accomplish physically in the trenches.

"After all," he argued, "how much poorer would Wales be if I were gone? The hole would soon be filled."

"I can't agree with you," I answered slowly; "your life is more important to others than you think, and you would risk it in a field for which you are not physically fitted. You have overdrawn your brain account at the Bank of Nature, and flesh is paying up. You must go home until the note is settled."

"Sounds rational but horribly mathematical—and I always hated mathematics. Hope I'll be able," he continued mischievously, "to repay the 'interest' you and uncle are taking in me."

"We want you to consider the matter philosophically," I said, "not mathematically."

"That's better," he replied, with his usual bright smile; "philosophy comes more natural to me. True, it savours of Euclid, but I can forgive it that offence; it has so many virtues."

He remained silent a few moments, thinking, and then asked me suddenly: "If I go home, how soon can I get back to France?"

"I hope you won't return here," I replied gravely; "it would be suicidal, and, flattery aside, your life is too valuable to be sacrificed over here."

"Perhaps you are right," he murmured pensively, as though we were discussing a third party whose life interested him only in an impersonal manner, and without exhibiting the slightest self-consciousness or vanity. "It might be better if I stayed at home. I admit," he continued more brightly, "I have a selfish desire to live. I am so young and have seen so little of this great big interesting world and I want so much to know what it all means. Still I would far sooner die than feel myself a slacker or a 'skrimshanker.'"

"No one will mistake you for either," I returned warmly. "Your lungs are not strong, and I fear if you remain here in the cold and wet you will not recover."

"There's so much in life to live for," he cried animatedly; "besides, I'm a little dubious of the after world. For a little longer I should like to learn what tangible pleasures this world offers, rather than tempt the unsubstantiated promises of a future state."

"But surely you believe in an after life?" I enquired, in some surprise.

"It's difficult to believe what one cannot prove," he returned evasively.

"But," I ventured argumentatively, "I can imagine that if the total matter in the universe is indestructible and cannot be added to or taken from, the soul too is indestructible—it may be changed, but cannot be destroyed."

"Ah!" he exclaimed quickly, "you are assuming the reality of the abstract. Suppose I do not agree with your hypothesis, and deny the existence of the soul! You cannot prove me wrong. Sometimes I fear," he continued more softly, "the soul, or what we conceive to be the soul, is merely the reflection of poor Humanity beating its anxious wings against the horror of extinction."

"Or the shadow of a poor physician scuttling away from the terrors of your philosophy," I laughed. "You iconoclasts would pull our castles-in-the-air about our ears and leave us standing in the ruins."

"I'll build another castle for you," he returned with a queer, sad smile, as though he sympathised with my dilemma.

"But not to-night," I urged, as I arose to go; "you must wait until you are stronger; you have been talking too much already for one so ill, and I must say good night."

It was several days later, and the youthful philosopher was making good progress on the road to recovery, when another young officer, very similar in appearance to our patient, drove up to the door of the hospital in a motor car. He was attended by two senior officers of distinguished appearance and very military bearing, and who showed considerable deference towards their young companion.

Apparently they had come from the front and, as the colonel showed them about the various wards, took the keenest interest in the patients. At last they came to the young Welshman's room. As they entered he turned to look at them, and, dropping his arms, suddenly lay at "attention" in bed.

"Llewellyn, by Jove!" exclaimed the youngest of the trio, as he stepped forward and shook our patient warmly by the hand. "I had no idea you were here. How are you?"

"Much better, thank you, your Royal Highness," said Llewellyn, with his ready smile, "and greatly honoured by your visit, sir."

"I hope it is nothing serious," said the Prince of Wales kindly—for it was he—"you are looking quite bright!"

"It isn't very serious, I believe, sir—a touch of pleurisy, that's all. But the doctors insist on sending me home on account of it. That is my chief grievance."

The young Prince smiled understandingly. It was not so long since he too had unwillingly been detained at home by illness. His blue eyes lit up with a quick sympathy as he remarked:

"I hadn't expected to find an old class-mate here; I hope you will soon be quite well again and able to return to France."

"I shall do my best to get well soon," Llewellyn answered thoughtfully; "but the doctors seem to consider my constitution too delicate for trench life, sir. I have the consolation, though, of knowing that our college is well represented at the front, for of the seventy-five students at Magdalen only five are home, and three of those were physically unfit."

"Isn't that a splendid record!" cried the Prince with enthusiasm. "It makes one feel proud of one's college."

They chatted on various topics for a few moments longer, and then as his Royal Highness turned to go he exclaimed:

"This is a wonderful hospital; a great credit to Canada! I must write father and tell him about it. I consider it one of the finest in France. I am sure you will do well here. Good-bye, dear chap, and the best of good luck to you!"

The kindly and earnest good wishes of his Royal young friend touched Llewellyn deeply, and there was a suspicious trace of moisture in his eyes as he returned:

"Good-bye, sir, and many, many thanks for your kindness in coming to see me."

CHAPTER XVII

The senior major bought a motor car. It was his supreme extravagance. If there were others who frittered away their substance in riotous living, at least the major could not be accused of such frivolity. He had none of the petty vices which eat like a wicked moth into the fabric of one's income. Any vice that got at his income bit it off in large chunks and bolted it before you could say "Jack Robinson." The motor car was the greatest of these. There may be some who do not consider a motor car a vice. The only answer I can give them is that they never saw the major's car. When he first unearthed its skeletal remains in the hospital garage, it bore a remote resemblance to a vehicle. It had part of an engine, four tireless wheels, and places which were meant for seats. A vision of its possibilities immediately arose before his mind's eye, and he could see it, rehabilitated and carefully fed, growing into a "thing of beauty and a joy forever."

Some of the officers argued it was German, because no such thing could have been made by human beings. Others maintained it had been left on the hospital grounds centuries before and the garage had grown up around it. The maker, out of modesty, had omitted to inscribe his name, but it had a number whose hieroglyphics antedated "Bill Stump's Mark." The original owner sacrificed it, from a spirit of patriotism, no doubt, for the paltry sum of three hundred dollars, and in the course of time, with the trifling expenditure of three hundred and fifty more, two mechanics succeeded in getting it started.

That was a memorable day when, with a noise like an asthmatic steam-roller, it came ambling out of the hospital yard, peered around the corner of the fence, and struck off down the road at a clip of three good English miles an hour.

We rushed to the door to see it, and when the smoke of the exhaust cleared a little, there sat the major ensconced in the front seat. There was a beatific smile about his mouth and a gleam of pride in his eye—the pride of possession. He wasn't quite sure what it was he possessed, but it was something which moved, something instinct with life.

"Sounds a bit noisy yet," he murmured confidentially to himself, "but it will loosen up when it gets running a while."

What prophetic sagacity there was in this remark! It did loosen up, and to such good purpose that several parts fell off upon the road. Little by little it got going, and in less than a month you might have heard it almost any bright afternoon, groaning in the garage preparatory to sallying forth upon its quest.

But about this time another event of such importance occurred that the major's car was thrust into the background. We had in our hospital a venerable old sergeant of peripatetic propensities, who had two claims to recognition: first, that he was, and is, the oldest soldier in the Canadian force in France; and secondly—but this was never proved—that he could "lick," according to his own testimony, any man within fifteen years of his age in that part of the world.

Sergeant Plantsfield, our postman and general messenger, travelled into Boulogne and back from once to thrice daily—in other words, inside the year he accomplished a motor trip of sufficient length to encompass the earth. His stock of rumours was inexhaustible, for he developed and launched upon an unappreciative world at least one new tale daily.

Now if there is one thing a soldier loves more than another it's a "rumour"; and the more glaringly absurd, the more readily he will listen to it. So when the worthy old sergeant burst into the hospital with excited eyes, flushed cheeks and cap all awry after his latest trip from Boulogne, the boys crowded round to hear the news.

"They're here! By gosh! They're here at last!" he shouted, as he deposited his overflowing mail bag in the hall and looked triumphantly from one to another of his listeners.

"Who's here," demanded Barker, "the Germans?"

"Germans be blowed!" declared the sergeant with scornful emphasis. "They won't never be here!"

"Put a little pep in it, dad!" said Huxford. "Wot is it?"

The sergeant waited a full minute to give impress to his announcement, and then in a tense whisper ejaculated: "The rest of the Canadians are in France—the whole division's at the front!"

There was a dead silence for a moment, and then a wild cheer went up that shook the hall until the windows rattled.

"Ye ain't stuffin' us again?" Wilson queried anxiously, when the noise had died away. "Ye done it so often afore."

Plantsfield looked at him with withering contempt. That his word—the word of the chief "rumourist" of the unit—should be doubted was almost too much for human endurance.

"I'll stuff you, ye young cub, if ye dare to doubt a man old enough to be yer grandfather," he returned scathingly; and then turning to the others he continued: "I seen the Mechanical Transport near Boulogne and was talkin' to them."

"Oh, I'll bet you wos talkin', all right," Wilson came back vindictively, "if ye got within fifty yards uv 'em."

Plantsfield's garrulity was proverbial. He had been known to buttonhole generals and draw them to one side to whisper a choice bit of scandal in their unwilling ears—his age excusing him from reprimand.

He looked wrathfully at Wilson, but that wily youth kept his rosy cheeks carefully out of arm-shot. Turning back to his more respectful auditors, and for the nonce ignoring the disrespectful one, he pursued:

"The Supply Column on their way to the front saw a German aeroplane over them, forgot discipline in their excitement, jumped down off their waggons and blazed away at it with their rifles."

"Without orders, I'll bet?" exclaimed Jogman, slapping his knee.

"Of course," grinned Plantsfield.

Honk had been standing with his mouth open, listening intently and taking in every word orally. He opened it a shade wider as Jogman finished speaking, and was about to make an observation, when Huxford, who was somewhat of a mimic, took the words out of his mouth:

"Just like them blawsted Canydians—'avin' their poke at th' bleedin' Hun. W'y cawn't they wyte fer h'orders like h'everybody h'else—wyte until 'e gits aw'y?"

Honk's indignant protest was drowned in the general clamour which followed this sally, but his eyes—individually—said wonders.

At the outset discipline was a sore point with the Canadians. Like the peoples of all free-born countries, it took a long time to suppress the desire for individual initiative and an innate independence resented authority. But as the war progressed, Tommy and his seniors came to realise the absolute necessity for discipline, and bowed with what grace they might before its yoke. Perhaps what reconciled them most was the acquired knowledge that it pervaded all ranks from the generals down. They soon saw that the chain of responsibility must have no missing link.

In the early days of the war, however, on Salisbury Plains in the rain and mud, discipline was almost an impossibility, and officers seeking to inculcate this quality in their men had many strange experiences.

A Tommy was doing "sentry go" one evening in front of his battalion lines when an officer approached to speak to him. Tommy kept his rifle firmly on his shoulder, at the "slope," and made no attempt to come to attention or salute. The officer, wishing to see if he understood his duty, demanded:

"What are you doing here?"

"Just walkin' up an' down," Tommy replied nonchalantly, forgetting, or at least omitting that important suffix: "sir."

"Just walking up and down," the officer reiterated, with annoyance. "What do you suppose you're walking up and down for?"

"To see that none of them guys comes in soused an' disorderly, I s'pose," he replied, but without any apparent interest in his occupation.

"Don't you know who I am?" the officer demanded testily, exasperated beyond endurance by such slackness.

"No," Tommy answered shortly. The absence of the "sir" was striking, and the tone implied further that he didn't care.

"I'm the commanding officer of your battalion!" Each word dropped like an icicle from the official lips.

"Holy—Jumpin'—Judas!" Tommy exclaimed, doing the "present arms" in three distinct movements—one to each word; "court-martial fer me!"

It was too much for the gravity of the most hardened disciplinarian. The colonel turned and fled from the spot until he was far enough away that the God of Discipline might not be incensed at his shouts of laughter.

Tommy escaped the court-martial, but he wondered all evening what a sentry really was supposed to do.

It was almost a month after Plantsfield's momentous announcement before the Canadians commenced arriving at our hospital. They came in twos and threes, scattered amongst large numbers of other British troops, but they were mostly cases of illness or slight wounds—and we had little opportunity for comparing the stoicism of our own boys with that of the English, Irish and Scotch who arrived in droves. What would our lads be like when they too came back broken and torn? Would they be as patient and brave as the other British Tommies? Could they measure up to the standard of heroism set by these men of the Bull Dog breed? We waited, we watched and we wondered.