It is a big ledger some one has given him, in which he notes the
important events of his life.
Auger writes a round schoolboy hand. In fact, he can just write
sufficiently well for his needs, I might almost say for his pleasure.
"Would you care to look at my book?" he says, and he hands it to me with
the air of a man who has no secrets.
Auger receives many letters, and he copies them out carefully,
especially when they are fine letters, full of generous sentiments. His
lieutenant, for instance, wrote him a remarkable letter.
He also copies into his book the letters he writes to his wife and his
little girl. Then he notes the incidents of the day: "Wound dressed at
10 o'clock. The pus is diminishing. After dinner Madame la Princesse
Moreau paid us a visit, and distributed caps all round; I got a fine
green one. The little chap who had such a bad wound in the belly died at
2 o'clock...."
Auger closes his book and puts it back under his bolster.
He has a face that it does one good to look at. His complexion is warm
and fresh; his hair stiff and rather curly. He has a youthful moustache,
a well-shaped chin, with a lively dimple in the middle, and eyes which
seem to be looking out on a smiling landscape, gay with sunshine and
running waters.
"I am getting on splendidly," he says with great satisfaction. "Would
you like to see Mariette?"
He lifts up the sheet, and I see the apparatus in which we have placed
the stump of his leg. It makes a kind of big white doll, which he takes
in both hands with a laugh, and to which he has given the playful name
of "Mariette."
Auger was a sapper in the Engineers. A shell broke his thigh and tore
off his foot. But as the foot was still hanging by a strip of flesh,
Auger took out his pocket-knife, and got rid of it. Then he said to his
terror-stricken comrades: "Well, boys, that's all right. It might have
been worse. Now carry me somewhere out of this."
"Did you suffer terribly?" I asked him.
"Well, Monsieur, not as much as you might think. Honestly, it did not
hurt so very, very much. Afterwards, indeed, the pain was pretty bad."
I understand why every one is fond of Auger. It is because he is
reassuring. Seeing him and listening to him one opines that suffering
is not such a horrible thing after all. Those who live far from the
battle-field, and visit hospitals to get a whiff of the war, look at
Auger and go away well satisfied with everything: current events, him,
and themselves. They are persuaded that the country is well defended,
that our soldiers are brave, and that wounds and mutilations, though
they may be serious things, are not unbearable.
Yet pain has come to Auger as to the rest. But there is a way of taking
it.
He suffers in an enlightened, intelligent, almost methodical fashion. He
does not confuse issues, and complain indiscriminately. Even when in the
hands of others, he remains the man who had the courage to cut off his
own foot, and finish the work of the shrapnel. He is too modest and
respectful to give advice to the surgeon, but he offers him valuable
information.
He says:
"Just there you are against the bone, it hurts me very much. Ah! there
you can scrape, I don't feel it much. Take care! You're pressing rather
too hard. All right: you can go on, I see what it's for...."
And this is how we work together.
"What are you doing? Ah, you're washing it. I like that. It does me
good. Good blood! Rub a little more just there. You don't know how it
itches. Oh! if you're going to put the tube in, you must tell me, that I
may hold on tight to the table."
So the work gets on famously. Auger will make a rapid and excellent
recovery. With him, one need never hesitate to do what is necessary. I
wanted to give him an anaesthetic before scraping the bone of his leg.
He said:
"I don't suppose it will be a very terrible business. If you don't mind,
don't send me to sleep, but just do what is necessary. I will see to the
rest."
True, he could not help making a few grimaces. Then the Sergeant said to
him:
"Would you like to learn the song of the grunting pigs?"
"How does your song go?"
The Sergeant begins in a high, shrill voice:
Quand en passant dedans la plai-ai-ne
On entend les cochons...
Cela prouve d'une facon certai-ai-ne
Qu'ils non pas l'trooo du... bouche.
Auger begins to laugh; everybody laughs. And meanwhile we are bending
over the wounded leg and our work gets on apace.
"Now, repeat," says the Sergeant.
He goes over it again, verse by verse, and Auger accompanies him.
Quand en passant dedans la plai-ai-ne...
Auger stops now and then to make a slight grimace. Sometimes, too, his
voice breaks. He apologises simply:
"I could never sing in tune."
Nevertheless, the song is learnt, more or less, and when the General
comes to visit the hospital, Auger says to him:
"Mon General, I can sing you a fine song."
And he would, the rascal, if the head doctor did not look reprovingly at
him.
It is very dismal, after this, to attend to Gregoire, and to hear him
groaning:
"Ah! don't pull like that. You're dragging out my heart."
I point out that if he won't let us attend to him, he will become much
worse. Then he begins to cry.
"What do I care, since I shall die anyhow?"
He has depressed the orderlies, the stretcher-bearers, everybody. He
does not discourage me; but he gives me a great deal of trouble.
All you gentlemen who meet together to discuss the causes of the war,
the end of the war, the using-up of effectives and the future bases
of society, excuse me if I do not give you my opinion on these grave
questions. I am really too much taken up with the wound of our unhappy
Gregoire.
It is not satisfactory, this wound, and when I look at it, I cannot
think of anything else; the screams of the wounded man would prevent me
from considering the conditions of the decisive battle and the results
of the rearrangement of the map of Europe with sufficient detachment.
Listen: Gregoire tells me he is going to die. I think and believe that
he is wrong. But he certainly will die if I do not take it upon myself
to make him suffer. He will die, because every one is forsaking him. And
he has long ago forsaken himself.
"My dear chap," remarked Auger to a very prim orderly, "it is no
doubt unpleasant to have only one shoe to put on, but it gives one a
chance of saving. And now, moreover, I only run half as much risk of
scratching my wife with my toe-nails in bed as you do. ..."
"Quite so," added the Sergeant; "with Mariette he will caress his good
lady, so to speak."
Auger and the Sergeant crack jokes like two old cronies. The embarrassed
orderly, failing to find a retort, goes away laughing constrainedly.