This is not a story, it is rather a fragment, beginning where usually a
battle story ends, with a man being "casualtied," showing the principal
character only in a passive part--a very passive part--and ending, I am
afraid, with a lot of unsatisfactory loose ends ungathered up. I only
tell it because I fancy that at the back of it you may find some hint
of the spirit that has helped the British Army in many a tight corner.
Private Wally Ruthven was knocked out by the bursting of a couple of
bombs in his battalion's charge on the front line German trenches. Any
account of the charge need not be given here, except that it failed,
and the battalion making it, or what was left of them, beaten back.
Private Wally knew nothing of this, knew nothing of the renewed British
bombardment, the renewed British attack half a dozen hours later, and
again its renewed failure. All this time he was lying where the force
of the bomb's explosion had thrown him, in a hole blasted out of the
ground by a bursting shell. During all that time he was unconscious of
anything except pain, although certainly he had enough of that to keep
his mind very fully occupied. He was brought back to an agonizing
consciousness by the hurried grip of strong hands and a wrenching lift
that poured liquid flames of pain through every nerve in his mangled
body. To say that he was badly wounded hardly describes the case; an
R.A.M.C. orderly afterwards described his appearance with painful
picturesqueness as "raw meat on a butcher's block," and indeed it is
doubtful if the stretcher-bearers who lifted him from the shell-hole
would not rather have left him lying there and given their brief time
and badly needed services to a casualty more promising of recovery, if
they had seen at first Private Ruthven's serious condition. As it was,
one stretcher-bearer thought and said the man was dead, and was for
tipping him off the stretcher again. Ruthven heard that and opened his
eyes to look at the speaker, although at the moment it would not have
troubled him much if he had been tipped off again. But the other
stretcher-bearer said there was still life in him; and partly because
the ground about them was pattering with bullets, and the air about
them clamant and reverberating with the rush and roar of passing and
exploding shells and bombs, and that particular spot, therefore, no
place or time for argument; partly because stretcher-bearers have a
stubborn conviction and fundamental belief--which, by the way, has
saved many a life even against their own momentary judgment--that while
there is life there is hope, that a man "isn't dead till he's buried,"
and finally that a stretcher must always be brought in with a load, a
live one if possible, and the nearest thing to alive if not, they
brought him in.
The stretcher-bearers carried their burden into the front trench and
there attempted to set about the first bandaging of their casualty. The
job, however, was quite beyond them, but one of them succeeded in
finding a doctor, who in all the uproar of a desperate battle was
playing Mahomet to the mountain of such cases as could not come to him
in the field dressing station. The orderly requested the doctor to come
to the casualty, who was so badly wounded that "he near came to bits
when we lifted him." The doctor, who had several urgent cases within
arm's length of him as he worked at the moment, said that he would come
as soon as he could, and told the orderly in the meantime to go and
bandage any minor wounds his casualty might have. The bearer replied
that there were no minor wounds, that the man was "just nothing but one
big wound all over"; and as for bandaging, that he "might as well try
to do first aid on a pound of meat that had run through a mincing
machine." The doctor at last, hobbling painfully and leaning on the
stretcher-bearer--for he himself had been twice wounded, once in the
foot by a piece of shrapnel, and once through the tip of the shoulder
by a rifle bullet--came to Private Ruthven. He spent a good deal of
time and innumerable yards of bandages on him, so that when the
stretcher-bearers brought him into the dressing station there was
little but bandages to be seen of him. The stretcher-bearer delivered a
message from the doctor that there was very little hope, so that
Ruthven for the time being was merely given an injection of morphia and
put aside.
The approaches to the dressing station and the station itself were
under so severe a fire for some hours afterwards that it was impossible
for any ambulance to be brought near it. Such casualties as could walk
back walked, others were carried slowly and painfully to a point which
the ambulances had a fair sporting chance of reaching intact. One way
and another a good many hours passed before Ruthven's turn came to be
removed. The doctor who had bandaged him in the firing-line had by then
returned to the dressing station, mainly because his foot had become
too painful to allow him to use it at all. Merely as an aside, and
although it has nothing to do with Private Ruthven's case, it may be
worth mentioning that the same doctor, having cleaned, sterilized, and
bandaged his wounds, remained in the dressing station for another
twelve hours, doing such work as could be accomplished sitting in a
chair and with one sound and one unsound arm. He saw Private Ruthven
for a moment as he was being started on his journey to the ambulance;
he remembered the case, as indeed everyone who handled or saw that case
remembered it for many days, and, moved by professional interest and
some amazement that the man was still alive, he hobbled from his chair
to look at him. He found Private Ruthven returning his look; for the
passing of time and the excess of pain had by now overcome the effects
of the morphia injection. There was a hauntingly appealing look in the
eyes that looked up at him, and the doctor tried to answer the question
he imagined those eyes would have conveyed.
"I don't know, my boy," he said, "whether you'll pull through, but
we'll do the best we can for you. And now we have you here we'll have
you back in hospital in no time, and there you'll get every chance
there is."
He imagined the question remained in those eyes still unsatisfied, and
that Ruthven gave just the suggestion of a slow head-shake.
"Don't give up, my boy," he said briskly. "We might save you yet. Now
I'm going to take away the pain for you," and he called an orderly to
bring a hypodermic injection. While he was finding a place among the
bandages to make the injection, the orderly who was waiting spoke: "I
believe, sir, he's trying to ask something or say something."
It has to be told here that Private Ruthven could say nothing in the
terms of ordinary speech, and would never be able to do so again.
Without going into details it will be enough to say that the whole
lower part of--well, his face--was tightly bound about with bandages,
leaving little more than his nostrils, part of his cheeks, and his eyes
clear. He was frowning now and again, just shaking his head to denote a
negative, and his left hand, bound to the bigness of a football in
bandages, moved slowly in an endeavor to push aside the doctor's hands.
"It's all right, my lad," the doctor said soothingly. "I'm not going to
hurt you."
The frown cleared for an instant and the eloquent eyes appeared to
smile, as indeed the lad might well have smiled at the thought that
anyone could "hurt" such a bundle of pain. But although it appeared
quite evident that Ruthven did not want morphia, the doctor in his
wisdom decreed otherwise, and the jolting journey down the rough
shell-torn road, and the longer but smoother journey in the
sweetly-sprung motor ambulance, were accomplished in sleep.
When he wakened again to consciousness he lay for some time looking
about him, moving only his eyes and very slowly his head. He took in
the canvas walls and roof of the big hospital marquee, the
scarlet-blanketed beds, the flitting figures of a couple of
silent-footed Sisters, the screens about two of the beds; the little
clump of figures, doctor, orderlies, and Sister, stooped over another
bed. Presently he caught the eye of a Sister as she passed swiftly the
foot of his bed, and she, seeing the appealing look, the barely
perceptible upward twitch of his head that was all he could do to
beckon, stopped and turned, and moved quickly to his side. She smoothed
the pillow about his head and the sheets across his shoulders, and
spoke softly.
"I wonder if there is anything you want?" she said. "You can't tell me,
can you? just close your eyes a minute if there is anything I can do.
Shut them for yes--keep them open for no."
The eyes closed instantly, opened, and stared upward at her.
"Is it the pain?" she said. "Is it very dreadful?"
The eyes held steady and unflickering upon hers. She knew well that
there they did not speak truth, and that the pain must indeed be very
dreadful.
"We can stop the pain, you know," she said "Is that what you want?"
The steady unwinking eyes answered "No" again, and to add emphasis to
it the bandaged head shook slowly from side to side on the pillow.
The Sister was puzzled; she could find out what he wanted, of course,
she was confident of that; but it might take some time and many
questions, and time just then was something that she or no one else in
the big clearing hospital could find enough of for the work in their
hands. Even then urgent work was calling her; so she left him,
promising to come again as soon as she could.
She spoke to the doctor, and presently he came back with her to the
bedside. "It's marvelous," he said in a low tone to the Sister, "that
he has held on to life so long."
Private Ruthven's wounds had been dressed there on arrival, before he
woke out of the morphia sleep, and the doctor had seen and knew.
"There is nothing we can do for him," he said, "except morphia again,
to ease him out of his pain."
But again the boy, his brow wrinkling with the effort, attempted with
his bandaged hand to stay the needle in the doctor's fingers.
"I'm sure," said the Sister, "he doesn't want the morphia; he told me
so, didn't you?" appealing to the boy.
The eyes shut and gripped tight in an emphatic answer, and the Sister
explained their code.
"Listen!" she said gently. "The doctor will only give you enough to
make you sleep for two or three hours, and then I shall have time to
come and talk to you. Will that do!"
The unmoving eyes answered "No" again, and the doctor stood up.
"If he can bear it, Sister," he said, "we may as well leave him. I
can't understand it, though. I know how those wounds must hurt."
They left him then, and he lay for another couple of hours, his eyes
set on the canvas roof above his head, dropped for an instant to any
passing figure, lifting again to their fixed position. The eyes and the
mute appeal in them haunted the Sister, and half a dozen times, as she
moved about the beds, she flitted over to him, just to drop a word that
she had not forgotten and she was coming presently.
"You want me to talk to you, don't you?" she said. "There is something
you want me to find out?"
"Yes--yes--yes," said the quickly flickering eyelids.
The Sister read the label that was tied to him when he was brought in.
She asked questions round the ward of those who were able to answer
them, and sent an orderly to make inquiries in the other tents. He came
back presently and reported the finding of another man who belonged to
Ruthven's regiment and who knew him. So presently, when she was
relieved from duty--the first relief for thirty-six solid hours of
physical stress and heart-tearing strain--she went straight to the
other tent and questioned the man who knew Private Ruthven. He had a
hopelessly shattered arm, but appeared mightily content and amazingly
cheerful. He knew Wally, he said, was in the same platoon with him;
didn't know much about him except that he was a very decent sort; no,
knew nothing about his people or his home, although he remembered--yes,
there was a girl. Wally had shown him her photograph once, "and a real
ripper she is too." Didn't know if Wally was engaged to her, or
anything more about her, and certainly not her name.
The Sister went back to Wally. His wrinkled brow cleared at the sight
of her, but she could see that the eyes were sunk more deeply in his
head, that they were dulled, no doubt with his suffering.
"I'm going to ask you a lot of questions," she said, "and you'll just
close your eyes again if I speak of what you want to tell me. You do
want to tell me something, don't you?"
To her surprise, the "Yes" was not signaled back to her. She was
puzzled a moment. "You want to ask me something?" she said.
"Yes," the eyelids flicked back.
"Is it about a girl?" she asked. ("No.")
"Is it about money of any sort?" ("No.")
"Is it about your mother, or your people, or your home? Is it about
yourself?"
She had paused after each question and went on to the next, but seeing
no sign of answering "Yes" she was baffled for a moment. But she felt
that she could not go to her own bed to which she had been dismissed,
could not go to the sleep she so badly needed, until she had found and
answered the question in those pitiful eyes. She tried again.
"Is it about your regiment?" she asked, and the eyes snapped "Yes," and
"Yes," and "Yes" again. She puzzled over that, and then went back to
the doctor in charge of the other ward and brought back with her the
man who "knew Wally." Mentally she clapped her hands at the light that
leaped to the boy's eyes. She had told the man that it was something
about the regiment he wanted to know; told him, too, his method of
answering "Yes" and "No," and to put his questions in such, a form that
they could be so answered.
The friend advanced to the bedside with clumsy caution.
"Hello, Wally!" he said cheerfully. "They've pretty well chewed you up
and spit you out again, 'aven't they? But you're all right, old son,
you're going to pull through, 'cause the O.C. o' the Linseed
Lancers[Footnote: Medical Service.] here told me so. But Sister here
tells me you want to ask something about someone in the old crush." He
hesitated a moment. "I can't think who it would be," he confessed. "It
can't be his own chum, 'cause he 'stopped one,' and Wally saw it and
knew he was dead hours before. But look 'ere," he said determinedly,
"I'll go through the whole bloomin' regiment, from the O.C. down to the
cook, by name and one at a time, and you'll tip me a wink and stop me
at the right one. I'll start off with our own platoon first; that ought
to do it," he said to the Sister.
"Perhaps," she said quickly, "he wants to ask about one of his
officers. Is that it?" And she turned to him.
The eyes looked at her long and steadily, and then closed flutteringly
and hesitatingly.
"We're coming near it," she said, "although he didn't seem sure about
that 'Yes.'"
"Look 'ere," said the other, with a sudden inspiration, "there's no
good o' this 'Yes' and 'No' guessin' game; Wally and me was both in the
flag-wagging class, and we knows enough to--there you are." He broke
off in triumph and nodded to Wally's flickering eyelids, that danced
rapidly in the long and short of the Morse code.
"Y-e-s. Ac-ac-ac."[Footnote: Ac-ac-ac: three A's, denoting a full stop.
In "Signalese" similar-sounding letters are given names to avoid
confusion. A is Ac; T, Toe; D, Don; P, Pip; M, Emma, etc.]
"Yes," he said. "If you'll get a bit of paper, Sister, you can write
down the message while I spells it off. That's what you want, ain't it,
chum?"
The Sister took paper and pencil and wrote the letters one by one as
the code ticked them off and the reader called them to her.
"Ready. Begins!" Go on, Miss, write it down," as she hesitated.
"Don-I-Don--Did; W-E--we; Toc-ac-K-E--take; Toc-H-E--the;
Toc-R-E-N-C-H--trench; ac-ac-ac. Did we take the trench?"
The signaler being a very unimaginative man, possibly it might never
have occurred to him to lie, to have told anything but the blunt truth
that they did not take the trench; that the regiment had been cut to
pieces in the attempt to take it; that the further attempt of another
regiment on the same trench had been beaten back with horrible loss;
that the lines on both sides, when he was sent to the rear late at
night, were held exactly as they had been held before the attack; that
the whole result of the action was _nil_--except for the casualty list.
But he caught just in time the softly sighing whispered "Yes" from the
unmoving lips of the Sister, and he lied promptly and swiftly,
efficiently and at full length.
"Yes," he said. "We took it. I thought you knew that, and that you was
wounded the other side of it; we took it all right. Got a hammering of
course, but what was left of us cleared it with the bayonet. You should
'ave 'eard 'em squeal when the bayonet took 'em. There was one big
brute----"
He was proceeding with a cheerful imagination, colored by past
experiences, when the Sister stopped him. Wally's eyes were closed.
"I think," she said quietly, "that's all that Wally wants to know.
Isn't it, Wally?"
The lids lifted slowly and the Sister could have cried at the glory and
satisfaction that shone in them. They closed once softly, lifted
slowly, and closed again tiredly and gently. That is all. Wally died an
hour afterwards.