[Illustration]
_Night_
You can little imagine how lonely it is here under the black,
star-swept sky, the houses only masses of regular blackness in the
darkness, the street silent as a dune in the desert, and devoid of
any sign of human life. Muffled and heavy, the explosion of a torpedo
inscribes its solitary half-note on the blank lines of the night's
stillness. I go up to my room, and sigh with relief as my sulphur match
boils blue and breaks into its short-lived yellow flame. Shadows are
born, leaping and rising, and I move swiftly towards my candle-end,
the flame catches, and burns straight and still in the cold, silent
room. The people who lived here were very religious; an ivory Christ
on an ebony crucifix hangs over the door, and a solemn-eyed, pure and
lovely head of Jeanne d'Arc stands on my mantel. What a marvellous
history--hers! I think it the most beautiful, mystic tale in our human
annals.
Silence--sleep--the crowning mercy. A few hours go by.
_Morning_
"There is a call, Monsieur Shin--_un couché à_----"
I wake. The night clerk of the Bureau is standing in the doorway. An
electric flashlight in his hand sets me a-blinking. I dress, shivering
a bit, and am soon on my way. The little gray machine goes cautiously
on in the darkness, bumping over shell-holes, guided by the iridescent
mud of the last day's rain. I reach a wooded stretch----_phist!_ a
rifle bullet goes winging somewhere. A bright flash illuminates the
road. A shell sizzles overhead. I reach the _poste de secours_ and
find a soldier in the roadway. More electric hand-lamps. Down a path
comes a stretcher and a man wounded in arm and thigh. We put him into
the wagon, cover him up, and away I start on my long, dark ride to the
hospital, a lonely, nerve-tightening ride.
_Stray Thoughts_
The voice of war is the voice of the shell. You hear a perfectly
horrible sound as if the sky were made of cloth and the Devil were
tearing it apart, a screaming undulating sound followed by an explosion
of fearful violence, _bang!_ The violence of the affair is what
impresses you, the suddenly released energy of that murderous burst.
When I was a child I used to wander around the shore and pick up hermit
crabs and put them on a plate. After a little while you would see a
very prudent claw come out of the shell, then two beady eyes, finally
the crab _in propria persona_. I was reminded of that scene on seeing
people come cautiously out of their houses after a shell had fallen,
peeping carefully out of doorways, and only venturing to emerge after a
long reconnoitring.
I am staying here. It was my design to leave at the beginning of the
year, but why should I go? I am very happy to be able to do something
here, very proud to feel that I am doing something. In times to come
when more Americans realize their lost opportunity, there will be many
regrets, but you and I will be content. So wish me the best. Not that
there is anything attractive to keep me here. To live continually under
shell fire is a hateful experience, and the cheerless life, so empty
of any domesticity, and the continuous danger are acid to any one with
memories of an old, beloved New England hearth and close family ties
and friendships. To half jest, I am enduring war for peace of mind.
How lonely my old house must be when the winter storms surge round it
at midnight. How the great flakes must swirl round its ancient chimney,
and fall softly down the black throat of the fireplace to the dark,
ungarnished hearth. The goblin who polished the pewter plates in the
light of the crumbling fire-brands has gone to live with his brother in
a hollow tree on the hill. But when you come to Topsfield, the goblin
himself, red flannel cap and all, will open the door to you as the
house's most honored and welcome guest.
A _fusée éclairante_ has just run over the wood--the _bois de la
mort_--the wood of the hundred thousand dead. And side by side with
the dead are the living, the soldiers of the army of France, holding,
through bitter cold and a ceaseless shower of iron and hell, the
far-stretching lines. If there is anything I am proud of, it is of
having been with the French army--the most devoted and heroic of the
war.