I wonder, as I sit here, in one of those rare, quiet moments that
fall in a nurse's day, whilst I am preparing my charts, what they are
thinking of in this silent room.
This group is singularly silent. They do not talk from bed to bed,
as some of the more loquacious do. Directly opposite is one of those
fragile bits of humanity that the violent wind of war has blown, like
an unresisting leaf, into the vortex. Monsieur Gilet is a humble
little school teacher from some humble little village school in a once
peaceful commune, where in another little village school his humble
little wife teaches school as he does. He is so light and so frail that
I can lift him myself with ease. He has a shrapnel wound in his side
and they have not found the ball. His thin cheeks are scarlet. He is
gentleness and sweetness itself. What has he ever done to be crucified
like this? Monsieur Gilet is not thinking of his burning wound. He is
thinking of the little woman in the province of Cher. How can she come
to see him? She has no congé. When will she come to see him? For his
life is all there in that war-shattered country. She has a baby twelve
weeks old, born since he went to battle. That's what he is thinking of.
When will she come?
On his right is a superb Arab, with an arm and hand so broken and
so mutilated that it is hard to hold it without shuddering when the
doctors drain it. On his head I have carefully adjusted a bright yellow
flannel fez. His mild, docile eyes follow the nurse as she does for
him the few little things she can to make him more at ease. For every
service done, he thanks her in a sweet, soft voice. Just now, when
I left him to come over here and sit down before my table, his eyes
filled with tears. He can say a few words of French. He kisses my hand
with Oriental grace. "Merci, ma mère."
On Monsieur Gilet's left lies a man whose language is as hard to
understand, very nearly, as the Arab's--almost unintelligible--a
_patois_ of the Midi. He is a gardener, used only to the care of plants
and flowers. He is a big, rugged giant, and so strong, and so silent
a sufferer that since his entrance to the hospital he has not made
one murmur or one complaint, or asked one service, and excepting when
spoken to, he never says a word. Then he gives you a radiant smile and
some token of gratitude. They operated on him to-day. There is shrapnel
in his eye. He will never fully see his gardens again, and he is so
strong and so patient and so able to bear pain, that they operated
on him without anæsthetics, and he walked to and from the operating
room--a brave, silent, docile giant, singularly appealing.... He is
thinking of his gardens, trodden out of all semblance of beauty, for
he had been working in the north before the heel of the barbarian
crushed out his flowers for ever and blotted out his sight.