In the Field (1914-1915) Part 15

And, as we came out of this humble chapel, I noticed two mattresses, laid in a corner of the little anteroom.

"Who sleeps here, then, Sister?" I asked.

Sister Gabrielle turned as red as a poppy. I had to repeat my question twice, when, lowering her eyes, she answered:

"Sister Elizabeth--Sister Elizabeth ... and I."

"Sister Gabrielle, ... Sister Gabrielle, then that little room and those two little beds where we slept, were yours?"

"Hus.h.!.+ Please come to breakfast at once."

And, light as a bird, she disappeared down the staircase, so quickly that her black veil floated high above her, as though to hide her confusion.

And we saw no more of Sister Gabrielle. It was a very old woman--one of the inmates--who brought us our hot milk and coffee, our brown bread and fresh b.u.t.ter, in the dining-room with the high cupboards of polished wood. She explained that at this hour the nuns were busy attending to their old folk. It was of no use begging to see our little hostess again. We were told it would be against the rules, and we felt that the curtain had now indeed fallen upon this charming act of the weary tragedy.

Only, just as we were pa.s.sing out of the convent gate for the last time, the old lady put into our hands a big packet of provisions wrapped up in a napkin. She had brought it hidden under her ap.r.o.n.

"Here, she told me to give you this, and ... to say that she will pray for you."

Our hearts swelled as we heard the heavy door close behind us. And whilst we went away silently along the broken, muddy road, we thought of the sterling hearts that are hidden under the humble habits of a convent.

Sister Gabrielle! I shall never forget you. Never will your delicate features fade from my memory. And I seem to see you still, going up the great wooden staircase, lit up by the flickering flame of the candle, when you and Sister Elizabeth gave up your beds so simply and unostentatiously to the two unknown soldiers.

VIII. CHRISTMAS NIGHT

"_Mon Lieutenant mon Lieutenant_, it's two o'clock."

My faithful Wattrelot held the flickering candle just in front of my eyes to rouse me. What torture it is to be s.n.a.t.c.hed from sleep at such an early hour! It would not be anything in summer; but it was the 24th of December, and it was my turn to go on duty in the trenches. A nice way of keeping Christmas!... I turned over in my bed, trying to avoid that light that tormented me; I collected my thoughts, which had wandered far away whilst I was asleep, and had been replaced by exquisite dreams, dreams of times of peace, of welfare, of good cheer, and of gentle warmth.

Then I remembered: I had to take command of a detachment of a hundred troopers of the regiment, who were to replace the hundred now in the trenches. It was nearly a month since we had joined our Army Corps near R., and every other day the regiment had to furnish the same number of men to occupy a sector of the trenches. It was my turn, on the 24th of December, to replace my brother-officer and good friend Lieutenant de la G., who had occupied the post since the 22nd.

I had forgotten all this.... How cold it was! Brrr!...

Whilst Wattrelot was taking himself off I braced myself for the necessary effort of getting out of the warm sheets. Like a coward, I kept on allowing myself successive respites, vowing to rise heroically after each.

"I will get up as soon as Wattrelot has reached the landing of the first floor.... I will get up when I hear him walking on the pavement of the hall, ... or rather when I hear the entrance-door shut, and his boots creaking on the gravel path...."

But every noise was hushed. Wattrelot was already some way off, and I still s.h.i.+ed at this act, which, after all, was inevitable: to get out of bed in a little ice-cold room at two o'clock in the morning.

Through the window, which had neither shutter nor curtain, I saw a small piece of the sky, beautifully clear, in which myriads of stars were twinkling. The day before, when I came in to go to bed, it was freezing hard. That morning the frost, I thought, must be terrible.

"Come, up!" With a bound I was on the ground, and rushed at once to the little pitch-pine washstand. Rapid ablutions would wake me up thoroughly. Horror! The water in the jug was frozen. Oh! not very deeply, no doubt; but all the same I had to break a coating of ice that had formed on the surface. However, I was happy to feel more nimble after having washed my face. Quick! Two warm waistcoats under my jacket, my large cloak with its cape, my fur gloves, my campaigning cap pulled over my ears, and there I was, with a candle in my hand, going down the grand staircase of the chateau.

For I was quartered in a chateau. The very word makes one think of a warm room, well upholstered, well furnished, with soft carpets and comfortable armchairs. But, alas! it was nothing of the sort.... The good lady whose house it was had provided for all contingencies; the family rooms had been prudently dismantled and double-locked. A formidable _concierge_ had the keys, and I was happy indeed when I found the butler's room in the attics. His bed, with its white sheets, seemed to me very desirable. And then, as we say in time of peace, one must take things as they come.

The open hall-door let in a wave of cold air, which struck cold on my face. But I had not a minute to lose. The detachment was to start at half-past two punctually, and it had, no doubt, already formed up in the market-place. I hurried into the street. The tall pines of the park stood out black against the silver sky, whilst the bare branches of the other trees formed thousands of arabesques and strange patterns all round. Not the slightest noise was to be heard in the limpid, diaphanous night, in which the air seemed as pure and rare as on the summits of lofty mountains. Under my footsteps the gravel felt soft, but, once I had got outside the iron gate, I found myself on ground as hard as stone. The mud formed by recent rains and the ruts hollowed by streams of convoys had frozen, and the road was a maze of furrows and inequalities which made me stumble again and again.

In front of the Hotel des Lacs a certain number of the men had already lined up, in front of their horses. Huddled in their cloaks, with collars turned up, they were stamping their feet and blowing into their hands. It must have been real torture for them too to come out of their straw litter, where they were sleeping so snugly a few moments before, rolled up in their blankets. They had got a liking for the kind of comfort peculiar to the campaigner, and had invented a thousand and one ingenious methods of improving the arrangements of their novel garrison. Sleeping parties had been gradually organised, and sets of seven or eight at a time enjoyed delightful nights, stretched on their clean straw. Many of them would certainly not be able to get to sleep if they suddenly found themselves in a real bed.

And then it is less difficult to get up when one has gone to bed with one's clothes on, and when the room is not very warm. Not one of them complained; not one of them grumbled. We can always count on our brave fellows.

"All present, _mon Lieutenant!_"

It was the senior non-commissioned officers of the two squadrons a.s.sembled there who reported. Every one had got up and equipped himself at the appointed hour; not one was missing at roll-call; they had all a.s.sembled of their own accord; the corporals had not needed to knock at door after door to wake the sleepers. Our Cha.s.seurs had very quickly established simple customs and rules of their own which ensured the regularity of the service without written orders. This intelligent and spontaneous discipline is one of the most admirable features of this campaign. It has grown up by degrees, without any special orders or prescriptions from above, with the result that the hardest labours are carried out almost without supervision, because each man understands the end in view and the grim necessities which it involves.

They understood at once that this early hour was the only one at which the relief could be effected. And every other day, just as on that December morning, twenty-five men out of each squadron get up at half-past one, equip themselves, and saddle their horses, whilst the cooks warm up a good cup of coffee for each man. Then, without any hurry, but at the exact moment, they form up in fighting order at the appointed spot, and when the officer arrives, in the dark, rain, wind, snow, or frost, he is sure of receiving the same report:

"All present, _mon Lieutenant!_"

Quick! Mount. We shall feel the cold less trotting over the hardened roads this bright night and under this brilliant moon. Two and two, in silence, we issued from the village in the direction of R. I knew that I should find a little further on, at the cross-roads where the crucifix stands, the fifty men of the first half-regiment and Second-Lieutenant de G., who serves under me.

Yes, there he was, coming to meet me on the hard road. It was a joy to me that chance had given me this jolly fellow for my trench companion.

I hardly knew him, for he had not been with us more than a few days.

Taken from the Military College directly war was declared, he had first been sent to a reserve squadron, and had only just been appointed to an active regiment. But I already knew, through my comrades of the first squadron, that he was a daring soldier and a merry companion. So much the better, I thought. War is a sad thing, and one must learn to take it gaily. A plague on gloomy spirits and long faces! True, we can no longer wage the picturesque war of the "good old days." We shall never know another Fontenoy, or Rivoli, or Eylau. But that is no reason why we should lose the jovial humour of our forefathers. Thank Heaven! we have preserved their qualities of dash and bravery. But it is more difficult to keep a smiling face in this hideous mole warfare, which is imposed even upon us troopers. All the more reason for liking and admiring the cheery officers who keep our spirits up, and G. is one of them.

We shook hands without speaking, for it seemed to us that if we opened our mouths the frost would get into our bodies and freeze them, and we set off at a sharp trot along the narrow by-road which, crossing the high-road to Paris, leads to C. There we should have to leave our horses, cross the zone of the enemy's artillery fire, and get to the trenches on foot. The horses snorted with pleasure, happy to warm themselves by rapid movement. Some of them indulged in merry capers, which were repressed, not too gently, by their more sedate riders.

Their hoofs struck the uneven ground with a metallic ring which must have echoed far; and the clink of bits and stirrups also disturbed the sleeping country. Before us the road ran straight amidst the dark fields, a long pale grey ribbon. No one thought of laughing or talking; sleep seemed still to hover over the column, and every one knew that the two days of trench duty would be long and hard to get through even if the Prussians left us in peace.

We pa.s.sed a cross, which shone white on the side of the road under the pale light of the moon, and saluted it. We had known it from the first days, and had its inscription by heart:

80 NON-COMMISSIONED OFFICERS, CORPORALS, AND SOLDIERS OF THE 39TH AND 74TH REGIMENTS OF INFANTRY, KILLED IN ACTION.

PRAY FOR THEM.

We dimly discerned the modest wreaths of green leaves, now faded and yellow, and the little nosegays of withered flowers attached to the arms of this cross, left there after the departure of the regiment and undisturbed by any sacrilegious hand.

We crossed the Paris road, with its double row of trees, which, in the night, appeared gigantic, and, after answering the challenge of the Territorial guarding the approach to C., we entered the village.

It appeared to be completely empty, and yet there were two battalions of the ---- Territorials quartered there. The moon seemed to be amusing itself by casting the shadows of the houses on one side of the street upon the walls of the other side in fantastic shapes.

"Dismount."

We had reached the spot where we were to leave our horses. The men quickly unbuckled the blankets which were to help them to endure the weary hours of the following night. They slung them over their shoulders, and we set off towards the towing-path of the ca.n.a.l. We went very slowly, as we had at least seven or eight kilometres before us, and a walk of eight kilometres for troopers laden and dressed as we were is no light matter.

We found the towing-path. Walking at that hour of the night is certainly not very alluring. However, the view was not lacking in grandeur. On either side of the ca.n.a.l the dark silhouettes of tall trees stood out against the sky. Their shadows were reflected in the water, which gleamed with a metallic l.u.s.tre in the moons.h.i.+ne. How calm and silent it was! Who would have thought we were at war? Not a cannon-shot, not a rifle-shot, disturbed the peace of the night. Yet, as a rule, there were no long intervals between the reports which reminded us of the serious work on hand.

That day it seemed as though some agreement had been come to by both sides to stop killing or trying to kill. However touching such an agreement might be, it would also be somewhat disturbing, for one must always beware of an enemy who resorts so freely to tricks and traps of every kind. It was as well not to celebrate Christmas too obtrusively.

Besides, I did not think we were the only ones keeping vigil at that hour.

From time to time we pa.s.sed small groups of infantry, haggard, dusty, and heavily laden, marching in ranks with their arms slung, by threes or fours, without speaking, striding slowly, as though they were trying to measure the length of the road. Some of them were carrying curious objects fastened to sticks: pots or big cans, perhaps baskets.

Where they were going or what they were doing we did not ask. Every man has his own job; if those fellows were going that way they had their orders, and n.o.body troubled himself about their object. All was well. The clattering of the Cha.s.seurs on the uneven road lent a little life to the picture. Perhaps they were talking together; but, if so, it was in an undertone, a whisper almost.

And suddenly the enemy let us know that he was also keeping watch. Far ahead of us, near C., a rocket went up into the clear sky and then fell slowly, very slowly, in the form of an intensely brilliant ball, lighting up all the surrounding country wonderfully. We knew them well, those formidable German rockets, which seemed as though they would never go out and shed a pallid and yet blinding light. We knew that as soon as they were lighted everybody who happened to be within range of the enemy's rifle fire had at once to lie flat on the ground, and not move or raise his head so long as the light was burning.