CHAPTER XII
Bridget Cookson slowly signed her name to the letter she had been writing in the drawing-room of the boarding-house where she was accustomed to stay during her visits to town. Then she read the letter through—
'I can't get back till the middle or end of next week at least. There's been a great deal to do, of one kind or another. And I'm going down to Woking to-morrow to spend the week-end with a girl I met here who's knocked up in munition-work. Don't expect me till you see me. But I daresay I shan't be later than Friday.'
Bridget Cookson had never yet arrived at telling falsehoods for the mere pleasure of it. On the whole she preferred not to tell them. But she was well aware that her letter to Nelly contained a good many, both expressed and implied.
Well, that couldn't be helped. She put up her letter, and then proceeded to look carefully through the contents of her handbag. Yes, her passport was all right, and her purse with its supply of notes. Also the letter that she was to present to the Base Commandant, or the Red Cross representative at the port of landing. The latter had been left open for her to read. It was signed 'Ernest Howson, M.D.,' and asked that Miss Bridget Cookson might be sent forward to No. 102, General Hospital, X Camp, France, as quickly as possible.
There was also another letter addressed to herself in the same handwriting. She opened it and glanced through it—
'DEAR MISS COOKSON,—I think I have made everything as easy for you as I can on this side. You won't have any difficulty. I'm awfully glad you're coming. I myself am much puzzled, and don't know what to think. Anyway I am quite clear that my right course was to communicate with you—first. Everything will depend on what you say.'
The following afternoon, Bridget found herself, with a large party of V.A.D.'s, and other persons connected with the Red Cross, on board a Channel steamer. The day was grey and cold, and Bridget having tied on her life-belt, and wrapped herself in her thickest cloak, found a seat in the shelter of the deck cabins whence the choppy sea, the destroyer hovering round them, and presently the coast of France were visible. A secret excitement filled her. What was she going to see? and what was she going to do? All round her too were the suggestions of war, commonplace and familiar by now to half the nation, but not to Bridget who had done her best to forget the war. The steamer deck was crowded with officers returning from leave who were walking up and down, all of them in life-belts, chatting and smoking. All eyes were watchful of the sea, and the destroyer; and the latest submarine gossip passed from mouth to mouth. The V.A.D.'s with a few army nurses, kept each other company on the stern deck. The mild sea gave no one any excuse for discomfort, and the pleasant-faced rosy girls in their becoming uniforms, laughed and gossiped with each other, though not without a good many side glances towards the khaki figures pacing the deck, many of them specimens of English youth at its best.
Bridget however took little notice of them. She was becoming more and more absorbed in her own problem. She had not in truth made up her mind how to deal with it, and she admitted reluctantly that she would have to be guided by circumstance. Midway across, when the French coast and its lighthouses were well in view, she took out the same letter which she had received two days before at the Grasmere post-office, and again read it through.
'X Camp, 102, General Hospital.
'DEAR MISS COOKSON,—I am writing to you, in the first instance instead of to Mrs. Sarratt, because I have a vivid remembrance of what seemed to me your sister's frail physical state, when I saw you last May at Rydal. I hope she is much stronger, but I don't want to risk what, if it ended in disappointment, might only be a terrible strain upon her to no purpose—so I am preparing the way by writing to you.
'The fact is I want you to come over to France—at once. Can you get away, without alarming your sister, or letting her, really, know anything about it? It is the merest, barest chance, but I think there is just a chance, that a man who is now in hospital here may be poor George Sarratt—only don't build upon it yet, please. The case was sent on here from one of the hospitals near the Belgian frontier about a month ago, in order that a famous nerve-specialist, who has joined us here for a time, might give his opinion on it. It is a most extraordinary story. I understand from the surgeon who wrote to our Commandant, that one night, about three months ago, two men, in German uniforms, were observed from the British front-line trench, creeping over the No Man's Land lying between the lines at a point somewhere east of Dixmude. One man, who threw up his hands, was dragging the other, who seemed wounded. It was thought that they were deserters, and a couple of men were sent out to bring them in. Just as they were being helped into our trench, however, one of them was hit by an enemy sniper and mortally wounded. Then it was discovered that they were not Germans at all. The man who had been hit said a few incoherent things about his wife and children in the Walloon patois as he lay in the trench, and trying to point to his companion, uttered the one word "Anglais"—that, everyone swears to—and died. No papers were found on either of them, and when the other man was questioned, he merely shook his head, with a vacant look. Various tests were applied to him, but it was soon clear, both that he was dumb—and deaf—from nerve shock, probably—and that he was in a terrible physical state. He had been severely wounded—apparently many months before—in the shoulder and thigh. The wounds had evidently been shockingly neglected, and were still septic. The surgeon who examined him thought that what with exposure, lack of food, and his injuries, it was hardly probable he would live more than a few weeks. However, he has lingered till now, and the specialist I spoke of has just seen him.
'As to identification marks there were none. But you'll hear all about that when you come. All I can say is that, as soon as they got the man into hospital, the nurses and surgeons became convinced that he was English, and that in addition to his wounds, it was a case of severe shell-shock—acute and long-continued neurasthenia properly speaking,—loss of memory, and all the rest of it.
'Of course the chances of this poor fellow being George Sarratt are infinitesimal—I must warn you as to that. How account for the interval between September 1915 and June 1916—for his dress, his companion—for their getting through the German lines?
'However, directly I set eyes on this man, which was the week after I arrived here, I began to feel puzzled about him. He reminded me of someone—but of whom I couldn't remember. Then one afternoon it suddenly flashed upon me—and for the moment I felt almost sure that I was looking at George Sarratt. Then, of course, I began to doubt again. I have tried—under the advice of the specialist I spoke of—all kinds of devices for getting into some kind of communication with him. Sometimes the veil between him and those about him seems to thin a little, and one makes attempts—hypnotism, suggestion, and so forth. But so far, quite in vain. He has, however, one peculiarity which I may mention. His hands are long and rather powerful. But the little fingers are both crooked—markedly so. I wonder if you ever noticed Sarratt's hands? However, I won't write more now. You will understand, I am sure, that I shouldn't urge you to come, unless I thought it seriously worth your while. On the other hand, I cannot bear to excite hopes which may—which probably will—come to nothing. All I can feel certain of is that it is my duty to write, and I expect that you will feel that it is your duty to come.
'I send you the address of a man at the War Office—high up in the R.A.M.C.—to whom I have already written. He will, I am sure, do all he can to help you get out quickly. Whoever he is, the poor fellow here is very ill.'
* * * * *
The steamer glided up the dock of the French harbour. The dusk had fallen, but Bridget was conscious of a misty town dimly sprinkled with lights, and crowned with a domed church; of chalk downs, white and ghostly, to right and left; and close by, of quays crowded with soldiers, motors, and officials. Carrying her small suit-case, she emerged upon the quay, and almost immediately was accosted by the official of the Red Cross who had been told off to look after her.
'Let me carry your suit-case. There is a motor here, which will take you to X——. There will be two nurses going with you.'
Up the long hill leading southwards out of the town, sped the motor, stopping once to show its pass to the sentries—khaki and grey, on either side of the road, and so on into the open country, where an autumn mist lay over the uplands, beneath a faintly starlit sky. Soon it was quite dark. Bridget listened vaguely to the half-whispered talk of the nurses opposite, who were young probationers going back to work after a holiday, full of spirits and merry gossip about 'Matron' and 'Sister,' and their favourite surgeons. Bridget was quite silent. Everything was strange and dreamlike. Yet she was sharply conscious that she was nearing—perhaps—some great experience, some act—some decision—which she would have to make for herself, with no one to advise her. Well, she had never been a great hand at asking advice. People must decide things for themselves.
She wondered whether they would let her see 'the man' that same night. Hardly—unless he were worse—in danger. Otherwise, they would be sure to think it better for her to see him first in daylight. She too would be glad to have a night's rest before the interview. She had a curiously bruised and battered feeling, as of someone who had been going through an evil experience.
Pale stretches of what seemed like water to the right, and across it a lighthouse. And now to the left, a sudden spectacle of lines of light in a great semicircle radiating up the side of a hill.
The nurses exclaimed—
'There's the Camp! Isn't it pretty at night?'
The officer sitting in front beside the driver turned to ask—
'Where shall I put you down?'
'Number——' said both the maidens in concert. The elderly major in khaki—who in peace-time was the leading doctor of a Shropshire country town—could not help smiling at the two lassies, and their bright looks.
'You don't seem particularly sorry to come back!' he said.
'Oh, we're tired of holidays,' said the taller of the two, with a laugh.
'People at home think they're so busy, and—-'
'You think they're doing nothing?'
'Well, it don't seem much, when you've been out here!' said the girl more gravely—'and when you know what there is to do!'
'Aye, aye,' said the man in front. 'We could do with hundreds more of your sort. Hope you preached to your friends.'
'We did!' said both, each with the same young steady voice.
'Here we are—Stop, please.'
For the motor had turned aside to climb the hill into the semicircle. On all sides now were rows of low buildings—hospital huts—hospital marquees—stores—canteens. Close to the motor, as it came to a stand-still, the door of a great marquee stood open, and Bridget could see within, a lighted hospital ward, with rows of beds, men in scarlet bed-jackets, sitting or lying on them—flowers—nurses moving about. The scene was like some bright and delicate illumination on the dark.
'I shall have to take you a bit further on,' said the major to Bridget, as the two young nurses waved farewell. 'We've got a room in the hotel for you. And Dr. Howson will come for you in the morning. He thought that would be more satisfactory both for you and the patient than that you should go to the hospital to-night.'
Bridget acquiesced, with a strong sense of relief. And presently the camp and its lights were all left behind again, and the motor was rushing on, first through a dark town, and then through woods—pine woods—as far as the faint remaining light enabled her to see, till dim shapes of houses, and scattered lamps began again to appear, and the motor drew up.
'Well, you'll find a bed here, and some food,' said the major as he handed her out. 'Can't promise much. It's a funny little place, but they don't look after you badly.'
They entered one of the small seaside hotels of the cheaper sort which abound in French watering-places, where the walls of the tiny rooms seem to be made of brown paper, and everyone is living in their neighbour's pocket. But a pleasant young woman came forward to take Bridget's bag.
'Mademoiselle Cook—Cookson?' she said interrogatively. 'I have a letter for Mademoiselle. Du médecin,' she added, addressing the major.
'Ah?' That gentleman put down Bridget's bag in the little hall, and stood attentive. Bridget opened the letter—a very few words—and read it with an exclamation.
'DEAR MISS COOKSON,—I am awfully sorry not to meet you to-night, and at the hospital to-morrow. But I am sent for to Bailleul. My only brother has been terribly wounded—they think fatally—in a bombing attack last night. I am going up at once—there is no help for it. One of my colleagues, Dr. Vincent, will take you to the hospital and will tell me your opinion. In haste.—Yours sincerely,