“I didn’t see any Germans—not in my guard-house. And I wasn’t invited anywhere else. What’s it all about, Bob? I wasn’t a spy, I was a prisoner. Awful beasts, Bol——”
“Oh, Alan!” Bob came so near saying “Don’t be a silly ass” that Arthur’s nickname for his brother all at once explained itself.
Major Greyson interposed. “Bob, do you know that a frozen foot hurts even more than a broken leg? Don’t expect too much thinking of him for a day or two. Forget the Bolshies for a while. Let other people worry about them until you’re on your legs again.”
Alan nodded approval. “Can’t see why he wants to think of them at all, can you, Major? Yes, that does rather hurt when you touch it. Sorry I jumped. I’ll be quiet now.”
CHAPTER V
FROM RUSSIA INTO GERMANY
The snow-storm that began on Christmas afternoon raged for five days before the grey skies lightened and the wind died down. And it was but the first of a long series that during all of January kept Archangel and the surrounding country buried beneath an impenetrable blanket which effectually put an end to fighting, other than small raids and infrequent air battles.
It was a world of snow; snow-covered roofs, paths dug between snow-walls, trees bent down with the burden of their snow-laden branches. Even a shout given in the open seemed dulled and deadened. The air, ice-cold though it was, had no tonic sting to it. It penetrated, chilling and dispiriting, to the soldiers’ very bones. The sun peeped out from behind the everlasting clouds only to disappear again before its pale warmth was felt, and in its place fog descended over the snow-fields, shortening the brief hours of daylight still more, so that sometimes the noon dinner hour was no more than over before darkness began to fall.
The snow kept Alan Leslie in the American hospital for weeks after Christmas, and when he and Bob were well on the road to convalescence it prevented them from moving beyond the hospital’s small, crowded rooms, where they shivered in draughts or crouched by the stove, longing for sunshine and a chance to hobble about outdoors a little without plunging into snowdrifts.
“This is no place for you to get well, Bob. We’ll send you away,” said Major Greyson one morning.