A famous war correspondent paid them a fleeting visit, before he was ordered twenty miles back to Dunkirk by Kitchener.
"By the law of probabilities," he observed to Dr. McDonnell, as he was saying good-bye, "you and your staff are going to be wiped out, if you keep on running your motors into excitement."
The Doctor smiled. It was doubtful if he heard the man.
One day, the Doctor got hold of Smith, a London boy driver, and Hilda, and said:
"I think we would better visit Dixmude, this morning. It sounds like guns in that direction. That means work for us. Get your hat, my dear."
"But I never wear a hat," she said with a touch of irritation.
"Ah, I hadn't noticed," returned the Doctor, and he hadn't. Hilda went free and fair those days, with uncovered head. Where the men went, there went she. For the modern woman has put aside fear along with the other impediments. The Doctor and Hilda, and, lastly, Smith, climbed aboard and started at fair speed.
Smith's motor-ambulance was a swift machine, canopied by a brown hood, the color of a Mediterranean sail, with red crosses on the sides to ward off shells, and a huge red cross on the top to claim immunity from aeroplanes with bombs and plumbed arrows.
"Make haste, make haste," urged Dr. McDonnell, who felt all time was wasted that was not spent where the air was thick. They had ridden for a half hour.