The Lieutenant read obediently, turning the card backwards and forwards in his fingers as if looking for something that wasn't there. The crumpled sheets of his letter dropped to the deck and lay unheeded.
Then abruptly he laughed; it was not a laugh common to Englishmen, and so disconcerting was the sound that two or three faces lifted from the preoccupation of letter or illustrated paper, and tranquil eyes stared curiously.
"My God!" said the First Lieutenant. "That's the best joke—the best joke——" His voice dropped low. He handed back the Christmas-card and fumbled blindly for the fallen sheets of his letter. One by one he straightened them on his knees, smoothing out the creases mechanically.
"The best joke——" He rose to his feet with something in his white face that jerked the medical man instantly upright beside him.
"Sit down," said the First Lieutenant, and there was a note in his voice the Doctor obeyed, because it was something he was still young enough to acknowledge. "Listen," said the Lieutenant, in hard, dry tones. "You've got to share this—you've all got to share this." Papers rustled and every eye was on the speaker. "It's—it's too good to keep to oneself. My brother"—he made a little gesture with the letter in his hand—"my brother was wounded—broken thigh—twenty miles behind the line in a base hospital—the Huns bombed it in broad daylight, with the Red Cross flying on every flagstaff and painted on every roof—bombed it in cold blood, and killed thirty-four wounded officers and men and two V.A.D.'s. They killed my brother, and they killed——" He thrust the letter into the limp hands of the Surgeon Probationer. "You gave me something to read just now. Read that! They killed the whitest woman—she was trying to save him—with the Red Cross on her breast—and his thigh broken. Goodwill among men! Love your enemies! Love your——"
The Gunner came across the mess with his heavy tread, his stolid face full of concern.
"No offence, I'm sure, sir," he said, glancing at the Surgeon. "Mr. Dantham didn't know—how could he? Nor yet his aunt——"
The tragedy of one is the tragedy of all in a community as small and as intimate as a Destroyer Wardroom; but the innate sense of justice in the Briton's heart found expression in the Gunner's inarticulate sympathy. He held no brief for the Hun, but he was the champion of the shocked Surgeon and Aunt Agatha for all her pacifist leanings.
The Surgeon sat with the unread letter in his hands staring up at the First Lieutenant.
"Oh!" he said. "Oh, the swine." A growl of confirmation ran round the Mess, but no one addressed the First Lieutenant direct.