The train made a long, slow grind over the rails; and it kept stopping with a griding sound and a jolt. Why did it go so slowly? At ten o’clock I begged and obtained another morphia dose, and got four hours’ sleep from it again.
Saturday
I suppose it was about 7.0 a.m. when we arrived at Étretat. I was taken and laid in the middle of rows and rows of Tommies in a big sunny courtyard. I thought how well the bearers carried the stretchers: I did not at all feel that I was likely to be dropped or tilted off on to my arm. There were a lot of men in blue hospital dress on the steps of a big house. I wondered where I was: in Havre probably. It was a queer sensation lying on my back gazing up at the sun; we were tightly packed in together, like cards laid in order, face upwards. How high everyone looked standing up. Then they discovered one or two officers, and I said that I too was an officer. I felt that they rather dared me to repeat this statement. Then a man looked at my label, and said: “Yes, he is an officer.” And I was taken up and carried off.
I found myself put to bed in a spacious room in which were only two beds. The house had only recently been finished, and was in use as a hospital. As soon as I was in bed, I felt a great relief again. No more motion for a time, I thought. There was a man in the other bed, threatened with consumption. We were talking, when a pretty V.A.D. nurse came in and asked what we wanted for breakfast. I felt quite hungry, and enjoyed tea and fish. I began to think that life was going to be good. I saw Cecil Todd, who had been slightly wounded a fortnight ago. I condoled with him on not getting to England. He asked me if I wanted to read. No, I did not feel like reading. I wrote a letter. Then two V.A.D. nurses came and dressed my wound. They seemed surprised to find so big a one, and sent for the doctor to see it. They dressed it very well, and gave me no unnecessary pain.
In the afternoon, I was again moved to a motor ambulance, which took me to Havre. It jolted and shook horribly. “This man does not know what it is like up here,” I thought. All the time I was straining my body to keep the left arm from touching the jolting stretcher. (The stretchers slide in the ambulance.) I was a top-berth passenger; I could touch the white roof with my right hand; and there was a stuffy smell of white paint.
At last it stopped, and after a wait I was carried amid a sea of heads, along a quay. I could smell sea and the stale oily smell of a steamer. Then I was taken over the gangway with that firm, steady, nodding motion with which I was getting so familiar, along the deck, through doorways, and into a big room, all green and white. All round the edge were beds, into one of which I was helped. In the centre of the room were beds that somehow reminded me of cots. I dare say there was a low railing round the beds that gave me this impression. A Scotch nurse looked after me. These nurses were all in grey and red; the others had been in blue. I wondered what was the difference. I asked the name of the ship and they said it was the Asturias.
Later on a steward brought a menu, and I chose my own dinner. Apparently I could eat what I liked. The doctor looked at my wound, and said it could wait until morning before being dressed; he pleased me. I was more comfortable than I had been yet. The boat was not due out till about 1.0 a.m. At eleven o’clock I again asked for morphia, and so got sleep for another four hours or so.
Sunday
“I represent Messrs. Cox and Co. Is there anything I can do for any of you gentlemen this morning?”
A short, squarely built man, with a black suit, a bowler hat, and a small brown bag, stepped briskly into the room. He gave me intense pleasure: as he talked to a Scotch officer who wanted some ready cash, I felt that I was indeed back in England. It was a hot sunny day; and a bowler hat on such a day made me feel sure that this was really Southampton, and not all a dream. Sir, whoever you are, I thank you for your most appropriate appearance.