'Yes,' said Macgillivray with lips tight drawn. 'It's me. That's Dewar, isn't it? No need to undo the bandage, Dewar. It's my eyes—both gone—a bullet through them both. And I'll never hold a scalpel again. You can give me some morphia, Dewar—and send me on to the ambulance out of the way. I'm no good here now—or anywhere else, now or ever. I won't die, I know, but——'
They gave him the morphia, and before he slid off into unconsciousness he spoke a last word to the chaplain: 'You were right, padre. You remember . . . it's the women pay the hardest. . . . I'm thinking . . . of . . . my wife.'
The chaplain's thoughts went back to the wife and mother of the Dohertys, to the legless market-gardener and his ailing wife, to the boy lieutenant who was the last of his line, and a score more he knew, and his eyes followed as the stretcher bore out the hulk that had been a man who had done much to relieve pain and might have done so much more.
The voice of another new-arriving casualty broke his thoughts. 'We're winnin', doctor,' it was saying exultantly. 'All along the line we're winnin' this time. The Jocks has got right away for'ard, an' the Ghurkies is in wid their killin' knives on our left. An' the Irish is in front av all. Glory be! 'Tis a big foight this time, an' it's winnin' we are. Me good arm's gone I know, but I'd rather be here wid wan arm than annywhere else wid two. An' what's an arm or a man more or less in the world? We're winnin', I tell ye—we're winnin'!'
A SMOKER'S COMPANION
Except for the address, 'No. 1, Park-lane,' marked with a muddy forefinger on the hanging waterproof sheet which served as a door, there was nothing pretentious about the erection—it could not be called a building—which was for the time being the residence of three drivers of the Royal Field Artillery. But the shelter, ingeniously constructed of hop-poles and straw thatch, was more or less rain-proof, and had the advantage of being so close to the horse-lines that half a dozen strides brought the drivers alongside their 'long-nosed chums.' It was early evening; but the horses having been watered and fed, the labours of their day were over, and the Wheel and Lead Drivers were luxuriating in bootless feet while they entertained the Gunner who had called in from his own billet in the farm's barn.
The Gunner was holding forth on Tobacco Gifts. 'It's like this, see,' he said. 'An' I knows it's so 'cos I read it myself in the paper. First you cuts a coo-pon out o' the paper wi' your name an' address on it. . . .'
'But, 'ere, 'old on,' put in the Wheel Driver. ''Ow does my name get on it?'
'You write it there, fat'ead. Didjer think it growed there? You writes your name same as the paper tells, see; an' you cuts out the coo-pon an' you sends sixpence for one packet o' 'baccy. . . .'
'Wot sorter yarn you givin' us now?' said the Wheel Driver. 'I didn't send no sixpence, or cut out a cow-pen. I gets this 'baccy for nothin'. The Quarter tole me so.'