'Ah! that's funny,' he muttered, 'I've been asleep—it has done me good.'
Indeed, he now felt less of that painful oppression, the bone-splitting clasp of fright upon his temples and his ribs; and he began to poke fun at Lapoulle, who had not merely been expressing anxiety about Chouteau and Loubet, ever since their disappearance, but had even talked of going to look for them. That was a fine idea; all he wanted, no doubt, was to shelter himself behind a tree and smoke a pipe there! Pache opined that the two men had been detained at the ambulance, where there was probably a lack of bearers. Ah! that business of picking up the wounded under the enemy's fire was by no means a pleasant one. Full of the superstitious notions of his native village, Pache added that it was very unlucky to touch a corpse—whoever did so would soon die.
'Thunder! will you just shut up?' cried Lieutenant Rochas, who had overheard this remark. 'Does anybody die?'
Colonel de Vineuil, erect on his big charger a few paces away, turned his head at this, and smiled for the first time that morning, Then he again subsided into his motionless attitude, still impassively waiting for orders, whilst the shells continued raining around him.
Maurice, who had now become interested in the bearers, watched them as they searched about in the various folds of the ground. A field ambulance was being installed behind a bank, at the edge of the hollow road near by, and the bearers attached to it were beginning to explore the plateau. A tent was promptly pitched whilst the necessary matériel was removed from a van waiting on the road. Instruments, apparatus, and linen were produced—the few things, in fact, that were requisite for summary dressings pending the despatch of the wounded to Sedan, whither they were sent as rapidly as could be managed. Vehicles, however, were already becoming scarce. There were only some assistant surgeons in charge of the ambulance, and it was more particularly the bearers who gave proof of a stubborn, inglorious courage. Clad in grey, with the red cross of Geneva on their caps and their arm-badges, they could be seen venturing slowly and quietly under the projectiles, as far as the spots where the soldiers had fallen. They often crawled along on hands and knees, and endeavoured to take advantage of the various ditches and hedges, of all the protection that the ground afforded, never evincing any braggardism in unnecessarily exposing themselves to peril. As soon as they found any men on the ground their laborious task began, for many of those who were lying there had simply fainted, and it was necessary to distinguish the wounded from the dead. Some men had remained face downwards, and were stifling with their mouths in pools of blood; others had their throats full of earth, as though they had bitten the ground; others, again, were lying in a heap, pell-mell, with their arms and legs contracted and their chests half crushed. The bearers carefully extricated and picked up those who were still breathing, stretching their limbs and raising their heads, which they cleaned as well as they could manage. Each bearer carried a can of water, in the use of which he was extremely sparing. And one or another of them would often be seen kneeling on the same spot for many minutes together, trying to revive some wounded man and waiting for him to open his eyes.
At fifty yards or so, on his left hand, Maurice noticed one bearer looking for the wound of a little soldier, from one of whose sleeves a streamlet of blood trickled continuously. This was a case of hæmorrhage, and the man with the red cross having at last found the wound managed to stop the flow of blood by compressing the artery. In this manner the bearers attended to all urgent cases. Whenever there was a fracture they were not only particularly careful how they moved the man, but they fixed and bandaged his damaged limb, so that his condition might not be aggravated by transport. The conveyance of the wounded to the ambulance was indeed the great affair; the bearers supported those who could still walk, and carried others either in their arms like babies or in pick-a-back fashion. At times also, according to the difficulties of the case, two, three, or four of them assembled and formed a seat with their joined hands, or carried the sufferer away in a horizontal position, by his legs and shoulders. To supplement the regulation stretchers, recourse was had to all sorts of ingenious devices; at times a stretcher would be formed by linking a couple of chassepots together with knapsack-straps. And all over the bare plateau which the shells were ploughing the bearers could be seen, now single, now in small parties, gliding along with their burdens, bending their heads, testing the ground with their feet, and displaying prudent but admirable heroism.
Whilst Maurice was watching one of them on his right hand, a thin, puny fellow, who, like some toilsome ant burdened with too large a grain of wheat, was staggering along with bended legs, carrying a heavy sergeant whose arms were entwined around his neck, he suddenly saw both men topple over and disappear amid the explosion of a shell. When the smoke had cleared off the sergeant again appeared to view, lying on his back and without any fresh wound, whereas the bearer was stretched beside him with his flank ripped open. And thereupon another bearer came up, another busy ant, who after turning his comrade over and finding him dead, again picked up the wounded sergeant and carried him away.
Maurice thereupon remarked to Lapoulle: 'Well, if you like their job better than ours, just go and lend them a hand.'
For a moment or so the batteries of St. Menges had been firing their utmost, and the hailstorm of projectiles was becoming more violent. Captain Beaudoin, who was still nervously walking up and down in front of his company, at last ventured to approach the colonel. It was pitiful, said he, that the spirits of the men should be worn out like that, by long hours of idle waiting.
'I have no orders,' stoically repeated the colonel.