A young medical man came out of the hospital, and seeing my wan and haggard face, came up to me. He was certainly sympathetic.
"Heavens, man! You look downright ill!" was his comment.
"I reckon I don't look worse than I feel!" I replied caustically. "I've just been turned out of the hospital. What is going to happen?"
"Oh! You've got to go to Paderborn. You'll go into hospital there. The van will be up in three hours' time!"
At this intelligence I sank on a wooden seat. I felt, and indeed could no longer ward off, the belief that everything for me was rapidly approaching the end. As I sat there a prey to my worst thoughts, a soldier came out of the hospital and sat beside me. I looked up.
"Hullo! old man! From Mons?" I asked.
"Yes! Going to Paderborn. Says I'm sick," nodding towards the hospital. The Tommy certainly looked as if the doctor had diagnosed a case correctly for once in his life.
"What's the matter?"
"Don't know for sure. But I heard the doctor whisper to an assistant that it was typhus!"
Despite my efforts to control myself I could not suppress a low whistle. I looked at the soldier, and although my first inclination was to move away, I felt that, owing to my condition, it really didn't matter, so I spared the Tommy's feelings. In a few minutes another soldier came out. He sat on the other side of me.