Then he told me the story. All had gone well until I had been placed on my cot. Now a man will, under the influence of an anaesthetic, apparently seem to know what is going on around him, and will answer questions coherently, though he knows nothing about it. I had been lying on my cot a few minutes when an orderly came by, carrying a tray of enamel cups. He stumbled and fell, upsetting the tray and its contents with a crash. It was then I reached to heights of superb eloquence, and I was in disgrace.
CHAPTER XXXIII
BACK TO EARTH
It was curious to watch the nurses glance furtively in my direction with looks of mingled horror and curiosity. They, too, had heard swearing in their career of healing broken, fighting men, but in one apparently so young and unsophisticated—"it is just shocking!"
After the horrible nausea had left me, the nurse asked me what I would like, and what I had longed for a thousand and one times in France came to my mind. "A bottle of Bass or Guinness'," I said. Back she came with a little of the Guinness' in a cup, and I sank into the first dreamless sleep I had had for ages.
I was awakened by the pain in my limb, so began to interest myself in the other patients. Oh, the exhibition of patience, courage and suffering, both on the part of patients and the doctors and nurses.
Doctor, or Major Evans came to see me. "How are you, laddie?"
"Doing all right, sir."
"Good boy! From the prairies, aren't you?"
"Yes, sir."