HEADQUARTERS OF THE MONTENEGRIN POLICE (AT PETCH)
ON RIGHT, GAOLBIRD'S HOUSE ON LEFT
CONVERTING FOUR-WHEELED WAGONS INTO TWO-WHEELED
CARTS, IN CEMETERY AT PETCH
The evening colours were a recompense for a wet and dreary day; this side of the broad Morava, yellow beech leaves, caught by the red rays of the setting sun; beyond the river, green-grey mountains, and over these a rainbow, which seemed unwilling to touch the bloodstained earth, and dispersed amongst the clouds. Along the road everything was drab and dead, or dying; the ghost-like procession of convoys and of fugitives was not dead, for it was moving; but it was movement without life, for the soul was stunned.
The town of Varvarin, which we reached at 6 p.m., was in darkness; shuttered and deserted; mud and rain, as usual, in possession. We halted in the broad, main street, ambulance wagons all in line, in a foot and a half of mud, for the column to eat some food, for which there had been no time all day. Immediately on arriving, I received a message that a certain artillery major had been waiting for some hours to shake hands with me. He had once visited our camp at Kragujevatz. I remembered him as a vivacious and intelligent officer, and I was proud that, in the midst of his strenuous work of placing batteries in defence of the retreating Army, he had time to think of his English comrade. It seemed that Serbian officers, indeed, in whatever circumstances they found themselves, always did the right thing at the right moment. They were truly chivalrous, not with the chivalry which rushes to open the door to let you out, but with the chivalry which leaves the door open for you to come in.
The congestion of convoys on the other side of the pontoon bridge, leading to Krushievatz, was terrific. A narrow mud lane led to the bridge, and when we arrived at the entrance to the lane, at about 8 p.m., we found that the column ahead of us, were taking things philosophically and had lighted fires in the road, and were cooking food, and warming themselves; the oxen were lying across the road. There was no possibility of getting past them, though Shanatz, as I then discovered, was on the left bank of the (Western) Morava, and we should therefore not cross by the pontoon. But we eventually moved, and we reached Shanatz, a tiny scattered village, at 3 in the morning, to my great relief, for no other convoys had followed us, and, as the night passed, I had begun to be afraid that we had taken a wrong road. On arrival, we roused the Prefect, and he gave us the keys of the school-house, for our hospital, and we requisitioned a couple of rooms for the staff. Wounded were waiting for us. We cleaned the schoolroom; the doctor and the nurses who were on night duty attended to the patients, who were also given hot coffee and food; and the oxen, wagons, and men, settled in the school enclosure. I went to rest in the car at 5 a.m. and was up again at 6.
The Morava, broad and magnificent, flowed by the side of the village, and in the evening, after dark, some of us seized the rare opportunity of a bathe and a wash.