From Brussels I returned to Paris, and procured all the necessary surgical instruments at my own expense. Next I bought three waggons with strong Trakene horses for my own transport and that of the invalids, furnished myself with all utensils requisite for camp hospitals, and then, under the protecting ensign of the Geneva Cross, I joined the regiment of the French army in which I had enlisted as volunteer camp-surgeon. My scheme was clear now. I was a dead man. I was seeking Death in his own realm, where he reigned supreme, and it was impossible not to find him there, if one really sought him. So I should die, but not the death of a suicide, despised, misjudged, forgotten, but a death on the field of honour and glory, as a hero and a martyr of science and philanthropy. And that accursed money which was given me as a fee for my disgrace would be blown to naught, as my body would be by a merciful Krupp shell. When the news of my death reaches that woman in Paris, she will try hard to discover what I have done with her fortune—and mine! But let her search ever so thoroughly, she would find—nothing! I had left no trace of my operations, nothing from which she could regain one penny. Then she would be compelled to come down from her height, return to Hungary, and live a lonely, miserable, poverty-stricken existence on my Slav kingdom, which I had mortgaged and ruined. She would have to struggle against poverty and want, and, by daily care and close economy, would have to pay from her scanty crops the heavy debts I had incurred. All day she would pine and toil, all night she would sigh and grieve. And in her dreams she would call me back, and ask me where I had buried the treasures. Her priests would fail to console her, and she would become superstitious, and resort to clairvoyants and mediums for the solution of the torturing mystery. But no prayer or curse will reach me, no incantation of conjurers or spirit-rappers will call me back. The dead do not return, either for promised kisses or for promised bites.
XII.
SEEKING FOR DEATH.
To tell the truth, on my arrival at the camp I felt like an apprentice in the presence of his masters. French surgery in general occupies a foremost place. French camp-surgeons have acquired skill and experience in their great military expeditions; there their studies receive the finishing-touch, whereas the little skill and practice which I had came entirely from the clinic and the dissecting-table.
But, nevertheless, I was very cordially received by the old, experienced masters of the profession, to whom I stated that I had come, as a voluntary apprentice, to aid in the work of philanthropy as best I could. My immediate superior was old Duval, who had served as camp-surgeon at Sebastopol, and I succeeded in acquiring his good graces. He asked me if I had ever been on a battle-field before, and I answered, a little ashamed, that I had never had that opportunity. In spite of my descent from the chivalrous Hungarian nation, I know the sound of the cannon only from hearing the salutes fired on our King's birthday, or other occasions equally peaceful.
"It does not matter," said the old man, encouragingly. "You will get over your first irritation at the noise, and then you will feel as much at home and as safe as in your own study. There is not the least danger for us. We hoist the Geneva flag with its red cross, and every civilised foe respects that ensign. After the battle is over, and the enemy has fled, beaten, shattered, and in disorder, we carry our ambulances to the gory field, and take up the wounded, friend and foe alike. The severely injured we attend to at once, dressing their wounds on the spot, and then we place them all on our beds, and take them to our hospital-tents for treatment."
This had been the old man's practice in many wars. The French had invariably been victors and masters of the field; the enemy had retreated, and then the French had taken up the wounded and nursed them faithfully, whether friend or foe. That a time could come when the French would be driven from the field, and the enemy would take up the wounded, was deemed preposterous and out of the question.
We were attached to Marshal Douay's corps, but, unfortunately, I did not receive the privilege of participating in the first battle at Saarbrücken, where old Dr. Duval's experience was confirmed; the Prussian advance was repulsed, and the victorious French gathered up the wounded.
The first wounded soldiers whom we treated were foes; one an Englishman, the other a German from Baden. Both were officers in the German army. Three daring officers from the German camp, on horseback and in full uniform, had galloped into the heart of the French camp in broad daylight; there they had cut down the sentinel, ordered food and drink, taken notes as to the camp, the position and order of the forces, the number of the batteries, etc., until at last the French awoke from their illusion, and recognised them as foes. They retreated firing, cutting their way through the French lines, killing two French officers, one of whom, as he expires, finds strength enough to return the fire, and one of the three, the Englishman, falls shot in the abdomen. A second, the Badener, is hewn down from his horse; but the third escapes unhurt, and cuts his way back to the German camp.