Action has cleared my brain—the necessity of going on—of doing some little, appointed thing. The tension is relaxing; the swaying, stumbling conflict has stabilized itself. Arras is saved and we have even counter-attacked the attackers and regained some ground! Many prisoners are coming in.
* * * * *
I have been out with a covering party cleaning up the dugouts and among other discoveries we have made prisoner a fierce-looking old fellow—quite a prize—a General von Holwitz. His left arm was pretty badly shot up. So I was delegated to take him to a dressing station and have it attended to. Brought him back to our post, as he looks pretty much played out, and coffee and a touch of brandy will pull him up amazingly. Even if he is a Boche, he is a gentleman and an officer.
De Saint Omer came in while I was feeding my prisoner, and recognized him as an old acquaintance of pre-war days. Curiously enough, Von Holwitz was visibly upset by the meeting and drew back into his Prussian shell. But that is the way with these war lords,—defeat is something they cannot bear, and I fancy that the humiliation of being made a prisoner is galling to him.
* * * * *
Our dugout is about six miles back of the front lines but as we are in a strategic village the crossroads are heavily bombarded. The cellars are full of refugees. De Saint Omer’s attitude towards his prisoner is strictly courteous but the conversation is along conventional lines, naturally. To-night Von Holwitz sleeps with us; to-morrow he goes to the rear, while we, in all probability, are destined for a forward sector.
V
In Germany, February, 1919
Ten months have passed since I broke off,—ten months in which I have shrunk again and again from opening this chronicle to write down the final chapters. For months, only the constant affection of De Saint Omer, who has watched over me like a brother, and the loyalty of Anne have kept me sane and struggling to accept life as it has had to be readjusted and lived out. I have been through battle after battle, buried twice under a torrent of shells, sought the thickest of the danger, and come through unscathed. The war is ended, the armistice has come, and ahead is the more difficult thing—life.
A month ago I tried to write and gave it up. This last week a new calm has come into my spirit,—a strange, sudden convalescence, like the lifting of a long fever. I shall suffer to write down the end, and yet I shall suffer more until it is done. It is only the record of a last few hours, six or seven in all, and yet it is the record of the ending of a lifetime and the beginning of another. To write it will not be difficult. Every word, every look is implanted in my memory, has haunted me in the delirium of the night and the walking unreality of the day, from the moment I came into the courtyard at R—— until the final parting, when I saw her with the baby in her arms.