"But yes, Monseigneur, he might have recovered!" The fair face framed in the narrow guimpe was shadowed and troubled. "The coup d'obus had spared the brain, arteries, and vertebra. His sight was uninjured—M. le Commandant and his colleagues had achieved wonders in the partial restoration of the visage. Speech was difficult—but we could understand him—unless he was sullen and would only speak German to us. But at those times a Bavarian soldier interpreted—he who has painted the headboard for the grave."
"He—the German officer—was grateful to those who nursed him?" inquired Monseigneur of the Aumonier.
The stout little Chaplain visibly hesitated. It was the Sister who answered in her clear and gentle voice:
"Alas! no, Monseigneur! He was arrogant, even brutal. But then—he suffered so terribly, in mind as in body—one could not be angry at anything he said. He could not resign himself to his disfigured condition. It was intolerable, he would cry, that he should now be an object of horror to women—women who had worshipped him almost as a god!"
"Chut—chut! Eh—well! One presumes he meant a certain type of women," observed Monseigneur.
"Possibly so, Monseigneur." The simplicity of the fair face in the narrow guimpe was touching. "For when we assured him that we did not regard him with horror he would say to us: 'That makes nothing! I speak of women. You are only nuns.'"
"But nuns are women," objected Monseigneur.
"Monseigneur, he said not. When his condition seemed to him most miserable he found relief in saying things—abusive—outrageous—about nuns. We didn't mind. We pitied him—poor Number Twenty! But the French and English officers in the same ward resented this. They entreated us to remove him to a separate room. This we did, and at his request the Bavarian was placed in the same apartment—he has been an officer's servant—and is active and useful, even though he has lost a leg. Thus things went better. Poor Twenty seemed more contented. He even looked forward to leaving the Hospital!"
"And then? A change?—a relapse?" suggested Monseigneur.
"A change. He became more gloomy—more violent after a letter arrived for him from England at the Jour des morts. Since two days comes another letter. We heard him raving of perfidy, the folly of his agents—the injustice of his Emperor—the revenge upon the Englishwoman that he would never have now! ... Then all was quiet. Towards morning the Bavarian came out of the room and called an orderly. The Herr Hauptmann was sleeping, he said, in such a queer way.... From that unnatural stupor he never awakened. All his letters and papers were torn up and scattered in fragments. There was a little cardboard box on the night-table and a pencil billet for me. I am to send a ring he always wore to the address of a noble young lady at Berlin. She was his fiancée, I believe, Monseigneur. He thanks me for the little I have been able to do for him!—he begs the Sisters to pardon his rudeness.... He wishes no name upon his grave—but to be forgotten.... Poor broken body—poor rebellious heart—poor stubborn, desperate soul!"