The Sword of Deborah

led at one o'clock, I lay in my tiny bed and revelled in that wonderful story of "The Bridge Builde

ey are answered, like someone who goes on ringing a bell till at length the door is opened. The rain was turning to snow, so there was less of that steady tinkling from without with which running water fills the world. I lay and listened; and the w

s boots outside, shouts from room to room, and begins the whole process, reversed, at about six o'clock the next morning. Here the girls wore soundless slippers, so that those

great truth that it was past spoiling, but she took it off me, whipped my cap from my head, and the girls proceeded to dress me. They pulled a leather cap with ear-pieces down on my head and stuffed me into woolly jackets an

st total darkness, girls were busy with their ambulances. I was hoisted up beside my driver and endeavoured clumsily with my bear's paws to fasten the canvas flap back across the side as I was bidden. I may say that I felt extraordinarily clumsy amongst these girls, most of whom could have put me in their pockets. They knew so exactly what to d

ut of the park into the road. There was no moon, the stars were mostly hidden by the heavy clouds, the sleet blew in gusts against the wind screen. We went at a good pace, bound for a Canadian hospital, and then for a station beyond E--, whe

and a door opened to show an oblong of orange light, and send a paler sh

must not be jarred one hair's breadth more than could be helped. We crept along the roads, past the pines that showed as patches of denser blackness against the sky, pas

re and there, and an occasional uncurtained window in the waitin

e carried and marked our cases off it duly, then told us the number of the compartment where

es of darkness against all the white, men laid straightly ... in front of us the Red Cross orderlies were sliding men down on stretchers from t

it was accomplished. It is a thing wrong in essence, it seems an outrage on Nature-I got an odd feeling that there was something wrong and unnatural about the mere posture of lying-down that

ly-lit interior. I could see the crowns of four heads, the jut of brow beyond them, the upward peak of the feet u

boy on the top stretcher the other side turned his head languidly and watched-I could see a pale cheek, foreshortened from where I sat, a sweep of long dark eyelashes, the

ard and started off again, stopping ag

ood pace, along the heavy roads, took fresh turnings about an

g sergeant to say, "Two stretchers and two sitters from Four." He echoed us, and we crept on to the appointed carriage and stopped. So it went on through a couple of hours, ambulance after ambulance swiftly leaving the

ore. The wind was behind us and the screen clear; far ahead of us on the road was an empty ambulance with its curtains drawn back, bare but for its empty stretchers and dark blankets, which made, in the pale glow of the white-painted interior

t sleet, half-snow, half-rain. My driver covered up the bonnet with tarpaulin, turned off the lights, and we went across to the kitchen. It was half-past th

apparently untired, throwing little quick scraps of talk to each other-about the slowness of "St. John's" on this particular night, who hadn't their cases ready and kept one or two ambulances "si

th something finer, some quality of radiance only increased by their utter unconsciousness of it. Each girl, with her clear face, her round, close head, her stamping feet and strong, cold hands, seemed so intensely alive within t

like some sculptured frieze, so lovely wa

my hot-water bag, though I assured her it would be quite well as it