with eager faces, other carriage
windows with beds slung across them, a vast Red Cross, a chemist's shop,
a theatre, more windows, more faces....

The stretcher-men are lined up; the M.O. meets the M.O. with the train;
the train Sisters drift in to the coffee-table.

"Here they come! Walkers first...."

The station entrance is full of men crowding in and taking the steaming
mugs of tea and coffee; men on pickaback with bandaged feet; men with
only a nose and one eye showing, with stumbling legs, bound arms. The
station, for five minutes, is full of jokes and witticisms; then they
pass out and into the waiting chars-a-bancs.

A long pause.

"Stretchers!"

The first stretchers are laid on the floor.

There I have stood so often, pouring the tea behind the table, watching
that littered floor, the single gas-lamp ever revolving on its chain,
turning the shadows about the room like a wheel--my mind filled with
pictures, emptied of thoughts, hypnotized.

But last night, for the first time, I was in the ward. For the first
time I should follow them beyond the glass door, see what became of
them, how they changed from soldiers into patients....

The gallants in the ward don't like a convoy; it unsexes us.

Nine o'clock ... ten o'clock.... Another biscuit. Both Germans are
asleep now.

At last a noise in the corridor, a tramp on the stairs.... Only walkers?
No, there's a stretcher--and another...!

Now reflection ends, my feet begin to move, my hands to undo bootlaces,
flick down thermometers, wash and fetch and carry.

The gallants play bridge without looking up. I am tremendously fortified
against them: for one moment I fiercely condemn and then forget them.
For I am without convictions, antipathies, prejudices, reflections. I
only work and watch, watch....

Our ward is divided: half of it is neat and white and orderly; the
other half has khaki tumbled all over it--"Sam Brownes," boots, caps,
mud, the caked mud from the "other side."

But the neat beds are empty; the occupants out talking to the
new-comers, asking questions. Only the gallants play their bridge
unmoved. They are on their mettle, showing off. Their turn will come
some day.

Now it only remains to walk home, hungry, under a heavy moon.

The snow is running down the gutters. What a strange and penetrating
smell of spring! February ... can it be yet?

The running snow is uncovering something that has been delayed. In the
garden a blackbi