She promised to do all she could for me and told the
surgeon the whole story, and it was arranged for him to see me and
advise what type of leg I had better wear and then decide where I was to
be put up later. He was most kind, but I returned from the interview
considerably depressed for, before I could wear an artificial leg,
another operation had to be performed. It took place at the military
hospital in January and I felt I should have to hurry in order to be
"doing everything as usual" by the time the year was up, as Captain C.
had promised.

For some reason, when I came round I found myself in the big W.A.A.C.s'
ward, and never returned to my little room again. I did not mind the
change so much except for the noise and the way the whole room vibrated
whenever anyone walked or ran past my bed. They nearly always did the
latter, for they were none of them very ill. The building was an old
workhouse which had been condemned just before the war, and the floor
bent and shook at the least step. I found this particularly trying as
the incision a good six inches long had been made just behind my knee,
and naturally, as it rested on a pillow, I felt each vibration.

The sheets were hard to the touch and grey in colour even when clean,
and the rows of scarlet blankets were peculiarly blinding. I realised
the meaning of the saying: "A red rag to a bull," and had every sympathy
with the animal! (It was so humorous to look at things from a patient's
point of view.) It had always been our ambition at Lamarck to have red
top blankets on every bed in our wards. "They make the place look so
bright and cheerful!" I daresay these details would have passed
unnoticed in the ordinary way, but I had already had eight months of
hospitals, during which time I had hardly ever been out of pain, and all
I craved was quiet and rest. Some of the women doctors were terribly
sarcastic.

We were awakened at 5 a.m. as per hospital routine (how often I had been
loth to waken the patients at Lamarck), and most of the W.A.A.C.s got up
and dressed, the ones who were not well enough remaining in bed. At six
o'clock we had breakfast, and one of them pushed a trolly containing
slices of bread and mugs of tea from bed to bed. It rattled like a
pantechnicon and shook the whole place, and I hated it out of all
proportion. The ward was swept as soon as breakfast was over. How I
dreaded that performance! I lay clenching the sides of the bed in
expectation;