Fix Bay'nets Part 28

"No; it feels dull and cold just there."

"Raise that hand a little."

"Can't, Doctor; I'm so tightly bandaged."

"Humph! Yes, you are pretty well tied up. That poor fellow Gedge did wonderfully well for you, considering. He attended to his ambulance lessons. First help's a grand thing when a man's bleeding to death."

"Was I bleeding to death?" said Bracy rather faintly.

"Of course you were; or perhaps not. The bleeding might have stopped of itself, but I shouldn't have liked to trust it. There; shan't do any more to you to-day. We'll have you to bed and asleep. That's the first step towards getting well again. Sorry to have you down so soon, Bracy, my dear boy. There, keep a good heart, and I'll soon get you right again."

The Colonel was at the hospital door soon after, along with Major Graham, both anxious to hear about Bracy's hurt.

"Bad," said the Doctor shortly as he put on his coat. "Don't ask to see the poor boy; he's just dropping off to sleep."

"Bad?" said the Colonel anxiously.

"Yes, bad, sir. A young fellow can't have a hole drilled right through him by a piece of ragged iron without being in a very serious condition."

"But the wound is not fatal?"

"H'm! no, not fatal. He's young, strong, and healthy; but the exit of the missile was in close proximity to the spine, and there's no knowing what mischief may have been done."

"What do you mean?" said the Colonel anxiously.

"Injury to the nerve centre there. I can't say. Possibly nothing may follow, but I am obliged to say the wound is bad, and there is danger of his being crippled--permanently injured in a way which would render him unfit for service."

"But look here," said the Major excitedly, "you have a bad habit of making the worst of things, Morton. Come, explain yourself. Are there any symptoms suggestive of what you hint at?"

"My dear Graham, I never come and interfere with your work; don't you meddle with mine."

"I don't want to, sir," said the Major tartly. "I only want for the Colonel and yours obediently not to be left in the dark."

"Graham is quite right," said the Colonel gravely. "We should like to know a little more."

"Very good," said the Doctor, "but I can only say this: there is a peculiar absence of sensation in the lower extremities, and especially in the poor fellow's left arm. This may be temporary, and due to the terrible shock of the wound; but it also may be consequent upon injury to the nerves in connection with the spine. I can say no more. Time only will show."

The two officers left the hospital-room, looking terribly depressed.

"Poor lad! poor lad!" the Major kept on saying. "Such a brave, una.s.suming fellow. It's wonderful how little we realise how we like our fellow-men, Colonel, till they are badly hurt. Hah! I am sorry--more sorry than I can express."

The Colonel said nothing, but turned and held out his hand, which the Major took and pressed warmly.

"Thank you, Graves," he said, taking out a showy silk handkerchief and blowing his nose very hard, making it give forth sounds like those made by a boy beginning to learn the bugle. "Hah!" he said; "one never knows. Here to-day and gone to-morrow, Graves. May be our turn next."

"Yes," said the Colonel quietly: "but if it is in the way of duty, I don't see that we need mind."

"Humph! Well, I don't know about that. I should like to live to a hundred, if only for the sake of finding out what it feels like. Some people do."

"Yes," said the Colonel, smiling; "and over a hundred; but then they die."

"Yes, of course; but from old ago."

"And other things too, as the old epitaph says."

"What old epitaph?"

"On the venerable lady. The lines run something like this:--

"She lived strong and well to a hundred and ten, And died by a fall from a cherry-tree then."

"Bah! don't talk about dying, Graves. Poor Bracy! Oh, the Doctor must set him all right again. But this sort of thing does make one feel a bit serious."

"It is very, very sad," said the Colonel.

"Yes, very. By the way, though, have you noticed how splendidly our lads are behaving?"

"Magnificently, for such mere boys," said the Colonel meaningly.

"For such mere boys?" said the Major sharply. "I never saw men in any regiment behave better. Why, sir, it was magnificent to-day. I didn't say anything to Roberts about it, because I don't want the lads to hear and get puffed up by pride. But, really, sir, I'm very proud of our regiment."

"And so am I. But you have changed your ideas a little."

"Bah! Pooh! Nonsense! Don't jump on a man because he spoke out a bit.

You'll grant yourself that they are a very boyish-looking lot."

"Yes; but I do not judge them by appearances. I look at their discipline and acts."

"So do I," said the Major, "and I recant all I said about them before.

There, sir, will that satisfy you?"

"Quite, Graham," said the Colonel. "There, we must be hopeful. I couldn't bear for poor Bracy to become a wreck."

CHAPTER THIRTEEN.

A BIT QUEER.

"Tell us all about it," said Bracy as he lay partially dressed outside his simple charpoy bed in the small room Doctor Morton had annexed for his officer patients.

"All about what?" said Roberts, who had come in, according to his daily custom, to sit for a while and cheer up his suffering friend.

"All about what? All about everything that has been going on--is going on."

"And is going to go on!" said Roberts, laughing. "That's a large order, old chap."

"You may laugh," said Bracy dolefully; "but you don't know what it is to be lying here staring at the sky."