CHAPTER XXIIA JOYOUS REUNION
“Bart!” Frank repeated with a groan. “And perhaps I’ve killed him!”
Tom lighted a candle while Billy rushed for his canteen. They dashed some of its contents into Bart’s pallid face and chafed his hands and wrists.
In a few minutes their vigorous efforts had results. Bart moved uneasily, his eyes opened and rested vacantly at first and then intelligently upon the faces of his friends.
“Hello, fellows!” he murmured weakly. “What’s up?”
Their joy was beyond measure. Even while they were seeking to restore him to consciousness they had been tormented by the fear of seeing only an insane gleam in his eyes when he should open them.
“Bart, old man!” cried Frank, in a voice that broke despite all efforts to control it. “You know us, then?”
“Know you?” repeated Bart wonderingly andtrying to raise himself, a movement which they gently checked. “Of course I know you. Are you kidding me?”
“Listen, Bart,” replied Frank with a warning glance at his companions not to reveal prematurely the whole story. “You got a knock on the head in the fighting that put you out of business for a while and we’ve been a little scared. But you’re all right now.”
“Sure, I’m all right,” answered Bart, “and I’ll be ready tomorrow to take another crack at the Huns. How is the battle going?”
“All to the good,” answered Frank. “But you’d better lie still for a while. We’ll put you on my bed and you won’t have even a headache in the morning.”
Bart protested, but they overruled him and tucked him in the blankets, where he promptly went to sleep. Then Frank went in search of one of the doctors who came promptly. He listened with the greatest interest while the three chums told their story. Then he made as careful an examination of Bart as he could without waking him.
“He’ll be all right, I think,” was his verdict. “He’s fairly well nourished. I suppose he’s found plenty of food in the wake of the army. And the life in the open air has built him up after his hospital experience. The only trouble hasbeen with his mind, and from what you tell me he’s come to himself again. Of course he’ll have to take things easy for the next few days and you mustn’t tell him now about his hospital escapade. Let him think the injury happened to him yesterday. We’ll take him along in one of the ambulances, and I venture to say that in a week he’ll be with you again as well as ever.”
“I can’t forgive myself for knocking him down,” said Frank mournfully.
The doctor laughed.
“Best thing you ever did in your life,” he said. “The blow he got on the head was just what he needed to shake him into sanity again. Medical history is full of just such cases. You’ve got the proof of it right here. He was undoubtedly insane when he came into the tent to take your blanket. He knew that he was cold and his only thought was to get something to keep him warm.”
“But why should he happen to strike our tent instead of somebody else’s?” asked Billy.
“Because he knew it was yours,” answered the doctor. “In his poor twisted brain he had recognized you and knew vaguely that you were his friends. Probably he has been dodging around somewhere and kept track of you.”
The boys’ eyes grew moist as the pathos of it all came upon them.
The doctor left them some stimulating medicine,promised to send the ambulance around in the morning and took his leave.
There was no more sleep for the boys the rest of that night. They were strung to too high a pitch of excitement and delight. They felt as though they were treading on air.
Bart was back with them again, dear old Bart, whose absence they had mourned as though he had been their brother, brave old Bart, with the heart of a lion, who had stood at their side in a score of desperate fights. For hours they sat outside the tent so that they would not disturb the sleeper, and talked in low voices of the great thing that had happened.
Bart woke in the morning refreshed and perfectly himself again as far as his mind was concerned. They fed him well and when the ambulance came around they helped to put him in it, promising to drop round to see him whenever they could get leave. The ambulance went along with the army, so that the boys had the feeling that Bart was with them all the time, even though not stepping along in the ranks.
Dick dropped in on them during the day, as did Will Stone, who was going along in one of the tank units of the army of occupation, and their delight was almost as great as that of the Army Boys themselves when they heard the news. Together they went to visit Bart at every opportunitythey had, and rejoiced to find that he was getting stronger all the time.
The nurse who had him in charge had been told his story, and, being a person of tact and discretion, she had gradually told him the truth bit by bit, “in homeopathic doses,” as Tom put it. The absence of the noise of the big guns was rather hard to explain, but she did it somehow, and finally Bart came to know the whole truth. It was something of a shock to him, but his delight at the defeat and surrender of the Huns was so great that it more than counterbalanced his distress.
In a few days, the doctor pronounced him strong enough to take his regular place in the ranks, and when he stepped out with them one morning in a brand new uniform and looking as stalwart and fit as ever he had, the Army Boys felt as though they had nothing on earth left to ask for. And their delight was shared by the rest of the regiment, with whom Bart was a general favorite, and who overwhelmed him with handshakes and congratulations. The boys marked that day as the best that had ever been on their calendar.
All were in a jubilant mood as they strode along in the crisp, cool air. It was almost a trial to keep their measured step. They all felt more like dancing.
“The only kick I have was that I wasn’t in at the finish,” said Bart. “I’d like to have heard the last shot fired. And I sure would have liked to have been with you fellows in the tunnel, and in the clearing of that Argonne Forest. You fellows were certainly going fast in those last days of the war.”
“You needn’t kick,” grinned Billy. “You’re some speed merchant yourself. You went to sleep in France and woke up in Germany.”