While Zaidos, aided by Velo, continued his heart-rending task among the dead and wounded on that bloody field, now applying the tourniquet to some emptying artery, now administering, drop by drop, the stimulant needed to hold life in some poor fellow, hurrying back with others on their stretcher, or giving way to the fearless and pitiful priests who moved among the dying—while all these things happened, it would be well to pause and reflect on the wise preparation which had made it possible for Zaidos to do well his allotted task.
As a Boy Scout, and in the extra work of school, he had taken a keen interest in the Red Cross work. Zaidos was the sort of a fellow who takes a keen pleasure in doing things well. He stood well in his classes always, not for the benefit of school marks, but because he thought that if he studied at all, he might as well be thorough about it and try to get at what the "book Johnny," as the boys called the textbook writers, really was driving at. It was the same with athletics. He had jumped higher and run faster than anyone else in school, not so much because he was quick and light and agile, but because, having found out that he could run and jump and put up a good boost for the team at other sports, he practiced every spare moment he could find. Zaidos was always trying to see if he could break his own records. He got a lot of fun out of it. It was like a good game of solitaire. He was not dependent on some other fellow. The other fellow was incidental, a sort of side issue and like a good pace-maker. Of course you had to beat him, but the sport was in coming in ahead of your own time.
It was for this that Zaidos had always worked. It had kept him from feeling the petty jealousies and envy which retard the progress of so many of the fellows. Racing with himself, in Red Cross drills, or running, racing, riding or studying, his rival was always present, always ready and willing to take another "try" at something. It was like having a punching bag in his room. Every time he passed it he took a whack or two, and developed his muscles accordingly.
So, in this unexpected and supreme test of his life, Zaidos found himself fit. As the work went on and on, endlessly as it seemed, Zaidos found that his brain commenced to work independently of his hands. The unbelievable wounds of war no longer shocked his deadened nerves. His hands worked more and more accurately and rapidly, but on the inside of his brain was a sort of screen on which flashed the moving picture of his life.
They started from his little boyhood, when he first crossed the ocean up to the time of the last crossing, at the sad summons which had taken him to his dying father. No real moving picture, thought Zaidos, had ever been screened with so many thrills and exciting incidents as the real life-film through which he saw himself rapidly moving. Here and there on the bloody field he puzzled it out for himself, finding that the plot was complete, and that Velo, his cousin, must be the villain.
Zaidos was still ignorant of the fact that Velo had stolen the papers, but that Velo hated him and would be glad enough to get him out of the way grew clearer and clearer, in spite of the apparent friendliness with which he had treated him up to the present time. But now, hour by hour, Zaidos was conscious of a sort of sour look of hatred which seemed to grow plainer and plainer in Velo's sharp face. Zaidos had an uncomfortable feeling that he must keep a watchful eye on Velo. It was nothing but an instinct, but even so, he felt it, and feeling it, was ashamed.
So the time wore on.
Bending over a soldier with a gaping, bloody hole in his side, Zaidos turned to the hospital corps pouch spread open beside him, and felt for a roll of gauze bandage. One little roll remained.
"Get back to the hospital and get another outfit of gauze and tape," he ordered Velo.
Velo stood up and straightened his back. He looked down at Zaidos, then his gaze traveled to the unconscious soldier.
"What do you bother with him for?" he said heartlessly. "It's no use. I'm going to quit. What's the use of working myself to death?"
"Going to desert?" asked Zaidos coldly. He was holding the hurt soldier in a position where he could treat the wound quickly.
"I suppose so," said Velo. "This isn't my fight!"
"Look here," said Zaidos, "I don't care what you do. If you desert and are caught at it, and are shot, it is no affair of mine. I wash my hands of you. But for the sake of your own manhoodget me that bandagewhile I take care of this man. Don't be such acad, Velo! Get me the things I need, and then let's talk this thing out later. But don't do anything to disgrace the family. After all, you know, if anything happens to me, why, you are the head of the house."
Zaidos glanced suddenly up at his cousin, and surprised in his face a look that once and for all swept away all the kindly doubts he had cherished. Velo's countenance was so full of cold speculation and deadly hatred that Zaidos started. Then he pulled himself together, and looked Velo in the eye.
"Get the bandages!" he said coldly and Velo, as though controlled by some superior force, turned to do as he was told.
As he hurried across the rough, blood-stained field, he too saw pictures in his mind. He saw the contrasting fates, either of which he thought might be his. The obscure life of a poor relation, dependent on a relative's kindness, and the life of luxury if all that relative had should come to him. A better boy could have planned to build up a career for himself, but Velo could not or would not. He was like a thief who would rather steal the dollar which he could go to work and earn honestly.
Velo had become desperate in the last few days. As he hurried on, he was seized with a sudden determination to end everything. He went into the First Aid shelter and secured the bandages from the supply table and went back, a dreadful resolve taking form as he went. He found Zaidos still bending over the wounded soldier.
"Well, you hurried, didn't you?" he said, looking up with a nod of thanks as Velo handed him the bandages. He went on rapidly, securing the gaping wound so that they could shift the torn body to the stretcher.
"It's funny," he said as he worked, "that we don't run across the doctors oftener out here. Of course they are all at work just as hard as we are, and a good deal harder, poor fellows, but it does seem as though every time we get hold of a case that is a good deal too hard for us to tackle, why, then there isn't a soul in sight to help. I'm so afraid of doing something that will make somebody heal wrong, or limp or something."
"Be a good way to take revenge on somebody," said Velo.
"Why you—" Zaidos could not finish. "How the deuce do youeverthink up such stuff? For goodness' sake, don't say it to me! You make me sick!" He bent over his patient again, and Velo looked idly about.
At his feet lay a revolver. He picked it up. It was loaded. Idly he tried the trigger. It worked. He looked at Zaidos. How he hated him! They seemed all alone on that field of dead and dying. The tide had swept away and left them there with their work.
There was a sudden red mist over Velo's sight.… Kneeling in the light of the big flashlight, Zaidos loomed up, a clear, clean cut figure with the velvet blackness of the night behind him. Velo brushed his hand before his eyes. Zaidos was putting the last pin in the neat dressing he had applied to the wound. There was a thread of hope for the man. Zaidos smiled. Velo knew he would get up—
The revolver sounded like a cannon. Zaidos, unhurt, got to his feet. He pressed a hand to his side. Velo watched him with fascinated eyes. Zaidos looked down. There was a cut across the service blouse between his sleeve and body, right under his left arm.
Zaidos stared first at Velo, then at the revolver still in his hand.
"How did that happen?" he demanded in a low, tense voice.
Velo swallowed and cleared his throat.
"The thing went off," he said huskily.
"Well, it came near doing for me," said Zaidos, still staring suspiciously at Velo. "You let me have that revolver! Yon are too funny with things to suit me."
Velo, still pale, smiled a wry, twisted smile. "I'm sorry," he lied. "I don't see how it happened. It must be out of order."
"Give it to me!" said Zaidos, "and take the front of this stretcher. I've got to look out for accidents, it seems. I never saw anything so careless in my life. You have just got to be careful, Velo! I won't stand for it! This isn't the first time I've nearly come to harm through yourcarelessness, if you want to call it that. I tell you I won't stand for it! Mind, I don't make any accusations; and I don't claim you are to blame for a lot of things that have happened to me lately, but if things don't stop, why, you are going to be sorry! There won't be any revolvers going off, and your bed won't go down, and your medicine won't get exchanged for poison, like it sometimes happens. I shall just take you out back of the next wire entanglement, and I will give you agood beating up, Velo. I remember I used to have to do it when we were about four years old. It used to do you a lot of good, and I suppose all these years since you have had no one to keep you where you belonged. I won't do this, you understand, unless you get careless with guns and things again. You hear, Velo?"
Velo made no reply.
The two boys carefully bearing the stretcher tramped along in silence.
"You hear, Velo?" said Zaidos again. "Honestly, the more I think of it, the madder I get!"
"You stop your nonsense!" said Velo suddenly over his shoulder. His voice took on a whine. "What makes you act so, Zaidos? I'm your cousin, and I should think you would be ashamed of the things you say to me, just as if I haven't stuck right beside you every minute, and as if I had not done everything in the world that I possibly could do to help you. You don't treat me well, Zaidos!"
"I do, too," said Zaidos, stung by this injustice. "I should think I did; but how do you treat me?"
They reached the entrance to the First Aid Station and gave their unconscious burden into the hands waiting to receive him. The doctor scanned the wound.
"Well, boys," he said, "you have saved this man all right." He turned the bright light on the still, white face. "My heavens!" he exclaimed.
"Who is it?" asked the nurse.
Velo looked at the face, and spoke before the doctor could reply.
"I know him," he said. "His name is John Smith."
The doctor was working rapidly with restoratives.
"John Smith?" he repeated. "This is the Prince of Teck's oldest son, and his brother was killed an hour ago. We must keep this fellow alive," he went on, doggedly. "First time I met him he was just an hour old. He won't go out of this world yet ifIcan help it!"
The boys went outside and for a moment sat down on the ground to rest.
"What do you suppose made him do that?" said Velo musingly.
"Do what?" asked Zaidos.
"Why," said Velo, "I asked what his name was one night and he said John Smith. I think that old doctor is making a mistake."
"What does it matter?" said Zaidos. "He would make just the same effort to save the plain John Smiths as he would to save the princes of the world."
"Pooh!" said Velo, sneering. "I guess not! Why should he? He knows a thing or two and you will find it out some day. Why, nobody does anything for anybody unless they get paid for it somehow or other!"
"Oh, say," said Zaidos, getting up and striking one clenched, fist violently into the other, "I wouldn't have your little bit of a soul for anything on earth! I wouldn't have your mean, little bit of a suspicious, ungenerous mind! I hate to remind a fellow like you of anything so fine, but how about my father? What pay,pay, mind you, did he ever get for taking care ofyou? What did he ever get for starting that colony of sick people up on the mountain back of his hunting lodge, with a doctor right there, and a nurse or two paid by father? Do you suppose it made him feel good to see them tottering all over the preserve where he could no longer shoot, for fear of hitting some of the poor wretches?"
"No," agreed Velo, "he didn't get a thing out of all that, and I always thought that colony for the sick was the silliest thing I ever heard of. I'll tell you right now when I get hold of things—" he caught himself up quickly. "I mean, of course, whenyouget hold of things, if you do as I would do, you will send those people packing back to their slums as fast as they can go. As far as his doing for me, why, I'm one of the family and he sort of had to. It is a duty. Besides, do you suppose it was very much fun sticking around that house, quiet as the grave,nothinggoing on,noone coming to see your father but old, grey-headed men and women forever fixing up charities?"
"That's all right," said Zaidos. "Do you know what I am going to do as soon as I get out of this? I'm going to cut right back to America and study as hard as I can. Then as soon as the war is over, I will come back here and straighten everything up. I will of course keep the title. You can't give that away, and I wouldn't want to. I'm proud of my name. It is an honorable one and it has been kept clean by the men before me; but I mean to give Greece everything I can turn into money. Then I'll take enough to start me, go back to America again, and cut out a career for myself. I'm going to be a doctor and as good a doctor as ever lived if study will do it.That'sthe monument I mean to give my father and my mother."
He gave a jerk of the head toward Velo, who sat upright before him.
"How does that strike you, old top?" he asked and climbed down into the First Aid pit.
Left alone, Velo sat thinking. Then he rolled over on his face and beat the earth with his fists. Once more the films flew along, in the moving picture of his mind. He saw the wealth of the Zaidos house—gold, gold! astreamof gold flowing and flowingawayfrom him! He saw the bright lights, the dancing, drinking, all the carousels he had so often dreamed of, slipping out of his grasp. What possible hope could a fellow like himself have of keeping on the right side of anyone like Zaidos? He smiled when he thought what Zaidos would say if he could know or guess what Velo's life had been. What would he do if he ever found out how he had treated Zaidos' long suffering father? And Velo did not try to deceive himself. He knew perfectly well that back there in Saloniki, there were people who would jump at a chance to get even with him, and who would give Zaidos an account of meanness and wrong-doing that would cause him to kick Velo out of the house.
Velo began to hate himself for the uncertainty in putting off what to him was a disagreeable necessity. Once more he went over the situation. It seemed as though he had gone over it a dozen times, a million times. It all ended at the blank wall which was Zaidos. Zaidosmustbe removed.
Now it is a well-known fact that we are what our thoughts make us. Our minds are like our houses, our homes. We do not have to entertain unwelcome guests. We do not have to invite them there. It may be that we feel obliged to treat everyone whom we meet at our games or in school or at work with common politeness. No matter how we despise a man, we can't very well go up to him in the street and say, "Here, I don't like your style," and proceed to knock him out with a good right-hander. Naturally it won't do. But we need not give the bounder the freedom of our homes. So with our thoughts. It is only when we bring them in and grow intimate with them, and make them part of ourselves that they begin to harm us.
Velo, too evil and too lazy to close the door of his mind on common thoughts and low desires, had grown more and more like his unworthy guests. And now instead of kicking the whole mob into the outer darkness, he lay there, face down, listening to their evil whispers.
"Get rid of Zaidos," they said over and over. "Get rid of him. Who will know? Don't you hate him? You ought to! Just because he is the one who really owns everything, is that any reason why you should get out and work for an honest living? You don't want to bother with an honest living. You want to live soft and lie easy. Get rid of Zaidos! Now is your chance! It is your only chance. You know how he makes friends everywhere. He is straight as a string. He does not lie. He wouldn't do a mean action. Fellows like us are afraid of that sort. Get rid of him. Now—now!"
So the whispering in Velo's mind went on, and he listened and listened, and presently he sat up. On his face was written what is written on every man's face when he gives the keys of his soul over to Evil.
Zaidos came climbing out.
"Well, the doctor is going to save your friend Smith," he said cheerfully. "Good work, too! One of the nicest fellows I ever knew, that Smith. Too bad about his little brother. I never saw two fellows so crazy over each other. It seems they are the last of the family. Doctor says this fellow will never be able to fight again, but he will get perfectly well in time. I don't believe it myself. I don't believe any of the men wounded go will ever get all over it, but we can hope so, anyhow. You see I feel as though I knew this man Smith real well because he knows a schoolmate of mine, Nickell-Wheelerson his name is. He was just a plain boy when we were at school, but he came over with me, and now he's a lord. Poor old Nick, how he will hate it!"
Zaidos paused, and stared into the night.
Velo scanned him under lowering brows.
"Get it over soon—soon!" whispered the impatient Evil in his soul.
Velo put a hand on his breast where the papers were hidden. Zaidos stooped and tightened the strap of his puttee. Velo watched him sneeringly. Zaidos was so maddeningly unconcerned. Velo wondered if he could be near anyone who hated him as he hated Zaidos and not feel and fear it. The urge of Evil became like a heavy hand knocking on his heart. He almost feared Zaidos would hear it. "Now—now—now!" it went.
"Come on, Zaidos," he said, standing up. "Let's get to work. I suppose we have an all-night task before us."
Zaidos yawned. "I thought so, too," he said; "but it seems they are looking for a bad day to-morrow and we have been relieved from duty for the night. A new shift goes into the field in ten minutes, and we go back to the rear to one of the farm-houses there to rest until ten to-morrow. Come on, let's start."
"To-morrow, then," whispered Velo to the Evil in his soul.
The boys walked slowly back, picking their way as well as they could in the darkness, occasionally taking to the zig-zag trenches when the surface paths were too obscure. Everywhere men were sleeping, rolled up in their blankets and lying uncomfortably along the bottom of the trenches or out on the ground under the stars. The boys did not talk. Zaidos was busy thinking of the present, with all its tragic incidents, and occasionally a funny happening to lighten the gloom. He thought of Helen, and wondered how her well-beloved patient was progressing. He had a sort of "hunch" as the fellows at school used to say, that Helen was a happy girl, and certainly, if the man was conscious at all, he was happy, too.
About four hundred yards from the lines they found the farm-house to which they had been sent. It was practically a ruin. The roof was gone, excepting over one room where a fire burned in a big fireplace, and where a great kettle swung on a heavy chain. This room had had one side blown out of it, so it was not much better off except in the matter of a rainstorm, than the other rooms that had four sides but no ceilings. It was too open to the weather for much use, however, and the small group of soldiers present were quartered in a cellar close by.
A young sentinel showed Zaidos and Velo the way down, and they rolled up in their blankets and tried to sleep. It was a difficult thing to do. Zaidos found that the steady tramping and kneeling of the day and evening had made his leg, so recently healed, ache badly. It throbbed and he turned and twisted in an effort to find a comfortable position.
Velo's head ached splittingly, and he lay staring into the darkness, keeping company ever with the evil thoughts in his heart. He slept finally, however, and did not awake until Zaidos shook him by the shoulder and told him it was time for breakfast. The three-sided room with the fireplace had been turned into a kitchen, and the cooks were busy there when the boys went over. The meal tasted good, and although the coffee was thick and muddy, the boys partook of it eagerly. It was at least hot and sweet.
Velo gritted his teeth with exasperation as Zaidos strolled out and at once spoke to a soldier who sat by the door with a couple of letters and papers in his lap. It was so exactly like Zaidos to get acquainted without a moment's delay. He smiled at the soldier, and in reply the young fellow made a place for him on the bench.
"Sit down, won't you?" he said. "Mail has come, and I got more than my share."
"Glad you fared well," said Zaidos, taking the offered seat. "I see you have a paper. May I look at it?"
"Certainly!" said the soldier. "There is nothing in it. The war news is so censored over home now that you can't get anything much out of the papers. I like 'em because I can read the home advertisements, and see notices of people I know, and watch what's playing at the theatres. Makes me forget this rotten hole for awhile."
"That's so," agreed Zaidos. "But just think how crazy all the people at home must be all the while to hear from you fellows at the front."
"I think they are," agreed the soldier. "I have a brother in France, too, and father has just sent me a letter from him. It's fun to compare experiences. Want to read it? You may if you care to."
"Of course I'd like to!" said Zaidos with his ready friendliness. "There is no one to write to me anywhere except some schoolmates over in America, and I don't suppose I will hear from them for months." He took the closely written sheets of thin paper, and read the letter, appreciating the spirit in which it was offered him.
"My dear Father," it ran. "I received your letter and note last night, and Auntie's parcel the night before. Thank you both very much for same. It is good of you to us both, but do not spend too much money. Hard times are coming on, I imagine. The kippers were grand. Six of us had a great tea on them in the wine cellar of a shattered farm-house where we are for four nights after four days in the trenches. Then we go back to the fighting line for another four days and nights. This place we are at, in the cellar, is a keep with emergency stores and loop holes, and is armored. Twenty-five of us have to keep it at all costs, should the enemy come over the line, which is perhaps four hundred yards away. The bally place is overrun with rats. They run all over your body and head at night, and I have to sleep with my overcoat tucked over my head to prevent them touching the bare skin.
"Up at the trenches, I was four days and nights stationed about sixty yards from the Huns doing sentry on and off day and night the whole time, waiting with bombs and bayonet in case they attempted to take it, and now on return here have done three more night-guards and then no more sleep again hardly for four more nights, when we return to the firing line.
"It is a hard life, isn't it? For in between, one is sent off on all sorts of fatigues, drawing rations, sand bags, trench boards, etc., etc.
"I must some time see that new Turkey carpet. The only one I see now is sand bags. If there is a big move shortly, which seems more than likely, it may delay our leave as I guess all the troopers would be wanted in that case, but I am looking forward tremendously to seeing you all again.
"Must conclude now, dear father.
"Much love to all from your son,DICK."
"P. S. We dug up some dead Prussian Guards the other day. There has been some great fighting here and may be again. I don't know what I should do without the candles and matches you send me. They keep me going nicely.
"I have just thought perhaps my letter does not seem very cheerful; so I must tell you we have lots of fun in between the serious parts of the game. Last rest, I had some great French feeds (for about one franc) in a town near by. Got pally with six French gendarmes and hope to see them again when I have another spell off.
"I guess they could take me around the town if I wanted to see the sights. Also at all villages where we stay, I make friends with some of the cottagers, and get lots of coffee and salads and washing done for me. I am getting quite a reputation for finding places to obtain a little meal to vary the Army rations.
"Cigs are best in tins; in boxes they get very damp. Cheer on! Good luck to you.
DICK."
Zaidos handed back the letter with a smile.
"Thank you very much," he said. "That's certainly a fine letter. It was nice of you to share it with me."
"That's all right," said the boy. "Everyone is glad to read every other fellow's letter out here, whether he knows anything about the people or not. We get so few letters. The people at home send us candles and matches and kippers, as you see from the letter, and they send lots of cigarettes to my brother. I don't smoke. They send us paper and envelopes, too. You know all our letters are opened, don't you? I don't see that it makes much difference. I've always thought that I could see how I could write a pretty innocent looking letter if I was a spy.
"They have had a lot of trouble with spies at Verdun, where my brother is. Why, would you believe it, the Germans have come right inside the French and English lines in broad daylight to do their spying! One bold ruse they worked, just once was to rig up one of their automobiles to look like our ambulances. That car carried six Germans, all dressed as English soldiers, and once inside our lines they went dashing around as aids and orderlies.
"All went well with them, they had seen the whole layout and gone down to the very last trench, when one of them stumbled and out came a thoughtless 'Mein Gott!' for he thought he had broken his ankle. Now of course that would have been a catastrophe indeed, but so was that slip into the German tongue. A kindly Providence saw to it that an alert Tommy had heard, and in a trice those six make-believe English soldiers had been rounded up and were on their way to headquarters. Next morning there was a sunrise party, for those Germans must be taught it isn't ever healthy for them inside our lines."
"Indeed they must!" agreed Zaidos heartily.
"We have got to beat them in the end," said the English soldier with the quiet sureness that has so often helped England to victory. "But they are sure as sure that they will beat us, so they keep hammering away and they will keep it up just as long as their men last."
As if in answer to his last statement a shell struck the earth twenty yards away, and exploded. Another followed, and fell in almost exactly the same place.
"See that?" said the Englishman. "Two days ago one of our best guns was there where those shells have fallen. How did they know just where it was stationed? We had not fired it. And it was ambushed from the airships. Pretty rotten, work, eh?"
As he spoke, a snapping, long-drawn snarl punctuated by deeper roars told that the rapid-fire guns and the howitzers were awake along the English lines. A stir of preparation passed like a wave over the resting and lounging soldiers. Two great Zeppelins appeared overhead. They wheeled closer and closer. Even at so great a distance, the roar of their engines was terrific.
Zaidos turned and shook hands warmly with the soldier whose letter he had shared.
"Good-bye, and good luck!" he said heartily. "Hope we will meet some day again."
"Good-bye to you!" cried his new friend.
Zaidos, calling Velo, jumped into the trench and ran along its uneven zigzags, on and on, the roar of battle sounding ever louder, until he reached the cook house, and turning into the arm leading to the First Aid Station, he raced into the room and reported to the doctor.
Velo was at his heels. Once more the evil in Velo's soul was crying to him, shouting to him, "This is your day—this is your day!"
"I won't forget," commented Velo aloud; and Zaidos said "What?"
They buckled on their aid kits, seeing that they were supplied with everything. They wore orderly kits now. They contained chloroform in a case, a roll of wire gauze, a long rubber bandage, and a tin which contained vials of hyperdermic solutions. These were only for the use of the field surgeons whom they chanced to meet and who frequently had to call on the Red Cross orderlies and stretcher bearers for supplies. Then in the next compartment was the hypodermic syringe, and beside it a flask for aromatic spirits of ammonia. There was a knife and a pair of surgical scissors. After having dropped his scissors a dozen times or so, Zaidos had taken the precaution to tie them to his pouch with a long, fine string.
There was gauze, eight packets of it; four first aid packets complete, six bandages, and two diagnosis tags and pencils. When there was time, it was sometimes advisable to tag the wounded men. It made them get moved quicker when the patient finally reached the operating room.
A spool of adhesive plaster was perhaps one of the most useful things included, and there were pins and ligatures, and a small pocket lantern which Zaidos at least had never had occasion to use.
Velo looked carefully at his own kit. He did not intend to be caught in any carelessness or neglect of duty. He had cast aside as unsafe the idea of skipping away. It was more dangerous than the falling shells. He, like many another, had become calloused. On battlefields men move with as much of a sense of security as though they were invisible. It is not so much that they are not afraid as that they grow into a feeling that the dreadful din, the rattle and bang and dirt and blood, the anguish of men and horses, the distorted and ghastly deaths, will pass them by. The whine of bullets, and the spiteful snarl of exploding shells seems as much an incident as the tin rainfall and the wooden thunder on the stage.
Zaidos noticed this, and felt it himself. He saw men go singing along the trenches to their death, singing love songs and tender little ballads that had to do with flowers and larks and English lanes in May. And most of all he noticed that the face of every wounded man held a look of surprise in greater or less degree; of amazement, as though the outraged body said, "Has this thing come tome? Impossible!" The look was on the dead lying sprawled and twisted in the last silent paralysis of humanity. And although the dead and dying and wounded lay like warnings of a coming fate, although men tossed and reared grotesquely, and shattered horses screamed shrilly in throes of blind agony, the unhurt thousands moved on or lay in their trenches giving fire for fire, death for death without a quiver of concern.
Out into the worst of it went the boys together, Zaidos filled with the high courage of one who does his duty whole-heartedly, and is too busy with the task to wonder at his own fate, Velo with the unconcern of the panther who creeps sure-footedly along the crumbling ledge after his prey. With the noise, the sights and confusion of battle, a kind of madness grew in Velo. The words "To-day, to-day, to-day!" made a sort of song within him. He had all the time in the world. He liked to see Zaidos working, working, tiring himself out. It didn't really matter when he put Zaidos out. He only knew that sooner or later he would do it. He had become a criminal. The evil had wrecked his soul.
The boys worked with furious zeal. When the final toll of this dreadful war is taken, high up on the lists of fame, supreme in the immortal and shining roster of the saints, should stand the names of the men and women of the Red Cross. The zeal of fighting could not uphold them. The lust of battle could not inflame their courage. It was theirs to walk unguarded in the red rain of death, to kneel where the shells fell thickest, to pass through the line of deadly fire with their pitiful burdens.
Doing only good, bringing relief and rescue, they, too, have fallen, hundreds of them, victims of a struggle in which they had no active part.
Zaidos and that dark shadow, Velo, knelt beside a wounded soldier, and strove to save his life, while a black robed priest knelt beside the conscious man. He made the responses of his Church clearly and evenly. He listened while the chaplain commended him to the mercy of God. With an even voice he gave his name and sent a last passionately loving message to one he loved. Then while the boys still doggedly strove to stay his passing, he began to speak. His voice changed to the shrill, clear tones of childhood. He forgot the sonorous Latin of a moment past. He looked up and folded his hands.
"Mary, Mother, meek and mild,Hear me, then a little child—"
He went on with the childish prayer. Velo stood up. Zaidos, kneeling, shook his head, waited until the voice trailed into silence, and folded his kit. They had come too late. The priest stood for a moment in prayer. The boys moved on, but Zaidos looked back. He was just in time to see the priest, with that strange look of wonder dawning on his face, sink slowly to his knees, and droop across the dead man's breast. A bullet was in his heart.
"I wish it would end," cried Zaidos passionately.
Velo smiled.
"Don't do that!" cried Zaidos wildly. "You are not half tending to your work. Get busy with this man here." He knelt beside a soldier as he spoke, and tried to change his position so he could tie up a gushing wound. Zaidos, who had done all the heavy work, was almost exhausted. His hands trembled a little. Time had rushed by, or else it had stood perfectly still since the first shot split the morning stillness. He had not eaten; he couldn't. On one of the trips with the heavy stretcher the doctor had given him something in a glass to take, but he had put it down for a moment, and Velo had spilled it. It had not seemed worth while to ask for more.
The battle roared around them. The enemy had pressed through the first wire entanglement, and a terrific hand-to-hand conflict was in progress. Then men charged with bayonet on gun in the right hand, a short, keen knife in their teeth, and on their left hands a band set with spiked steel knuckles. They leaped into the trenches, struck once with the bayonet, let the musket go, and continued the fight with knife and knuckles. The boys seemed to be the center of a horrible whirlpool or eddy of fighting.
"Give me a bandage!" screamed Zaidos.
Velo, all unconscious of the battle about, stood looking down at Zaidos. His bloodshot eyes were narrowed to slits, his lips drawn back in a wolfish snarl. In his hand was a revolver. He leaned forward a little. He spoke, but in the din Zaidos could not hear his words. He could read the twisting lips, however.
"I've got the papers!" was what he said. He took careful, open aim with the revolver, and before Zaidos could move or spring, he fired straight at Zaidos' face!
Then he stood looking at the fallen boy. Zaidos lay on his back, arms spread wide, knees partly bent under him. Somehow he looked very young. Velo, once more conscious of the roar of guns, looked about him. The battle raged madly. As if drawn by a magnet, his gaze traveled back to the face of his victim. Sure enough, he had killed him. Zaidos was out of his way forever. He felt in his blouse where the precious papers were, then, moved by some strange impulse, he took them out, and held them up before the unseeing eyes of his cousin.
"All here; all here!" he said thickly. "NowI'mZaidos;I'mhead of the house!" Still holding the papers in his hand, he threw the revolver far from him. It had done its work. He nodded to Zaidos. "All here!" he repeated, fingering the pocket. "I'm—"
Something or someone seemed to strike him a violent blow in the back. It surprised him. He turned to see the offender. There was no one near. The tide of battle had swept past. He looked inquiringly at Zaidos, and idly dropped the papers on the ground, as he put a hand to his breast. Suddenly he lost interest in everything but the cause of the blow. He wondered what in the world had hit him. Not a bullet. Surely a bullet did not make you feel so numb and queer! He balanced back and forth as though he was walking a tight rope. Still staring at Zaidos, and still pressing a hand to his chest, he went slowly, very slowly, to his knees.
"That's strange," he said to Zaidos. Then without warning, he coughed. It tore, and ripped, and rent him with mortal agony. He screamed aloud. He clutched with both hands at his breast, screamed, and screamed and screamed, and so went slowly down and down, a million miles into blackness, and lay without further motion, his head against Zaidos' knee.
Inch by inch, step by step, yard after yard, the enemy forced the English back. They reached the second line of wire entanglements, where for awhile the battle raged, while Zaidos and Velo, like other thousands of silent and bloody figures, lay in strange, distorted groups.
At the second entanglement, however, something seemed to happen. Perhaps the enemy's charge had exhausted them, perhaps because a bulldog courage always fills the British. The tide turned. Once more the ground was covered. The first entanglement was reached and crossed. The havoc grew; the rout was turned into a victory. The Allies had won the day!
They followed the fleeing enemy, stubbornly hammering their rear as they retreated, while a thin sprinkle of Red Cross aids and doctors and nurses commenced to appear on that dreadful field. They moved here and there, clear stars in the dark sky of history.
One of them stopped to bandage a head where a clean line of blood showed a deep furrow in the side. When the wound was bandaged, the surgeon administered a dose of medicine, and in a moment Zaidos opened his eyes, and looked curiously up at the doctor.
"You are all right," said the doctor. "Nothing but a scratch on the head. Lie still and wig-wag the ambulance when it comes along."
He moved rapidly away, and Zaidos obeyed his parting order. In fact he was not able to move. Velo's bullet had cut close to the skull and Zaidos had lost much blood. He was conscious also of a pain in his broken leg, but could not move to see what caused it. Finally the aching grew so intense that it drove him to an upright position, although for a moment things whirled, and he was forced to close his eyes. When he looked he saw Velo, the anguish and pallor and amazement of death written on his face, lying doubled against Zaidos' knee. Carefully he worked himself free, to find that a bullet had struck his leg while he was unconscious, and had broken the small bone below the knee. It was the broken leg, at that. He straightened himself as well as he could, and looked at Velo. He commenced to remember. It came back bit by bit; the fight, and Velo's treachery. Last of all he remembered what Velo had said. "I have the papers!" So it was Velo all the time! Zaidos could not imagine how Velo had secured them. He knew when he had lost them that night in the barracks at Saloniki. Velo certainly had not been there. His hurt head beat painfully, and it was difficult for him to think. If Velo had the papers, however, he must get them. Velo was dead apparently. Zaidos knew that look. The papers were his. He must take them before someone came and carried him away. He knew what Velo's resting place would be, and shuddered. Slowly, painfully, he shifted his position until he lay close at his cousin's side. Supporting himself on his elbow, with his free hand he felt in the blood-stained blouse. The pockets were empty. Zaidos felt again. Then it seemed as though he could feel a faint heartbeat. It was so feeble that when Zaidos laid his hand on the torn breast and waited, he could feel no stir. He managed to get at his Aid kit, however, and drop by drop coaxed down a dose of strong restorative. He pressed a pad of gauze against the wound, and secured it with adhesive tape. He could see that the wound came through from the back, but he did not dare turn him over. Presently a faint sigh parted the lips, and Zaidos administered another dose.
Velo lived!
He opened his eyes presently, and looked dully at Zaidos. Then he recognized him, and a wild look crossed his face.
"Didn't I kill you?" he asked in a whisper.
"No," said Zaidos. There seemed to be nothing else to say.
"I tried to," said Velo.
"Don't talk!" said Zaidos. He didn't know what to say to the boy who had nearly taken his life in cold blood. It was murder. The slow deliberation of the thing chilled him. He had read of things like that; of innocent people who injured no one being killed in order that someone might unjustly enjoy something they possessed. He had been ready to stand by Velo and see that he was all right always. And Velo must have known it. No matter what he had said, Velo must have known that! Yet Velo had tried to kill him. He had seen the leveled revolver, and besides, Velo had just told him, as though he didn't in the least mind his knowing. As a matter of fact, Velo did care; but he was so near the shadowy borderland that lies between the living and the dead, that there was nothing left for him but the truth. And because of that, he continued, "I'm sorry, Zaidos."
But Zaidos would not reply.
"I'm sorry, Zaidos," Velo said again in his thick, queer whisper. "Will you forgive me?"
"No," said Zaidos suddenly. "No, I won't! What did I ever do to you that you should try to take my life? If I said I forgive you it would be a lie. Besides, you can't be sorry right off like that. As soon as you get well, you will try it again."
"Oh, Iamsorry!" said Velo. "Youmustforgive me, Zaidos. I am too badly hurt to get well; you will not be troubled again. I know how I am wounded. So I am going to talk as much as I can. I wish you would take the papers. I stole them from you at the barracks. I got permission to go in while you were asleep. I thought you wouldn't be there, and I wanted to look for you and say that I couldn't find you, and so call the attention of the officers to your absence. The night your father died, you know. But you were there asleep, and I felt in your blouse, and found the packet. You had better get it out of my jacket now."
Zaidos unwillingly felt once more through the pocket. "It is empty," he said.
Velo thought a moment.
"I had it in my hand just now," he said. "Look on the ground."
The papers lay beside Velo's hand. Zaidos picked them up, and put them in his pocket.
"I have them," he said gruffly.
"I'm glad of that," said Velo. "Zaidos, I sold my soul for those papers. I have been a bad boy all my life, not because I had bad surroundings, not because I was neglected. Your father was as good to me as he could be. I just thought it was smart to be bad. I don't think I hated you because of all your money and your title as much as I did because I knew you were square. I knew it as soon as you came into your father's house that night. I could see it in your face, and hear it in your voice, and feel it in your hand-shake. I knew you would never stand for the sort of life I led, and I hated you for it, Zaidos. And so it went from bad to worse, until I shot at you. Youmustforgive me, Zaidos!"
"I can't," said Zaidos stubbornly. "What's the use of my saying I do, if I don't?"
"Oh, youmustforgive me!" begged the dying boy. "I am so sorry, so sorry! You can't see anyone as sorry as I am and not forgive them. Please, Zaidos! I can't bear it unless you do!"
"No," said Zaidos again.
Velo did not speak. When you are asked to forgive a wrong, and you refuse, it turns the punishment on you. Velo was silent, but Zaidos commenced to suffer. He could feel himself growing hard and cruel. After all, Velo had not succeeded in injuring him much, and Velo himself was dying fast. He could see it. But something kept him silent. He could not say the words Velo had begged to hear, and he stared back while Velo looked at him with dumb and suffering eyes.
"Oh, forgive me!" begged Velo with a dry sob that racked him. "Zaidos, be as good as you can, but don't be hard! You can't tell what temptations people have. It is a terrible thing to be hard. Don't do it, Zaidos! There are so many hard people—hard teachers and hard fathers who don't know how fellows are tempted and how they suffer. I am dying, Zaidos, and I tell you don't be hard. Forgive me!"
"I do!" said Zaidos quite suddenly. "I do, Velo! I mean it!"
Everything changed. He felt a kindliness and affection for Velo.
"You will get well, Velo, and we'll hit it off like twins."
"It's too late," said Velo, smiling; "too late for anything except to be happy to think you have forgiven me. Besides, it is as well for me to go. I think I'm a bad sort, Zaidos.… But I'm—so—glad—you—will—forgive me—"
There was a long silence. Then Velo opened his eyes once more.
"I'm going," he whispered. "Take my hand—"
Zaidos did so, and for a long, long time did not stir. The hand in his grew limp, then very cold. Zaidos held it loyally but he kept his eyes shut tight, because he could not bear to look.
The Red Cross orderlies did not find Zaidos until after dark. He was very cold, or else very hot, he did not know which, but tried to tell them all about it, and only succeeded in mumbling very fast before he dropped off into unconsciousness. He could not say farewell to Velo, lying there under the stars with a noble company about him. He was silent enough himself until he reached the big field hospital in the rear. He did not know Nurse Helen when she bent over him, but he commenced to talk in a low tone, and he kept on, as though he would never stop.
He told her all about everything, including a green dragon that sat on his leg, and felt heavy. He told her school jokes, and about the girl who came to the hop and about several million other things. Fever raged in him and his voice went down and down until it was as thin as a field mouse's squeak. Nurse Helen grew to look at him gravely and rather sadly and she spent no time at all with Tony Hazelden, who was almost well enough to get married. At least he could sit up an hour every day. But at last one day there came a change. Zaidos gave a sigh, and stopped talking and went to sleep.
The next time he opened his eyes, he looked straight into Nurse Helen's great, lovely, dark pools of silence and content. He looked at her a long time; then without speaking, he went to sleep again. The next time he woke up, he managed to whisper, "Got a lot to tell you!"
"Let it wait," she whispered back. "Don't talk at all. You will get well much sooner."
She was right, and he did, making great jumps toward recovery when he once got started. The time came when she let him talk and Zaidos told her all about everything. He even told her how hard he had been and how long it had taken him to forgive Velo.
So the days went on smoothly. Zaidos did not know how many; but one morning there awoke in him a great longing for his adopted land. And that happened to be the very morning when he heard something that might have made him very unhappy, but did not.
The doctor came along.
"What are you going to do with yourself when we discharge you, young man?" he demanded.
"I suppose I'll have to go back on the field," Zaidos replied.
"Don't you want to?" asked the doctor.
"I can't really say I do," said Zaidos regretfully. "You see I've never had the chance to fight. I was lame when they put me at the Hospital Corps work. At least my broken leg was tender. Now it's shot up, and I won't be good for anything else but Red Cross jobs."
"I may as well tell you," said the doctor. "You will always be a little lame, Zaidos. Not much, understand, but enough to bar you from any work here. I'm sorry, son. We did our best, but that shin bone didn't heal right. You have been given your 'honorable discharge.'"
For a little Zaidos was silent. No more running; no more jumping. It was a little hard, but he thought of the wounds of others, and was ashamed.
"Will I have to walk with a cane, doctor!" he asked.
"Oh, no," said the doctor. "Your limp will scarcely be noticeable."
"Then I guess I'll get on my job," said Zaidos, unconsciously quoting the boys at school.
"What's that?" asked the doctor.
"Why," said Zaidos, "I planned to go back to New York after all this was over, and study medicine."
"Couldn't do a better thing," said the doctor heartily. "That's the best thing you could possibly do. Nurse Helen has told me something about you, and I will say that I think you have planned wisely and well. If you had ties of family in this part of the world, it might be a different matter. No one has any right to carve out his destiny without some reference to the people nearest him. 'Honor thy father and thy mother' holds good to-day as well as it did when the old patriarchs walked the earth. And I'm not sure it isn't needed now more than it was then, when the scheme of life was simpler. Only now we usually have a few sisters and brothers, and perhaps an unmarried aunt or two to consider. But you are all alone, are you not?"
"Yes," said Zaidos. "I couldn't be more alone without being gone myself. I have lots of friends in school and I know a fellow in England; and so it's not so bad."
"No," said the doctor. "I should call it very good. And you have already found out, Zaidos, that sometimes blood relations fail a man.
"I think I will write out a discharge for you, and as soon as you can move you had better get away, and move toward the first seaport where you can get an American ship. I will pull all the wires I can. You had a pretty bad fever, my boy. You need a change, and you need it soon. I'll see what I can do. In the meantime, lie still and get your strength together. Things are frightfully crowded, but a lot of supplies and more nurses have been promised. Has Nurse Helen told you any news?"
"No," said Zaidos, "not a thing. About the hospital, do you mean, doctor?"
"Not exactly," said the doctor, smiling. "Just some little plans of her own."
"I'll bet Tony Hazelden is in them!" said Zaidos.
The doctor chuckled. "Well, these girls! You never can tell," he said. "She will tell you herself, I've no doubt."
He got up and straightened his bent back. "This sort of thing is hard on an old man," he said. "It is just two weeks since I have been to bed."
"Well, this one feels good to me," said Zaidos. "I was so surprised when I woke up and found something smooth and clean under me. I don't see how the nurses manage to keep things so neat."
"You would not wonder if you could see what they do," said the doctor solemnly. "I tell you every woman who goes into the field deserves a place in the Legion of Honor. She deserves a crown, and a big pension. She's an angel. You want to honor all women, all kinds, all your life, my boy, for the sake of these nurses. Some day, perhaps, I will come over to your America, if you would like to see an old derelict, and we will talk and talk, and I will tell you some stories."
He touched Zaidos' bandaged head gently, nodded farewell and walked on down the line of cots. Zaidos continued to sleep and eat. His blood was so clean that his wounds healed almost at once. Helen came to his bedside one day with a queer little smile on her face.
"Do you remember, John, what I said when you brought Tony to me? I told you that just as soon as he was able to hold my hand, I meant to marry him."
"Did you do it?" asked Zaidos.
"Not yet," said Helen.
"Goodness!" said Zaidos. "I didn't think Tony was as sick as all that! I would have to be a good deal worse than he looks to be so sick I couldn't hold your hand!"
"Silly!" said Helen, blushing. "If you will attend with the gravity the occasion requires, I will explain things to you. Perhaps Tony has been able to hold my hand alittle; but he was not strong enough to hold it very hard. Now, however, he is growing better fast. On the other hand, the doctors sayIam worn out. I don't think so myself. I think they are making it up, the dears, so I can honorably go home with Tony. But be that as it may, I am going home. We are going to be married a week from tomorrow, John, dear, and then in a few days I will begin to move my dear Tony by slow stages homeward. And I want you to come with us."
"Me on a honeymoon trip? Well, I think not!" Zaidos exploded. "Nay, nay, pretty lady, you won't get me to chaperone you!"
"Now, John!" cried Helen. "Oh, I could shake you! What will I do crossing Europe with a sick man on a cot, unless someone comes to help me? I didn't think you were so ungallant!"
Zaidos stared at her. "That's another way to look at it," he said. "Of course I will go with you, and glad enough to do it. I never thought of that, Helen. Of course you could not go alone! Why can't I get up and go talk things over with Tony? You can't yell that sort of conversation the whole length of a ward."
"You are to be allowed to get up tomorrow," said Helen, "and, oh, John,pleaseget well fast, because really I don't see how we can go without you. No one else can be spared, and I want to go home. I want to see my father and mother. Just think of it, I will have to be married all alone. Not one of my own people to give me away, and kiss me, and say, 'God bless you.' I suppose I am an ungrateful girl. I ought to be thinking only that I have Tony, and how happy I am; but you know after all, John, a girl's wedding day is a wonderful time. It is all so different to what we had planned. At home, we would have had the service in our own dear church, trimmed by all the little girls in the parish. And everyone would be there. The church would not hold them; the churchyard would be full of beaming faces, everybody bobbing and curtsying and wishing us good luck. And if I felt that Imustshed a few happy tears, my mother's shoulder would be near."
"Do youhaveto cry?" asked Zaidos.
"Why, I don't suppose onehasto," said Helen musingly, "but generally you do."
"That's awful," said Zaidos dismally, and then repeated, "Awful! However, I don't know the first thing about girls, and of course you do. If you must cry on somebody, why, you must; and you can use me, if you like."