Part 6

It was a short run but a bad one, shells were arriving and shells were departing. I found an Abri had been squarely hit and badly torn up. I got four wounded, who were in very bad condition. I drove back and got through. My premonitions were not realized. It was sunrise when I drove away from the hospital and my work for the night was over. Coming down the road I met Holt. He told me he was having trouble with his car and he asked me to wait while he made some repair. I drew up alongside the road, put my head down on the steering wheel and went to sleep. A few minutes later Holt woke me up and we drove on together. A short while later, over hot coffee, I confessed to Holt the premonitions I had the night before. And then he confessed that he had had them, too. Then I read to him what I had written:

“I gained my first impression of France while sailing up the broad Gironde River, flanked by its stately trees, its green and rolling fields, its Catholic spires, its old châteaux and ancient monasteries. I came on to Paris. I saw and admired that magnificent city which stoically smiles through sorrow. I stood at the tomb of Napoleon but I did not shed a tear; I sat in Nôtre Dame Cathedral on a Sabbath afternoon, and there I saw women with faces sad but brave, kneeling in prayer; I heard the organ’s sacred notes; perhaps I shed a tear, why should I say? I sat at one of the many crowded tables in front of the famous Café de la Paix and there I watched the Congress of the Armies of the Allied Nations, sipping drinks, smoking cigarettes, passing the time of day. I drove up the sloping, tree lined Champs Elysées at sunset and through the Arch of Triumph. At its crest I saw the tinted sky and clouds and tops of trees and as I drove on through the peaceful groves of the Bois du Boulogne by moonlight I thought that though I loved my native land I would love to live in France.

“Then I came on out to the battle front. I passed through desolate villages, past desecrated cathedrals; I saw deserted homes and shell wrecked towns. I heard the thunder and roar of many guns, I heard the crash of avion bombs, I heard the shriek, the whistle, the moan of shells. I saw the horror and havoc that these things wrought, the wounded, the dying, the countless dead. But through all the terrors of the days and nights I saw the noble Nation, fatigued, yet with Christlike resignation suffering and bleeding so that others might live to enjoy an honorable repose. And I thought that the prayer of this noble Nation must be the prayer of Christ: ‘O Lord, forgive them, for they know not what they do!’ And as I saw these things I thought that though I loved my Country, the land of Chance, though I loved my own Flag, I should be willing to die for France, but it has not thus far been willed and I am glad. I am glad to go on living and loving France. She is our kin. Her blood is on our soil, our blood on hers. She is our sister country.

“Vive l’Amérique! Vive la France!”

XXI

Afterthoughts

So now my story is told and as I close the pages of the book I pause to think and wonder if ever again I shall see France. I wonder if again I shall walk along the quays of the River Seine or up the sloping tree-lined Champs Elysées, or wander with friends around to the Café de la Paix, or if again I shall pass through the desolate villages at the front and hear the shrieking shells, the aeroplanes overhead singing in the night “Guerre, guerre, guerre,” their monotonous song of death. I wonder if again I shall see those noble, weary people of our Sister Country fighting bravely against the Iron Hand; whether I shall go back to see our own flag being carried on to final victory; and rejoice that America at last has ridden into the field full armed, the Savior of France, as was once the Maid of Orleans.

I wonder if I shall resist or follow that invisible finger beckoning to me――whether I shall listen to that voice whispering and saying to me, “Come back”?

I wonder if again I shall see the towers of Rheims Cathedral or stand upon the hill beside the resting place of Norton?

I wonder if again some day I shall walk into the peaceful town of Aillianville and sit down by the crackling fire and visit my friend Tourgant, the boar hunter, and his wife; whether I shall some evening step in the “Cheval Blanc” and to Madame Julie and the patron, say, as I have said before: “Bon soir, Madame, bon soir, Monsieur”; whether sometime I shall sit with Marie and her husband, who will wear the Croix de Guerre upon his breast, and with them talk about the war. I wonder if I shall again go in the “Lion d’Or,” and, in happy memory, hear the music as I did before, and if perhaps I shall see again my friends of Section One in France?

I wonder if I shall answer that voice which whispers to me as I walk along the crowded streets, which whispers as I lie awake at night, which whispers in my sleep and says to me――“Come back.”

FINIS

Footnotes:

[1] Extrait de l’Ordre No. 238 du 19 Septembre, 1917 Portant Citation d l’Ordre de la Division 69ᵉ Division d’Infanterie Etat-Major-1ᵉʳ Bureau

Le Général Monroe, Commandant le 69ᵉ Division d’Infanterie, cite à l’Ordre de la Division, les militaires dont les noms suivent; RICE, Philip S., Conducteur à la Section Sanitaire Americaine, 1 (20 Escad. T. E. M.):

A toujours donné l’exemple du plus grand courage et de devouement dans les circonstances les plus penibles lors des evacuations des blessés pendant les attaques d’Aout et Septembre, 1917, devant VERDUN. Le Général Commandant la 69ᵉ A. T. Signe: Monroe. Extrait certifie conformé A. G. le 29 Septembre 1917 Le Chepd Etat-Major. EDMOND CHAPILLIN, 69ᵉ Division D’Infanterie Etat-Major.

[2] Stuart Walcott, Princeton 1917, son of Secretary Walcott of the Smithsonian Institution. The Princeton University Press has published his letters, under the title “Above the French Lines.” Walcott was killed in combat, December, 1917.

Transcriber’s Note:

Words and phrases in italics are surrounded by underscores, _like this_. Footnotes were renumbered sequentially and were moved to the end of the book. Dialect, obsolete words, misspellings, and typographical mistakes were left unchanged.