Part 7

“Listen! Lieutenant Limberg was a Jew, and you were going to give him a Catholic funeral.”

“A Jew!”

“Yes; I say a Jew!”

The priest smiled, supremely incredulous.

“He was not a Jew, Doctor, because I administered the sacrament to him yesterday again.”

M. Gilbert stopped short, like a horse who shies at a wheelbarrow. Then he whispered absently:

“Then you don’t believe a word I say!”

“Oh, Doctor!” protested the priest, and he raised his hands, the palms outwards, with an unction that was surprising in a soldier who arranged his putties so dapperly in corkscrew fashion from his ankles.

“Yes, you may quite well have given him the sacrament,” said M. Gilbert; “but what did he have to say in the matter?”

“I’m sure I don’t know what he could say,” interrupted Augustus, “when, as you know, for the last ten days he has been quite delirious.”

“That’s true,” remarked M. Gilbert. “What have you got to say to that, Bénezech?”

“I don’t know what to think, Doctor; but I can’t believe that a young man as well educated as Lieutenant Limberg was not a Catholic. He took the sacrament twice with me.”

“That may be; but did he tell you he was a Catholic?”

“But, Doctor, how could I insult him by asking him, especially when he was in such a sad state. Besides, he came here wearing crosses on his neck. I gave him several myself, which he willingly took.”

“Evidently there is something wrong,” said M. Gilbert. “You tell me that Limberg was a Catholic; well, we have just been told that he was Jewish. You had better send first for the rabbi of the division. Then, to make sure, send me a despatch-rider from Limberg’s battalion. We shall find out from them.”

Bénezech went out, raising his hands several times, his fingers spread apart, looking perplexed.

“Let’s go to the mortuary tent,” said M. Gilbert, getting up from the table.

It was a disused tent where coffins were placed on biers ready for burial services.

Wrapped in an old flag, Limberg’s coffin had been placed on two boxes. A ray of sunlight broke obliquely across the shadow, revealing a glittering swarm of mosquitos. Some hens were pecking at the fine gravel. This place of death seemed like a haven of rest on the edge of the tempest of war.

An orderly came in, placed two candles on the table, lit them, and stood a crucifix between them.

“Damn!” muttered M. Gilbert between his teeth; “it’s very tiresome, all this fuss.”

As we were coming out of the place, we saw Bénezech and the despatch-rider. Bénezech’s beard seemed to bristle with triumph. With his fingers on his _képi_, he saluted as if he were pronouncing the benediction, and he said in a celestial voice:

“Information from the battalion, Doctor: Lieutenant Limberg was a Catholic.”

“Confound it all!” cried the doctor. “Have you a written note?”

“No,” replied the cyclist. “The officers only discussed the matter among themselves, and they said he was a Catholic. You will see them yourself presently: they are coming to the funeral with the infantry platoon.”

M. Gilbert stamped on the ground. He was very red, and the unruly movements of his nose showed that a decision was about to be made.

“Can I get ready for the service?” asked Bénezech, with the innocent and measured tone of a man who does not press home his victory.

“What!” said M. Gilbert. “The service? As you please--get ready as much as you like. I have my own idea now.”

Our devoted Augustus, who had left us for a few minutes, came back with a packet of envelopes.

“I have been looking into the private correspondence of the lieutenant. I find nothing conclusive, except perhaps this postcard, signed by a Mr. Blumenthal, who calls Lieutenant Limberg ‘his cousin.’ Blumenthal--that’s a Jewish name.”

“Perhaps so,” said M. Gilbert; “but I don’t mind now. I have my own idea.”

“It is true,” said Augustus hesitatingly, “that you could still--have the coffin opened.”

“No! you mustn’t think of it!” M. Gilbert firmly replied; “and I repeat, I have my own idea. Let’s go back to our work.”

We returned then to work; and that lasted about two and a half hours. Then the orderly reappeared.

“Monsieur, the Jewish chaplain wants to see you.”

“I’m coming,” he said.

He put on his four-striped _képi_, took off his overalls, and disappeared.

Looking through the window, I saw the rabbi of the division arriving. He got out of a pedlar’s cart drawn by a crook-kneed mule. With his black skull-cap, his flowing beard, his long coat, his cross-hilted stick, his tall bent figure in the distance, he seemed to me like the Polish Jews one reads of in popular novels. He appeared a man of mature age, and got off the step with the dignity of a patriarch.

My curiosity was aroused, and I went out to see what was going to happen. Twenty steps from the cart, in the bend of an avenue, I again saw the rabbi, without at first recognising him: his beard was black, rather frizzly, he had a very slight tendency to corpulence, his smile was that of an Assyrian god, and there was something in his looks of the Eastern calm of the Mediterranean Sea.

I skirted a shed and found myself face to face with the doctor and the Jewish chaplain. I saw at once that I had been twice mistaken. He was a man of the world, not old at all, wearing pince-nez, with a studious, attentive appearance, aloof and erudite--the “distinguished” air of a university graduate. He spoke the rather cosmopolitan French of a man who knows six or seven languages, but who has not perfectly mastered the correct accent of any of them.

“Really, Doctor,” he was saying, “we have many Limbergs in the East. I know several families.”

“I’m sure you do,” replied M. Gilbert courteously. “But I have finally decided what to do. Will you come along now, sir?”

We walked slowly to the tent. As we got near, the ground vibrated with the rapid tread of a small company on the march, and the infantry platoon appeared. Some officers followed, a little distance off.

Everybody stopped before the tent, and we saw Bénezech coming out. Over his jacket he had thrown an ancient surplice, which seemed to have seen service not only in the present war, but in every war of the past century.

“Gentlemen,” said the doctor rather emphatically, “an unfortunate thing has happened. We cannot tell with certainty what was Lieutenant Limberg’s religion. The information you have sent us would tend to show he was Catholic.”

“A practising Catholic,” added Bénezech, taking advantage of a pause.

“May I ask you,” continued the doctor, “on what you base your judgment?”

The officers looked at one another, as if they had been caught unawares.

“Why!” said one of them, “he never told us he was a Jew.”

“But----”

“Oh! I have definite evidence,” said a captain: “he went to Mass several times with me.”

“But, hang it!” said M. Gilbert to this obtuse soldier, “that proves nothing. Why! I go myself to Mass sometimes.... It’s true,” he added, “I’m not a Jew. As for Limberg: to-day I saw one of his intimate friends, who informed me that the lieutenant held the Jewish faith.”

Another pause intervened. The soldiers had piled arms in the avenue. All present seemed perplexed and hesitating. The two priests had not looked at one another yet, and seemed to be examining the uniform of the officers with the greatest care.

At that moment two stretcher-bearers came out of the tent carrying the coffin draped with the French colours. They took three paces forward, and the priest and the rabbi found themselves suddenly one on each side of the corpse.

“Gentlemen,” said the doctor, in a voice a prophet would use when thinking of Solomon--“gentlemen, because of the uncertainty, I have decided that Lieutenant Limberg shall be buried according to the rites both of the Roman Catholic and of the Hebrew Church. There will then be no possibility of a mistake being made; at most, one superfluous service. We know that God recognises his own. These gentlemen will proceed in turn. I believe I am doing a wise and just thing.”

The officers nodded their heads, without betraying what they thought. The two priests, for the first time, looked at one another. They looked at each other over the coffin, and bowed as if they had only just arrived. Moved by the same impulse, they both affected a curious smile; but their eyes had no share in it. They confronted each other like two members of a family who have a feud of centuries behind them, and who meet in the presence of a man of the world.

Between them, the stake was, not a soul, but a box containing a stiff body, distorted by a death-agony of ten days--a box wrapped in a symbolic shroud which a light breeze ruffled.

The two priests looked at one another with interest for one long moment. On one side, the country priest, with an ungainly peasant build: on the other the cultured and cosmopolitan rabbi, with the sophisticated smile, old as the Bible.

“Really,” whispered Augustus in my ear--“really, Bénezech has done it often enough in his time; he might let the other have a chance.”

“You be quiet!” said M. Gilbert, who had overheard him. “You are a fool to talk like that. This is no laughing matter.”

Bénezech was just very slightly shrugging his shoulders; he lowered his eyes and stammered:

“Monsieur, if Lieutenant Limberg was really of the Hebrew faith, I would prefer to withdraw.”

“Do as you think best, Bénezech,” said M. Gilbert.

The rabbi continued to smile. He had the patient look of a believer who knows that the Messiah once failed to appear at the appointed time, and that one must continue to expect him for thousands of years again.

“Then,” said Bénezech, quite low, “I withdraw, Doctor.”

He made a few steps, and we heard him murmur as he withdrew:

“The chief thing is that he should receive the sacrament. And he has--twice.”

The rabbi was still smiling, as if he was thinking: “As for me, I remain.”

M. Gilbert made a sign. Commands rang out, and everybody stood at the salute.

FIGURES

No, my dear fellow, the war hasn’t changed everybody.

You didn’t know M. Perrier-Langlade?

He was what we should call a great organiser--a man who might, for instance, hit upon a spot where everything was going on all right, and everyone knew his job and was busy at it. But to M. Perrier-Langlade, who had very original views as to what was practical, everything was going quite wrong. Objects had at once to be moved from their places and jobs had to be exchanged. He walked with a stick in his right hand--_his_ working tool--which he waved like a fencer or an orchestral conductor: he tapped everybody with this annoying stick, and commands fell from him like hail from a cloud. One works-section which his genius had reorganised was several weeks before it could be set going again with anything like its old smoothness. M. Perrier-Langlade had ideas: and that is an event of momentous importance. For ordinary mortals, you know, can never pretend to ideas: these are the preserve of the great. And the height of M. Perrier-Langlade’s ingenuity was to think that the suggestions we had all been wanting to work out were entirely his own. But that again did not lead to efficiency; for this rare mind was ever open to the latest thing in ideas--showing, let us admit, a very generous disposition. He bent to every gust of wind. He was indeed so unpractical that his sense of the relation between thought and action was of the haziest. But that of course is the penalty of an exalted position, and in other respects M. Perrier-Langlade was a great organiser.

He loved figures. Let us do him this justice: he handled them with the freedom of an expert. He saw in them a deep meaning which always escaped our unmathematical minds.

M. Perrier-Langlade I had only seen from a distance--and on rare occasions; but at last I was to talk to him. What am I saying!--I am presuming a great deal: you know what my rank is--well, then, I was at last to be admitted to the presence of M. Perrier-Langlade, to hear him discourse, to profit by the kind of education which the most insignificant of his utterances and movements were able to bestow.

It occurred last winter, during the weeks of intense cold. For a fortnight it had been blowing--a sharp, despairing, cold east wind.

The cold and the wind had given rise to an epidemic of fires on the front. The little stoves had been stuffed to their fullest capacity, and they crackled and smoked convulsively, and the corners of sheds sometimes caught their fever. A flame stuck its nose outside: the wind snapped at it, twisted, stretched it, swelled it like a sail, and most often it cost five or six thousand francs in wood, paper, canvas, and other materials. When the Germans saw it happening within gunshot distance, they despatched a few explosives with the charitable object of helping on its sinister designs. It’s what you must expect, you know. You either make or you don’t make war. And the miserable world has made it--there’s no shadow of doubt about that.

We had lost in this way many huts, which were happily cut off from the others, and it had been a useful warning to us when, one night, about one o’clock, a fire--a terrible fire--broke out in Hut 521, which could be seen on the plain three or four miles away from us.

We had just put on our boots and had gone out to watch it. What a sight it was! The huge furnace with its tongues of flame, the bluish country benumbed with frost, the wind which seemed to ripple like water in the moonlight, and the reflections of the fire on the Siberian landscape, honeycombed with the old trenches of 1915.

We were horrified at the thought of what was happening there; but we did not dare to leave our post.

And we did right; for towards 3 A.M. a long line of motors came hooting before the door--some of the wounded rescued from the fire were being brought to us.

We got them out of the cars. How patient they were, poor things! Two with fractured skulls, one with an amputated leg, and another with a broken leg, and several less seriously wounded. They had lost in the fire all the possessions which, as soldiers, they were allowed to have--the linen bag you see hanging on the bed, containing a knife, a box of matches, three or four old letters, and a small lead pencil. I repeat, they did behave well; but they were pitiful to look at. They really looked like people who for one awful moment had lain helpless in their beds while the flames surrounded them, and who were conscious of only one agonising thought: “If help doesn’t come at once, in five minutes it will be too late.”

We put them into bed, and got them warm again: they needed it. I well remember seeing icicles glistening on the bandages of the man with the broken leg. It was a sorry business. The whole night long we looked after them; and only in the morning were we able to chat round the coffee-pot. The wounded were dozing. The hut was almost warm. We had made them wear cotton caps and woollen vests, and drink a cupful of boiling milk. They were in a half-dozing, half-waking state and seemed to be thinking: “Lord! what a narrow shave! And it’s the second one too. We had better look out for the third.”

It was then, old fellow, that M. Perrier-Langlade arrived on the scene.

I had gone out--I don’t remember why--and I was kicking my heels on the frosty ground, when I saw a sumptuous motor-car come to a stop on the road. The door clicked open, and M. Perrier-Langlade came out, staggering under a heavy, luxurious fur cloak.

I at once thought: “Ah, good! Here’s M. Perrier-Langlade coming to cheer up my poor patients.”

I had a hundred yards to cover. I leaped over some dizzy gratings, and I arrived, rather out of breath, just in time to spring to attention before the door. M. Perrier-Langlade stamped with annoyance.

“What!” he said to me. “There is no one here to receive me!”

“I ask your pardon, Monsieur----”

“Hold your tongue! You can see for yourself there is no one here. You have to-night taken in some of the wounded from Hut 521. I went to see the fire myself--at two o’clock in the morning--risking an attack of pneumonia. I’m not bothering about that, though; but it is my wish that some one should be here to receive me--here--when I come out of the car. If you hadn’t come there would have been no one, and I will not be kept waiting these very cold days. In future you will have an orderly permanently stationed here.”

“But you understand, Monsieur----”

“Hold your tongue! How many wounded did you take in to-night?”

“Thirteen, Monsieur. It is true that----”

“Enough! Thirteen! Thirteen!”

M. Perrier-Langlade began to repeat the number, presumably for his own benefit. It was quite clear that this number suggested to his mind thoughts of a deep and wide significance. I don’t know what foolish impulse made me then open my mouth.

“But note, sir----”

“Be quiet!” he said angrily. “Thirteen! Thirteen!”

I felt extremely confused and took refuge in complete silence. That didn’t last long. Ravier was approaching as fast as his legs could carry him: he had seen the motor, and had galloped.... He stopped dead at five paces, his two heels stuck in the crunching snow, and saluted.

“There you are,” remarked M. Perrier-Langlade--“not too soon either. How many wounded have you taken in to-night that you wouldn’t have ordinarily?”

Ravier gave me a despairing look. I showed him my open hand, holding apart my fingers, and Ravier, in spite of his discomfiture, replied:

“Five, sir.”

“Five! Five!” said M. Perrier-Langlade. “Then it is not thirteen, but five!”

I jumped as if some one had stuck a hatpin in me.

“But note, sir, that----”

“Hold your tongue!” he said, with an authoritative calm. “Five! Five!”

And he began to repeat this word, with an air that was at once Olympian and indulgent, like some one who cannot reproach men who are too ignorant to enjoy the supreme delights of arithmetic.

We looked at one another, astounded, when we heard the tread of a pair of hobnailed boots, and M. Mourgue appeared, his nose blue with cold, his little beard quite stiff, and emitting, as he panted, a cloud of steam.

“Ah! at last!” cried M. Perrier-Langlade. “Here you are, Monsieur Mourgue. Will you be good enough to tell me how many men you have at present in your huts?”

M. Mourgue appeared to sink into himself before replying, in a preoccupied tone:

“Twenty-eight, sir.”

M. Perrier-Langlade this time laughed a bitter, discouraged laugh.

“Well, well! it is not thirteen, nor five, but twenty-eight! Twenty-eight! And I was suspecting----”

“But, sir----” we cried all together excitedly.

From beneath the cloak of fur he thrust out his hand, which, in spite of its velvet glove, was none the less a mailed fist.

“Be silent, gentlemen! You do not understand. Twenty-eight!”

We looked at each other as if we had suddenly gone mad. M. Perrier-Langlade, carried away by sublime meditation, walked to and fro repeating, “Twenty-eight! Twenty-eight!”

I noticed his voice had almost a provincial inflection, and was not without geniality. For a few moments he repeated, first shaking his head, then with increasing joy, “Twenty-eight! Twenty-eight!” And I was convinced that to him figures did not mean the same thing as they do to you or me.

Then he abruptly saluted, with a supreme, imperious courtesy.

“Good-bye, gentlemen! Twenty-eight! Twenty-eight!”

And he went off to his car, rubbing his hands together, with the savage joy of a man who has got hold of some absolute truth.

DISCIPLINE

Frankly, I do not regret those four days’ imprisonment. True, they cost me a terrific cold--and perhaps I may here be allowed to say that the guard-room was anything but clean--still, I learnt some very useful things. Indeed, I can hardly cry out against the injustice of it in view of the inestimable benefit I received and the insight it gave me. No, I am not sorry for having experienced, at the age of forty-six, the straw of the prison cell that every one admits to be damp and unhealthy.

When the sergeant, who is not at all a bad fellow, though afflicted with a painful disease, came and told me, “Monsieur Bouin, you’ve got four days guard-room,” I was at first amazed and incredulous. At the same time, it was early in the day, and the sergeant, who never joked before his morning operation, added with a doleful expression:

“Some one named Bouin ought to have been on duty last night in the hospital. But no one turned up. It wasn’t perhaps you, my poor Monsieur Bouin, who cut your job, but it’s certainly you who have four days’ imprisonment.”

The sergeant stopped. I felt something gripping me in the pit of the stomach, and a heavy blush added to my discomfort. Right up to the first weeks of the war, my life had been peaceful and happy: there were some emotions I had not until then experienced, and I could not get accustomed to them, so that I was acutely conscious of the indignity I now had to suffer.

“Sergeant,” I said, “it can’t be true. I was on hospital duty the day before yesterday, and I am to-morrow again. It wasn’t my turn last night, I am quite certain.”

I must have been very red and trembling, for the sergeant looked at me for a moment or two, evidently feeling very sorry. Then he said, “Just wait a moment. I’ll go and see the orderly officer”; and he went out.

I went back to my scrubbing. That is very tiring work for a man who has spent his life studying mathematics; but in September 1914 a spirit of determination and of sacrifice had aroused all Frenchmen worthy of the name. I had volunteered to serve my country humbly, proudly, within the extreme limits of my strength; and as it was upon my physical strength that the demand was chiefly being made, I used every day to scrub the floor with enthusiasm. On that morning I threw myself frantically into the job, with such a will indeed that heavy drops of perspiration undid my work. I suffered, but was quite content: we water our native soil with what we can. Don’t you think so?

The sergeant came back.

“Monsieur Bouin,” he said, “it’s you all right. You’ve got four days’ clink, and it’s a dirty trick they are playing on you. Quite lately a doctor joined up who has the same name as yours, but he hasn’t yet been given his rank. As he does the work of a major, he hasn’t to stick it on night duty. But the clerks, who never know anything, put him down for duty, and that’s how no one turned up. You understand? Then the colonel ordered four days’ imprisonment. But the orderly officer got him to see that he couldn’t punish the doctor, who’s got his job to do! But you see the punishment has been posted under the name Bouin; and as some one has got to be punished, I suppose it’s got to be you....”

I was holding one of those scrubbing-sticks at the end of which a piece of wax was usually fixed. I was so astounded that I let the thing fall. The clumsy clatter seemed to be cruelly emphasised by the echoing walls of the room. It sounded like a smack. I felt so wretched.

“Go yourself and see the officer,” said the sergeant, rather touched, shifting from one leg to the other. “I have now to see about the signatures....”

I let him go; for when this good fellow talks of signatures, he is tortured by a very necessary need, which he cannot satisfy without suffering those shooting pains....

I placed my scrubbing implements in a corner, and I hastened to the office, buttoning my little jacket with trembling fingers: my equanimity was never real, and I felt some difficulty in controlling my emotions.

I knew the officer: he was an old Alsatian whom the war had dragged out of a _mairie_ where he was spending the days of his retirement. He had not, up till then, appeared to me a difficult person, nor needlessly fussy; and I did not despair of being able to make him unbend and to acknowledge himself in the wrong.

“Ah! it’s you, Bouin,” he said coolly. “Well, you’ve got to do four days’ imprisonment. You begin at noon.”

“But, sir,” I said, “while my name is Bouin--Bouin, Léon--and----”