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Charge! - A Story of Briton and Boer, a novel by George Manville Fenn |
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Chapter 37. A Hospital Visitor |
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_ CHAPTER THIRTY SEVEN. A HOSPITAL VISITOR "Hang being in hospital!" Denham said over and over again. "I seem to be always in hospital. There never was such an unlucky beggar." I sighed deeply. "It is miserable work," I said. "Yes; and it seems so absurd," said Denham. "There's something wrong about it." "Of course," I said; "we're wounded, and suffering from the shock of what we've gone through." "Gammon!" said Denham. "That wouldn't knock us up as it has. We both got awful toppers on the skull; but that wouldn't have made us so groggy on the legs that we couldn't stand." "Oh, that's the weakness," I replied. "My grandmother! It's your weakness to say so. We're made of too good stuff for that. Why, you were as bad as I was when the hospital orderly washed us. Bah! How I do hate being washed by a man!" "Better than nothing," I said. "We can't have women-nurses." "No," said Denham. "But what was I saying when you interrupted so rudely? Really, Val Moray, I shall report your behaviour to the Colonel. You're not respectful to your officer. You're always forgetting that you are a private." "Always," I replied, with what was, I fear, a very pitiful smile, for my companion looked at me very sympathetically and shook his head. "Poor old chap!" he said; "I am sorry for you. There, he shall be disrespectful to his officer when he isn't on duty. I say, old chap, I wish you and I were far away on the veldt shooting lions again. It's far better fun than fighting wild Boers." "What a poor old joke!" I said. "Best I can do under these untoward circumstances, dear boy," he said. "Yes, it's a 'wusser.' I wish I could say something good that would make you laugh. But to 'return to our muttons,' as the French say. About being so weak. You and I have no business to shut up like a couple of rickety two-foot rules when we are set up on end. It's disgusting, and I'm sure it's old Duncombe's fault." "No, you're not," I said. "Well, I say I am, just by way of argument. It's all wrong, and I've been lying here and thinking out the reason. I've got it." "I got it without any thinking out at all," I said. "Don't talk so, private. Listen. Now, look here, it's all Duncombe's fault." "That we're alive?" I said. "Pooh! Nonsense! It's that anti-febrile tonic, as he calls it. It's my firm belief that he hadn't the right sort of medicine with him, and he has fudged up something to make shift with." "What nonsense!" I said. "It's a fact, sir, and I'll prove it. Now then, where are we hurt?" "Our heads principally, of course." "That's right, my boy. Then oughtn't he to have given us something that would have gone straight to our heads?" "I don't know," I said wearily. "Yes, you do, stupid; I'm telling you. He ought to have given us something that affected our heads, instead of which he has given us physic that has gone to our legs. Now, don't deny it, for I watched you only this morning, and yours doubled up as badly as mine did. You looked just like a young nipper learning to walk." I laughed slightly. "No, no, don't do that," cried my companion in misfortune. "You were wishing just now that you could make me laugh," I said, by way of protest. "Yes, old chap; but I didn't know then what the consequences would be. It makes you look awful. I say, don't do it again, or I shall grow horribly low-spirited. You did get knocked about. I say, though, do I look as bad as you do?" "I believe you look ten times worse," I said, trying to be cheerful and to do something in the way of retort. "No, no; but seriously, do I look very bad?" "Awfully!" I said. "Oh, I say! Come, now, how do I look?" "Well, there's all the skin off your nose, where you scratched against the rock." "Ye-es," he said, patting his nose tenderly; "but it's scaling over nicely. I say, what a good job I didn't break the bridge!" "It was indeed," I said. "Well, what else?" "Your eyes look as if you'd been having a big fight with the bully of the school." "Are they still so very much swollen up?" "More than ever," I said, in comforting tones. "But they're not black?" "No; only purple and yellow and green." "Val," he cried passionately, "if you go on like that I'll sit up and punch your head." "You can't," I replied. "No, you coward! Oh, if I only could! It's taking a mean advantage of a fellow. But never mind; I'm going to hear it all. What else?" "I won't tell you any more," I replied. "You shall. Tell me at once." "You don't want to know about that place on the top of your head, just above your forehead, where you are so fond of parting your hair?" "Yes, I do. I say, does it look so very bad?" "Shocking. He has crossed the strips of sticking-plaster over and over, and across and across, till it looks just like a white star." "Oh dear," he groaned, "how horrid! I say, though, has he cut the hair in front very short?" "Well, not so short as he could have done it with a razor." "Val!" he shouted. "It's too bad." "Yes," I said; "it looks dreadful." "No, I mean of you; and if you go on like that again we shall quarrel." "Let's change the conversation, then," I said. "I say, oughtn't old Briggs to have been here by now?" "I don't know; but you oughtn't to give a poor weak fellow such a slanging as that." "I say," I said, "you wished we were up the veldt shooting lions." "So I do," replied Denham. "Don't you?" "No. I wish you and I were at my home, with old Aunt Jenny to nurse and feed us up with beef-tea and jelly, and eggs beaten up in new milk, and plenty of tea and cream and--" "Val! Val, old chap! don't--don't," cried Denham; "it's maddening. Why, we should have feather-beds and beautiful clean sheets." "That we should," I said, with a sigh; "and--Ah! here's old Briggs." "Morning, gents," said the Sergeant, pulling back the tilt curtain after entering. "Hope you're both better." "Yes, ever so much, Sergeant," cried Denham. "Here, come and sit down. Light your pipe and smoke." "What about the doctor, sir?" said Briggs dubiously. "Won't be here for an hour. I'll give you leave. Fill and light up." The Sergeant obeyed orders willingly. "Now then," said Denham, "talk away. I want to know exactly how matters stand since yesterday." "All right, sir," said the Sergeant, carefully crushing out the match he had struck, as he smoked away. "Well, go on," said Denham impatiently. "You said yesterday that things were as bad as they could possibly be." "I did, sir." "Well, how are they now?" "Worse. Ever so much worse." "What do you mean, you jolly old muddler?" cried Denham, rousing up and looking brighter than he had been since he came under the doctor's hands. "What I say, sir," replied the Sergeant, staring. "Things are ever so much worse." "Val," cried Denham, turning to me, "poor old Briggs has had so much to do with that scoundrel Moriarty that he has caught his complaint." "I beg pardon, sir," growled the Sergeant stiffly; "I've always been faithful to Her Majesty the Queen." "Of course you have, Sergeant." "Beg pardon, sir. You said I'd caught his complaint, meaning I was turning renegade." "Nothing of the kind; but you have caught his national complaint, for there you go again--blundering. Can't you see?" "No, sir," said the Sergeant, drawing himself up stiffer than ever. "Then you ought to. Blundering--making bulls. If the state of affairs was as bad as it could be yesterday, how can it be worse to-day?" The Sergeant scratched his head, and his countenance relaxed. "Oh!" he said thoughtfully, "of course. I didn't see that at first, gentlemen." "Never mind, so long as you see it now. But go ahead, Briggs. You can't think what it is to be lying here in hospital, with fighting going on all round, and only able to get scraps of news now and then." The Sergeant chuckled. "Here, I don't see anything to laugh at in that," cried Denham, frowning. "Do you find it funny?" "I just do, sir. Think of you talking like that to me? Why, twice over when I was in the Dragoons I was bowled over and had to go into hospital, up north there, in Egypt. Thirsty, gentlemen? I was thirsty, double thirsty, in the nasty sandy country--thirsty for want of water, and twice as thirsty to get to know how things were going on. That's why I always come, when I'm off duty, to tell you gentlemen all I can." "There, Val," cried Denham, beaming. "Didn't I always say that old Briggs was a brick?" "I don't remember," I replied. "Well, I always meant to.--Now then, Sergeant, go ahead." "Nay! I don't want to damp your spirits, sir, seeing how bad you are." "I'm not bad, Sergeant; neither is Moray. We're getting better fast, and news spurs us on to get better as fast as we can. Now then, don't make us worse by keeping us in suspense. Tell us the worst news at once." "That's soon done, sir. These Doppies, as they call 'em--these Boers-- shoot horribly well." "Yes," sighed Denham; "they've had so much practice at game." "They've got so close in now, with their wagons to hide behind, that I'm blessed if it's safe for a sentry to show his head anywhere." "But our fellows have got stone walls to keep behind, and they ought by now to shoot as well as the Boers," I said. "That's quite right, Mr Moray," cried the Sergeant, angrily puffing at his pipe; "they ought to, but they don't--not by a long way. Every time they use a cartridge there ought to be one Doppie disabled and sent to the rear. I keep on telling them this fort isn't Purfleet Magazine nor Woolwich Arsenal; but it's no good." "But, Sergeant," cried Denham anxiously, "you don't mean to say that we're running out of cartridges?" "But I do mean to say it, sir; and the time isn't so very far off when we shall either have to hang out the white flag--" "What!" cried Denham, dragging himself up into a sitting position. "Never!" "Or," continued the Sergeant emphatically, "make a sortie and give the beggars cold steel." "Ah! that sounds better," cried Denham, dropping back upon his rough pillow. "That's what we shall have to do." "Right, sir," cried the Sergeant. "Cold steel's the thing. I've always been a cavalry man, and I've seen a bit of service before I came into the Light Horse as drill-sergeant and general trainer. I've been through a good deal, and learned a good deal; and I tell you two young men that many a time in a fight I've felt wild sitting on horseback here, and trotting off there, dismounting to rest our horses; finding ourselves under fire again, and cantering off somewhere else--into a valley, behind a hill, or to the shelter of a wood, because our time hadn't come--and the infantry working away all the while. I'm not going to run down the cavalry; they're splendid in war when they can get their chance to come to close quarters. You see, we haven't done much with our swords, for the Doppies won't stand a charge. Where we've had them has been dismounted, as riflemen, and that's what our trouble is now. We can't get at the enemy; what we want is a regiment of foot with the bayonet. Just a steady advance under such cover as they could find, and then a sharp run in with a good old British cheer, and the Doppies would begin to run. Then we ought to be loosed at them, and every blessed Boer among them would make up his mind that it was quite time he went home to see how his crops are getting on." "Yes, Sergeant," said Denham gravely; "that's exactly the way to do it, and that's what people at home are saying. But we're shut up here, ammunition is failing, and we have no regiment of foot to give the brutes the cold steel and make them run; so what's the best thing to do under the circumstances?" _ |
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