The War Romance of the Salvation Army Part 14

"Ye-ah."

"Then you didn't have any sleep?"

"No."

"Why did you come over here then?"

"I wanted to see you." There was a sound of a deep hunger in his voice.

"Well, we're awfully glad to see you, surely. Is there anything we can do for you?"

"No, Just let me look at you"-there was frank honesty in his eyes, a deep undertone of reverence in his voice, not even a hint of gallantry or flattery, only a loyal homage.

"Just let me look at you--and----" he hesitated.

"And what?" "And cook some doughnuts."

"Why, of course!" said the girls cheerily, "but you must lie down and sleep awhile first. We'll fix a place for you."

"I don't want to lie down," said the soldier determinedly, "I don't want to waste the time."

"But it wouldn't be wasted. You need the sleep."

"No, that isn't what I need. I want to look at you," he reiterated. "I've got a wife and a little baby at home, and I love them. I like to be here because seeing you takes me back to them. This morning I knew I ought to sleep, but I just couldn't go over the top tonight without seeing you again. That's why I want to see you and fry a few doughnuts for you. It takes me back to them."

He finished with a far-away look in his eyes. He was not thinking what impression his words would make, his thoughts were with his wife and little baby.

He worked around for a couple of hours, saying very little, but seeming quite content. Then he looked at his watch and said it was time to go, as it was quite a walk back to his company. Just so quietly he took his leave and went out to take his chance with Death.

The two girls thought much about him that night as they went about their work, and later lay down and tried to sleep, and their prayers went up for the faithful soul who was doing his duty out there under fire, and for the anxious wife and little one who waited to know the outcome. Sleep did not come soon to their eyes, as they lay in the darkness and prayed.

"The next day about noon as the girls were dipping doughnuts the chief doughnut dipper stumbled once more into the hut, tired, dirty, dusty and worn, but with his eyes sparkling:

"Just thought I ought to come back and tell you I'm all right," he said.

"I was afraid you'd be worried. My wife and baby would, anyway."

The girls received him with exultant smiles. "You go out there under the trees and go to sleep!" they ordered him.

"All right, I will," he said. "I feel like sleeping now. Say, you don't think I'm crazy, do you? I just had to see you! It took me back to them!"

It was one of those chill rainy nights which have caused the winter of 1917-1918 to be remembered with shudders by the men of the earlier American Expeditionary Forces. A large part of the American forces were billeted in the weathered, age-old little villages of the Gondrecourt area. They slept in barns, haylofts, cowsheds and even in pig sties. The roads were mere ditches running knee deep in sticky, clogging mud. Shoes, soaked through from the muddy road, froze as the men slept and in the morning had to be thawed out over a candle before they could be drawn on.

Frequently men were late at roll-call simply because their shoes were frozen so stiff that they were unable to don them, and their leggings so icy that they could not be wound. After sundown there were no lights, because lights invited air-raids and might well expose the position of troops to the enemy observers. Only in towns where there were Salvation Army or Y.M.C.A. huts could men find any artificial warmth, during the day or night, and only in these places were there any lights after nightfall.

Such huts afforded absolutely the only available recreation facilities.

But in countless villages where Americans were billeted there was not even this small comfort to be had.

On this particular night, in such a village, an eighteen-year-old boy sat in the orderly room of a regimental headquarters, which was housed in a once pretentious but now sadly decrepit house. Rain leaked through the tiled roof and dribbled down into the room. Windows were long ago shattered and through cracks in the rude board barricades which had replaced the gla.s.s a rising wind was driving the rain. The boy sat at a rough wooden table waiting orders. Two weeks previously a letter had come, saying that his mother was seriously ill. Since that he had had no further word. He was desperately homesick. There had been as yet none of the danger and none of the thrill which seems to settle a man down, to the serious business of war.

A pa.s.sing soldier had just told him that in a village some twelve kilometers distant two Salvation Army women were operating a hut. He longed desperately for the comfort of a woman of his own people and, sitting in the drafty, damp room, he wished that these two Salvationists were not so far away--that he could talk with them and confide in them. At last the wish grew so strong that he could no longer resist it.

He got up quietly, and silently slipped out into the rainy night. The darkness was so thick that he could not see objects six feet away. Walking through the mud was out of the question. He stumbled down, the street, once falling headlong into a muddy puddle, finally reaching the horse- lines, where, saying that he had an errand for the Colonel, he saddled a horse and slopped off into the night.

For a while he kept to the road, his horse occasionally taking fright, as a truck pa.s.sed clanking slowly in the opposite direction, or a staff car turned out to pa.s.s him like a fleeting, ghostly shadow. By following the trees which lined the road at regular intervals he was fairly sure to keep the road. He was very tired and soon began to feel sleepy, but the driving storm, which by this time had a.s.sumed the proportions of a tempest, stung him to wakefulness. Once, at a cross-roads a Military Police stopped and questioned him and gave him directions upon his saying that he was carrying dispatches.

He went on. He dozed, only to be sharply awakened by a truck which almost ran him down. He must be more careful, he thought to himself, feeling utterly alone and miserable. But in spite of his resolution his eyes soon closed again. He was awakened, this time by his horse stumbling over some unseen obstacle. He could see nothing in any direction. The blackness and rain shut him in like a fog. He turned at right angles to find the trees which lined the road, but there were no trees. He swung his horse around and went in the other direction, but he found no trees--only an impenetrable darkness which pressed in upon him with a heaviness which might almost have been weighed. He was lost--utterly lost.

He guided his steed in futile circles, hoping to regain the road, but all to no avail. Fear of the night fell upon him. He was wet to the skin and chilled to the bone. He shivered with cold and with fright. Dropping from his horse he pulled from his pocket an electric flashlight and began throwing its slender beam in widening arcs over the ground. The light revealed a stubble field. Surely there must be a path which would lead to the road, thought the boy. Backward and forward over the field he waved the light. His hands trembled so that he could not hold the switch steady, and the lamp blinked on and off.

On the storm-swept, night-hidden hillside which overhung the field was established an anti-aircraft battery.

The sound detectors had just registered the intermittent hum of an enemy plane. It was unusual that an enemy aviator should fight his way over the lines in the face of such a storm, but such things had occurred before and the Captain in charge of the battery searched the tempestuous skies for the intruder, waiting for the sound to grow until he should know that the searchlights had at least a chance of locating the venturesome plane instead of merely giving away their position.

Suddenly, cutting the night in the field below, a tiny ray of light cut the darkness, sweeping back and forward, flashing on and off. For a moment the officer watched it, then, with a muttered curse, he raced down the hillside followed by one of his men. The noise of the storm hid their approach. The boy collapsed into a trembling heap, as the officer grasped him and wrested the flash-light from his chilled fingers. He made no protest as they led him down into a dark, deserted village. He followed his captors into a candle-lighted room where sat a staff officer.

Briefly the Captain explained the situation.

"Caught him in the act of signaling to an enemy plane, sir," he said.

The boy was too cold to venture a protest.

"Bring him to me again in the morning," said the Colonel, shrugging his shoulders. "Hold on, though! What are you going to do with him? He will die unless you get him warmed up."

"Don't know what to do with him, sir, unless I take him down to the Salvation Army... they have a fire there."

"Very good, Captain, see that he is properly guarded and if they will have him, leave him there for the night." And so it came to pa.s.s that the boy reached his destination. It was past closing time--long past; but the motherly Salvationist in charge knew just what to do. Within ten minutes, wrapped in a warm blanket, the boy sat with his feet in a pan of hot water, with the Salvation Army woman feeding him steaming lemonade.

Between gulps, he told his story and was comforted. Soon he was snugly tucked into an army cot, and still grasping the Salvationist's hand, was sleeping peacefully.

The next day a little investigation a.s.sured the Colonel that the boy's story was a true one, and with a reprimand for leaving his post without orders he was allowed to return. The delay, however, had absented him, of course, from morning roll-call, and he was sentenced to thirty days repairing wire on the front-line trenches, which was often equivalent to a death sentence, for as many men were shot during the performance of this duty as came in safely.

He had done fifteen days of his time at this sentence when the Salvation Army woman from the Ansauville hut which the boy had visited that rainy night happened over to his Officers' Headquarters, and by chance learned of his unhappy fate. It took but a few words from her to his commanding officer to set matters right; his sentence was revoked, and he was pardoned.

Ansauville was a point of peculiar importance in that all the troops pa.s.sing into or out from the sector stopped there. It was here that cocoa and coffee were first provided for the troops. Afterwards it came to be the habit to serve them with the doughnuts and pie. It was when the Twenty-sixth Division came into the line. They had marched for hours and had been without any warm meal for a long time. Detachments of them reached Ansauville at night, wet and cold, too late to secure supper that night, and hearing they were coming, the la.s.sies put on great boilers of coffee and cocoa, and as the men arrived they were given to them freely.

A hut was established at Mandres. This was some distance in advance of Ansauville and lay in the valley. At first a wooden building was secured.

It had nothing but a dirt floor but lumber was hauled from Newchateau by truck--a distance of sixty miles, and the place was made comfortable.

For some little time the boys enjoyed this hut, but on one occasion the Germans sent over a heavy barrage; they hit the hut, destroying one end of it, scattering the supplies, ruining the victrola, and after that the military authorities ordered that the men should not a.s.semble in such numbers.

When this order was given, the Salvation Army had no intention of discontinuing work at Mandres and so found a cellar under a partially destroyed building. This cellar was vaulted and had been used for storing wine. It was wet and in bad condition, but with some labor it was made fit to receive the men; and tables and benches were placed there, the canteen established and a range set up. It was at this place that a very wonderful work was carried on. The Salvation Army Ensign who had charge, for a time, scoured the country for miles around to purchase eggs, which he transferred to his hut in an old baby carriage. The eggs were supplied to the men at cost and they fried them themselves on the range, which was close at hand. This was considered by the military authorities too far front for women to come and only men were allowed here.

The Ensign also mixed batter for pan cakes and established quite a reputation as a pan-cake maker. Here was a place where the soldiers felt at home. They could come in at any time and on the fire cook what they pleased.

They could purchase at the canteen such articles as were for sale and it was home to them. Very wonderful meetings were held in this spot and many men found Christ at the penitent-form, which was an old bench placed in front of the canteen.

On the wharf in New York when the soldiers were returning home some soldiers were talking about the Salvation Army. "Did you ever go to one of their meetings?" asked one. "I sure did!" answered a big fine fellow--a college man, by the way, from one of the well known New England universities. "I sure did!--and it was the most impressive service I ever attended. It was down in an old wine cellar, and the house over it _wasn't_ because it had been blown away. The meeting was led by a little Swede, and he gave a very impressive address, and followed it by a wonderful prayer. And it wasn't because it was so learned either, for the man was no college chap, but it stirred me deeply. I used to be a good deal of a barbarian before I went to France, but that meeting made a big change in me. Things are going to be different now.

"The place was lit by a candle or two and the guns were roaring overhead, but the room was packed and a great many men stood up for prayers. Oh, I'll never forget that meeting!"

That meeting was in the old wine cellar in Mandres.