the others knew less. I went up to my room in a state of bewilderment.
It was a huge room without a carpet, and the tiny fire refused to
light. There was a funeral wreath over the bed, with the picture of
the deceased woman in the centre. It was bitterly cold, and there was
a curious odor of disinfectants in the air.

By a window was a narrow black iron bed without a mattress. It looked
sinister. Where was the mattress? Had its last occupant died and the
mattress been burned? I sniffed about it; the odour of disinfectant
unmistakably clung to it. I do not yet know the story of that room or
of that bed. Perhaps there is no story. But I think there is. I put on
my fur coat and went to bed, and the lady of the wreath came in the
night and talked French to me.

I rose in the morning at seven degrees Centigrade and dressed. At
breakfast part of the mystery was cleared up. The house was being used
as a residence by the chief surgeon of the Ambulance Jeanne d'Arc, the
Belgian Red Cross hospital in Calais, and by others interested in the
Red Cross work. It was a dormitory also for the English nurses from
the ambulance. This explained, naturally, my being sent there, the
somewhat casual nature of the furnishing and the odour of
disinfectants. It does not, however, explain the lady of the wreath or
the black iron bed.

After breakfast some of the nurses came in from night duty at the
ambulance. I saw their bedroom, one directly underneath mine, with
four single beds and no pretence at comfort. It was cold, icy cold.

"You are very courageous," I said. "Surely this is not very
comfortable. I should think you might at least have a fire."