Sometimes it is his turn to have a dressing. But scarcely is it
completed when he is up again with his apron before him, silently
busy.

At eleven o'clock, Mehay disappears. He has gone, perhaps, to get
a breath of fresh air? Oh, no! Here he is back again with a
trayful of bowls. And he hands round the soup.

In the evening he hands the thermometer. He helps the orderlies so
much that he leaves them very little to do.

All this time the bones of his skull are at work under his
bandages, and the red flesh is growing. But we are not to trouble
about that: it will manage all alone. The man, however, cannot be
idle. He works, and trusts to his blood, "which is healthy."

In the evening, when the ward is lighted by a night-light, and I
come in on tiptoe to give a last look round, I hear a voice
laboriously spelling: "B-O, Bo; B-I, Bi; N-E, Ne, Bobine." It is
Mehay, learning to read before going to bed.


VI


A lamp has been left alight, because the men are not asleep yet,
and they are allowed to smoke for a while. It would be no fun to
smoke, unless one could see the smoke.

The former bedroom of the mistress of the house makes a very