Across the top of his head a bald streak ran
from the forehead, and it was here they returned to alight, after each
twitching and heave of the sunken body.
In the early months he had fought a losing fight with them. The walls
and ceiling and panes of glass were spotted with the marks of his long
battle. But his foes had advanced in ever-fresh force, clouds and swarms
of them beyond number. He had gone to meet them with a wire-killer, and
tightly rolled newspapers. He had imported fly paper from Dunkirk. But
they could afford to sacrifice the few hundreds, which his strokes could
reach, and still overwhelm him. Lately, he had given up the struggle,
and let them take possession of the room. They harassed him when he
read, so he gave up reading. They got into the food, so he ate less.
Between his two trips to the front daily at 8 A.M. and 2
P.M., he slept. He found he could lose himself in sleep. Into
that kingdom of sleep, they could not enter. As the weeks rolled on, he
was able to let himself down more and more easily into silence. That
became his life. A slothfulness, a languor, even when awake, a
half-conscious forcing of himself through the routine work, a looking
forward to the droning room, and then the settling deep into the old
plush chair, and the blessed unconsciousness.
He drove a Red Cross ambulance to the French lines at Nieuport,
collected the sick and wounded soldiers and brought them to the Poste de
Secours, two miles back of the trenches.
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