William Monk 11 - Slaves of Obsession

corrected him. “Or there are too many dead. The fighting is too heavy for anyone to leave and care for them.” She saw the denial in his face. “We must go and do what we can.”
    It was definitely fear she saw in his eyes, perhaps not of injury or death to himself, more probably of other people’s pain and of his own inability to help. She knew exactly what it was like; it churned in her own stomach and made her feel sick and weak. The only thing that would be worse was the hell of living with failure afterwards. She had seen it in men who believed themselves cowards, truly or falsely.
    She turned towards the door. “We need to take water, bandages, instruments, all we can carry.” She did not try to persuade him. It was not a time for many words. She was going. He could follow or not.
    Outside she met a soldier who was climbing into a blood-spattered ambulance.
    “Where are you going?” she asked.
    “Sudley Church,” he replied. “It’s about eight miles away … nearer where the fighting is now.”
    “Wait!” Hester ordered. “We’re coming!” And she ran back inside to get Merrit. The surgeon was still busy trying to evacuate the last of the wounded.
    Merrit came with her, carrying as many canteens as she could manage. They scrambled up into the ambulance and set out the eight miles to Sudley.
    The heat was like a furnace; the glare of the sun hurt the eyes. Clouds of dust and gunpowder marked easily where the fighting was densest, on a rise beyond the river, whose course was well marked by the trees along the banks.
    It took them over an hour, and Hester got off at least a mile before the hospital, carrying half a dozen canteens and setting out to reach the men still lying where they had fallen.
    She passed broken carts and wagons, a few wounded horses, but there was very little cavalry. There were shattered weapons lying in the grass. She saw one which had obviously exploded; its owner was dead a couple of yards away, his face blackened, the ground dark with blood. Beside him others lay wounded.
    She swore blindly at the ignorance and incompetence which had sent young men into battle with guns that were so old and ill-made they slaughtered the users. The irony brought tears of helplessness to her eyes. Was she really sure it would be better if they fired properly, and killed whoever was in their sights instead? Guns were created to kill, to maim, cripple, disfigure, cause pain and fear. It was their purpose.
    The firing ahead was very heavy. The sound of grape and canister being shot from cannon screamed through the air. She could clearly see the lines of men, blue-gray against the parched grass, half obscured by dust and gun smoke. Battle standards were high above them, hanging limply in the hot air. It must be after three o’clock. Sudley Church was a few hundred yards away.
    She passed more shattered carts, guns, bodies of the dead. The ground was red with blood. One man was lying half propped against a caisson, his abdomen ripped open and his intestines bulging out over his torn and bloody thighs. Incredibly, his eyes were open; he was alive.
    This was what she hated most, worse than the dead, those still in agony and horror, watching their own blood pour away, knowing they were dying and helpless to do anything about it. She wanted to walk on, pretend she had not seen, wipe it out of her memory. But of course she could not. Itwould have been easier to put a bullet through his head and stop the pain.
    She bent down in front of him.
    “There ain’t nothin’ you can do for me, ma’am,” he said through dry lips. “There’s plenty o’ fellows further on.…”
    “You first,” she answered softly. Then she lowered her eyes to his dreadful wound and the hands clenched over it, as if they could actually do something.
    Perhaps she could? It seemed to be the outer flesh which was torn; his actual organs looked undamaged. She could barely see for the dirt and blood.
    She put down the canteens of water and took out the first roll of bandages. She poured water onto a pad, and a little wine, and began to unclench his hands and wash the dirt off the pale flesh of his intestine. She tried in her mind to separate it from the live man watching her, to think only of tiny detail, of the little grains of earth, sand, the oozes of blood, to keep it all clean and try to place it where it should be in the cavity of his body.
    For a few moments she was even unaware of the heat burning her skin, the