The White Road of Mystery: The Note-Book of an American Ambulancier

BAR-LE-DUC, the old stronghold of the feudal dukes of Bar, nestling in the valley on the banks of the slow-moving Ornain, tributary to the River Marne, and with la ville haute trespassing far onto one ridge, and the ruined castle frowning down from the other, is a town of memories and traditions which greets this war as but another chapter in the never-ending book of its history. It has two large and ancient cathedrals, the one crowning the upper city—now quite naturally in ruins, as the enemy, by this time a connoisseur in churches, makes frequent air raids. The chateau—considered quite modern as it is but two hundred years of age—has mellowed into the surroundings by now, and forms a sufficiently integral part of the beauty of the city to be likewise a target for our “considerate” neighbor.

One evening, as the last rays of the sun glinted from its roof, it stood solid and strong,—ready to do battle with the elements for many centuries more, but while the city lay quiet in the cold moonlight of an August night, the sound of purring motors broke the silence from above. The contre-avions crashed, and the yellow shrapnel broke in the sky often a mile from its invisible target, and never near enough to arrest the advance of the raiders, who suddenly shut off their motors and, as often before, swooped silently down on their motionless prey, and dropped their bombs. Then, turning on their motors, they climbed and glided over the city again and again until, having dropped their entire cargo, they flew off. But in the morning the chateau no longer stood proudly up from the river mist, and another buttress against the ravages of the elements had crumbled into untimely ruins.

The main street of the town is denuded of its plate glass, and more houses crumble each time the enemy reports “military advantage gained” by an indiscriminate slaughter of the future crop of France’s defenders, and those heroic souls who bear them.

The town is noted for its manufactures, its wines, and its confitures. As to the first-named I know little, but as to the merits of its wines, its liqueurs, and its confitures I cannot say enough, nor can many thousands of others who seek out Bar-le-Duc as the one sanctuary from the mud and deprivations of the rest of their existence, and bask gloriously in the discomforts of its civilization for a few stolen hours.

CONVOY formation again, the cars freshly washed and glistening in the sunlight,—for a few minutes, before the grey cloud of dust pouring from the cars in front settles on us again. We come to a turn. A large sign greets us, Souilly—vers Verdun, emphasized by a giant arrow pointing in the direction we take. We are instantly sure that this is to be our headquarters. Verdun is a name we have long wished to visualize. At the first stop we tell each other the great news. While we are grouped in the road a big grey limousine carrying three generals dashes past. Every one salutes, and by a miracle we are noticed and the salute is returned. Cheerful Liar at once informs us that they were Joffre, Petain, and—he is at a loss for the third name. We help him out—Hindenburg perhaps.

But we are doomed to bitter disappointment. Thirty kilometres from the famous city we are given orders to park our cars in a pile of ruins formerly known as Erize—Erize la petite, and well named.

ERIZE is, without exception, the dullest place beneath the sun—a small town, now a mass of crumbling ruins, holding not above two dozen civilians, who are, for the most part, still less interesting than the town. Of course, there are Grand’mère and Grand-père, no relation to each other, but so christened by us because they are the only two octogenarians here. Grand’mère is not properly from Erize. Her home is somewhere north of Verdun, in a town with an unpronounceable name and long since destroyed. She, herself, carries proudly on her wrinkled forehead a two-inch scar from shrapnel, and informs us tearfully that her two sons have died in action, “_pour la patrie_,” she concludes, with a faint smile.

I met Grand’mère for the first time when I picked an unripe apple from an overburdened tree. The old woman appeared from the depths of a nearby building and advanced menacingly towards me, hobbling along on a cane, and pouring forth as she came an unintelligible tirade from which I gathered that the apple reposing guiltily in my hand was hers—not mine. A single franc served to wreathe her face in smiles and to obtain undisputed claim to the apple and her good graces in the future. Ira furor brevis est. I afterwards learned that houses in Erize rent for fifty francs a year, this including several acres of farm land.

Grand-père, aged ninety-eight, I met near the temporary kitchen where the cook was giving him a cup of Pinard, which he drank eagerly, while Grand’mère gave him wise counsel, to which he replied as Omar Khayyam might have done.

But they are the only characters of interest here. The fields surrounding the town have as their redeeming feature a system of old trenches, with much barbed wire and an occasional shell-fragment to reward the searcher. The German advance was stopped less than a mile from here, and the trenches have been used since for practice.

The dugouts interest us particularly. We are later to become surfeited with them, but as yet they are still delightfully novel. The rumble of the guns can be heard plainly from here, and at rare intervals a saucisse rises on the horizon, much to our joy and excitement.

THE saucisse is a balloon shaped like a sausage—hence its name. At the front they are in the sky by the hundreds on both sides to direct the fire of the artillery and to observe the enemy’s operations generally. They are consequently made the objective of the aeroplane, and many are brought down every day. The aeroplane dodges along from cloud to cloud, and when he is just over the saucisse suddenly swoops down, and with a tic-tic-tic from his machine-gun the bag crumples up in a cloud of black smoke and flames, the observer jumps out with his parachute, and the aeroplane dashes off pursued by many shells.

In the balloons the observers all have parachutes and usually make their escape, although often they have to spend a little time dangling from the limb of some tree.

WE are told not to stray far, as the order to move may come at any moment. We take walks through the country, and always on returning find the section with “no news,”—but at last the order comes.

We have gotten our baggage ready, and are sitting around in the darkness smoking our pipes and thinking. Tomorrow we are going up to the lines. A big attack has been scheduled, and we are to take care of the wounded. It is to be our first work, and any fighting at all seems a “big attack” to us. We are a green section, fresh from Paris. We have never heard a shell whistle, and have been thrilled by the sound of guns twenty miles away. What will be our sensations face to face with the real thing? We are a bit nervous. There is some tension. We discuss the probable extent of the attack and debate as to its success. This leads us nowhere, and after we have pledged each other and the section “_Bonne chance_” in a glass of cognac from a bottle opened for the occasion, we turn in.