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Page 54
"It is not _comme il faut_, M'sieur le Docteur, that a man whose very
grandfather fought for Jeanne should fail France now in her need.
Jeanne, one knows, was the saviour of France. Is it not?" I agreed. "It
is my inheritance, therefore, to fight as my ancient grandfather
fought." I looked at the lame boy, not knowing the repartee. He began
again. "Also I am the only one of the family proper to go, except
Adolphe, who is not very proper, having had a tree to fall on the lungs
and leave him liable to fits; and also Jacques and Louis are too young,
and Jean Baptiste he is blind of one eye, God knows. So it is I who
fail! I fail! Jesus Christ! To stay at home like a coward when France
needs men!"
"But you are Canadian, Philippe. Your people have been here two hundred
years."
"M'sieur, I am of France. I belong there with the fighting men." His
look was a flame, and suddenly I know why he was firing off hot shot at
me. I am a surgeon.
"What's the matter with your leg?" I asked.
The brilliant eyes flashed. "Ah!" he brought out, "One hoped--If M'sieur
le Docteur would but see. I may be cured. To be straight--to march!" He
was trembling.
Later, in the shifting sunshine at the camp door, with the odors of
hemlocks and balsams about us, the lake rippling below, I had an
examination. I found that the lad's lameness was a trouble to be cured
easily by an operation. I hesitated. Was it my affair to root this
youngster out of safety and send him to death in the _d�b�cle_ over
there? Yet what right had I to set limits? He wanted to offer his life;
how could I know what I might be blocking if I withheld the cure? My job
was to give strength to all I could reach.
"Philippe," I said, "if you'll come to New York next month I'll set you
up with a good leg."
In September, 1915, Dick and I came up for our yearly trip, but Philippe
was not with us. Philippe, after drilling at Valcartier, was drilling
in England. I had lurid post cards off and on; after a while I knew that
he was "somewhere in France." A grim gray card came with no post-mark,
no writing but the address and Philippe's labored signature; for the
rest there were printed sentences: "I am well. I am wounded. I am in
hospital. I have had no letter from you lately." All of which was struck
out but the welcome words, "I am well." So far then I had not cured the
lad to be killed. Then for weeks nothing. It came to be time again to go
to Canada for the hunting. I wrote the steward to get us four men, as
usual, and Lindsley and I alighted from the rattling train at the club
station in September, 1916, with a mild curiosity to see what Fate had
provided as guides, philosophers and friends to us for two weeks. Paul
Sioui--that was nice--a good fellow Paul; and Josef--I shook hands with
Josef; the next face was a new one--ah, Pierre Beauram�--one calls one's
self that--_on s'appelle comme �a. Bon jour!_ I turned, and got a shock.
The fourth face, at which I looked, was the face of Philippe Martel. I
looked, speechless. And with that the boy laughed. "It is that M'sieur
cannot again cure my leg," answered Philippe, and tapped proudly on a
calf which echoed with a wooden sound.
"You young cuss," I addressed him savagely. "Do you mean to say you have
gone and got shot in that very leg I fixed up for you?"
Philippe rippled more laughter--of pure joy--of satisfaction. "But, yes,
M'sieur le Docteur, that leg _m�me_. Itself. In a battle, M'sieur le
Docteur gave me the good leg for a long enough time to serve France. It
was all that there was of necessary. As for now I may not fight again,
but I can walk and portage _comme il faut_. I am _capable_ as a guide.
Is it not, Josef?" He appealed, and the men crowded around to back him
up with deep, serious voices.
"Ah, yes, M'sieur."
"_B'en capable!_"
"He can walk like us others--the same!" they assured me impressively.
Philippe was my guide this year. It was the morning after we reached
camp. "Would M'sieur le Docteur be too busy to look at something?"
I was not. Philippe stood in the camp doorway in the patch of sunlight
where he had sat two years before when I looked over his leg. He sat
down again, in the shifting sunshine, the wooden leg sticking out
straight and pathetic, and began to take the covers off a package. There
were many covers; the package was apparently valuable. As he worked at
it the odors of hemlock and balsam, distilled by hot sunlight, rose
sweet and strong, and the lake splashed on pebbles, and peace that
passes understanding was about us.
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