loudly, “Sestra.”  Taking the milk off, Sestra hurries across the courtyard and along the corridor to the little rooms with the puppy tugging at her skirt.  The woman wants water; she has wakened the other women—­they want water.  When silence again comes back into the ward, one notes instinctively the vivid colouring of the two big blue windows at the far end, the long lines of beds disappearing into the darkness, the dim light of the lantern on the table showing up the cheap clock and a few flowers.  The intensity of light upon this clock is only equalled by the intensity of one’s thoughts upon the clock.  The minute-hand drags on as though it were weary with the day’s work.  A groan ticks off the quarters and cries for water or milk the half-hours.  At last one o’clock.  Time for a midnight meal.  Eggs and cocoa hurriedly eaten without appetite in the kitchen, but breaking the monotony.  Back to the ward again, one of the patients very restless, in great pain.  Poor fellow, he has had a long and hard time of it, fifteen months in bed and all due to early neglect.

“Sestra,” he says, “sestra,” and holds out a handkerchief heavy with coin.  “Tell the doctor to take me down to the operating-room and cure me or not let me wake up.”

Between four and five there is more movement in the ward.  Groans give way to yawns.  In the windows the blue is paling to grey.  Cocks are crowing now quite close, now faintly, like an echo.  Suddenly the world is filled with work, “washings, brushings, combings, cleanings, temperatures, breakfasts, medicines, some beds to make, reports, all fitted together like a jigsaw puzzle, until at last the day-sisters come and relieve, and yawning at the daylight one eats warmed-up dinner while the others are having breakfast.”

After a seven weeks’ absence one was bound to miss many old friends in the ward.  Some had gone home, others were back in the army.  Old Number 13, the king of the ward, was still there.  He had a dark brown face and white hair, and was furious if any dared to call him a gipsy.

“I am a respectable farmer,” he said, “and I own seventeen pigs, a horse, and five sheep, a wife, and two children.”

He loved to tell of his wedding.  It was done in the correct old Serbian style.  He went with his mother and a gun to the chosen one’s house, where she was waiting alone, her parents tactfully keeping out of the way.  They abducted the lady, who was treated with great honour as a visitor in her future father-in-law’s house.

“Father” turned up next morning.  Rakia was served, and father divulged ceremoniously how many pigs he could spare to them for keeping his daughter.

Number 13 wanted to know everything:  how old was Jo, how much she was paid?

“What, you are not paid?” he said in amazement.  “Then the English are wonderful!  In Serbia our women would not do that.”

Poor little John Willie still left a blank, though he had died long before.  His name was not John Willie, but it sounded rather like it, so we just turned it into John Willie.  He loved the name, and told his father about it.