20

When Private Patrick MacQueen began to assess what had happened to him, he was in a ward of the old stone military hospital at Cogswell Street in Halifax. It was in that hospital his father had briefly served before going to France in 1916; his mother had been an emergency nurse there after the Halifax Explosion in 1917. They did not meet until 1919, upon his father’s return from France.

MacQueen was in a long ward with high ceilings and a view of the top of Citadel Hill. His left arm was in traction and a heavy cast. Some bones in his left shoulder had been splintered, and he had been treated with the new sulphonamides, blood transfusions, and shock therapy. This had been a continual process until he reached Halifax, where the surgeons had cleaned the wound and mounted him in the bed. His memories were sporadic…he couldn’t yet tell which were facts and which were fantasies. He shared the ward with a sailor who had lost an arm in a winch, an army transport driver who had coasted into the harbour and broken his neck, and a merchant seaman whose foot had been removed for frostbite and gangrene. Others roamed about in the gaudy hospital patient’s uniform of bright blue with a scarlet necktie—presumably to keep them from running away; it was just as effective as a ball and chain.

Wounded soldiers were still somewhat of a novelty, and there were visitors from various associations bearing cigarettes, candies, and writing material—one nice lady even gave MacQueen a shawl. A brief letter from Sergeant Cyples said that Andy had been put into the detention centre, where he had tried to hang himself. He added that the A Company would soon be shipped overseas, and that he would visit the hospital. And that Barbara sent her love.

More surprisingly, a telegram arrived from his mother with an invitation to recuperate in Bermuda. Her cousin, one of the family’s retired colonels, also paid a visit, accompanied by the stern chief nurse of the hospital, who tried her best to smile. The colonel was now employed mustering names for possible conscription in the province. He told MacQueen that he would be lowered in category to “F”, which meant that he was medically unfit for further military service.

“You were too young, anyway,” said the family colonel. “Visit your mother, then come back and if your arm is okay we’ll see what we can do to get you into officer’s training. Your brother seems to be doing well enough, I hear.” That duty being performed, the family colonel left for lunch at the officer’s mess in Artillery Park, on the other side of Citadel Hill. He never reappeared.

Time dragged on and MacQueen lay quietly. He didn’t really care what happened now. The hospital routine and his companion’s vulgar jokes became the pattern of life, punctuated infrequently by a letter or a visit. His father wrote to tell him to visit him in Charlottetown, but not until a trip was arranged on one of the Lady Boats to take him to Bermuda soon after. The idea that a U-boat might sink it en route did not seem to occur to him, or at least it wasn’t mentioned. A fixed departure date would allow him to do his fatherly duty, discuss Patrick’s future, and avoid the strain of a prolonged visit. He received a postcard from his brother stating that he was going to get married, but he neglected to say when, where, or to whom. It was postmarked BROCKVILLE.

The leaves had fallen from the few trees that were visible at the foot of Citadel Hill, and the sun set behind it earlier each day. The yellow tram cars clanged all night as they passed the corner, and the lights of traffic reflected off the ceiling. Unlike Saint John’s, Halifax was not blacked out, to the despair of silhouetted mariners whose ships might unluckily be framed in a periscope. MacQueen read pulp magazines of the Great War imported from the United States, his favourite hero being a hard-drinking aviator named Terence X. O’Leary, who reminded MacQueen of Sergeant Cyples.

Finally, his arm was put into a sling, and MacQueen rose unsteadily to his feet. For a day or so he shuffled about like an old man but then gradually became more sure of his footing. His shoulder ached at all times, but it was bearable. He looked out of the windows and watched the sailors passing the windy corner with their square collars fluttering and their girlfriends turning their backs to the wind and laughing. Clang-clang warned the tramcars, whose every conductor looked like a two-dimensional woodcut framed in the large front window. In the distant sky, the Red Ensign flew outright above the Citadel, now pointing north and then pointing south as more troopships were loaded. Destroyers entered and left the harbour with a whoop-whoop-whoop, and begrimed Halifax prepared for another winter of war.

Finally, the hospital orderly helped MacQueen to get dressed in his battle dress uniform. The orderly goosed him in front of the bathroom mirror, which sent a tremor of pain through his shoulder. “I’ll miss washing your pecker,” said the orderly with a naughty leer. “Keep it in your pants.”

There was no privacy in the army, and MacQueen accepted this familiarity with stoicism. This orderly had taken a motherly interest in MacQueen’s welfare, and there wasn’t much he could have done about it anyway—under the circumstances everyone just helped themselves. He put his right arm into the sleeve of the tunic, and the orderly draped it over the cast and belted it around his waist. “You now look just like a hero,” he said in admiration. MacQueen had forgotten the weight of army boots; they felt like large lumps of lead. His personal gear had been sent from Aldershot and was now all packed in one brown canvas kit bag and a haversack. His greatcoat lay on the bed and he was ready to leave. His orders were to report to the Wellington Barracks for a medical discharge from the Canadian army, which would take a week or more to complete.

He wrote a postcard to Sergeant Cyples, stuck a three-cent stamp onto it, and left it at the desk. Another orderly heaved his bags into an army pickup truck and shook his hand. “We didn’t think you’d make it,” said the orderly. “But I’m glad you did.” A cold wind whistled around the corner of the hospital, scattering dead leaves. MacQueen held onto his field service cap and climbed into the truck, beside the driver. He felt exhausted and his shoulder hurt.

“Wellington Barracks!” said the driver cheerfully. He was an army service corps corporal and the most contented man in MD No. 6. Halifax was his home grounds, he lived with his family, and he could moonlight as a taxi driver. He did not care if the war lasted forever. “For your sake, I hope you don’t have to stay in there for long—it’s a cold dump in the wintertime.” They bounced onto the cobblestones of Cogswell Street and MacQueen winced. The stitches had just been removed and he hoped that his shoulder wouldn’t start to bleed.

Wellington Barracks was a three-storey brick quadrangle, surrounded by a high stone wall. One entered through an arched passageway that penetrated the building and exited onto the parade ground. It was located on Gottingen Street and overlooked the harbour at almost the exact spot where the munitions’ ship had blown up to cause the Halifax Explosion in 1917. The concrete parade square was surrounded by a stone drive with upended cannon as marking posts. Between it and the harbour view were a long row of brick senior officers’ residences. It had been built for the British garrison in Queen Victoria’s reign, and the explosion had cracked it from top to bottom. The wind moaned eerily through its long corridors and the windows rattled in their frames. A sentry from the Halifax Rifle Regiment waved them through the gate and they drove under the arch. A spit-and-polish sergeant, wearing a forage cap tilted over his nose and short puttees, stepped from a half-open Dutch door and held up his hand. He held a clipboard in his other hand.

“Name?” he asked briskly.

“Private MacQueen, Patrick, F26453.”

“Get out m’lad,” said the sergeant. MacQueen eased himself into the drafty archway, slung the kit bag over his right shoulder, and reached for the duffle. The service corps corporal got out and lifted it to the stone walkway. “Okay, Jim, get the hell outta here,” said the sergeant. “You’re holdin’ up traffic.”

The truck rolled ahead, and a staff car drew abreast. It hesitated, and the sergeant sprang erect and saluted smartly. The staff car rolled ahead. “Jesus, it was the general!” muttered the sergeant. His hand shook slightly as he traced down a list on the clipboard. “MacQueen? Right, here we are…discharge, eh? Lucky boy! You’re for room 211. Through that door and up the stairs, turn left. Any bunk, there’s only one other in there. Standing orders on the wall. Supper at five over there.” He pointed to a door under some arched cloisters facing the parade square. Two platoons of soldiers were assembled on the square but did not seem to be doing anything. It was a cheerless outlook, and the sky looked laden with snow.

“Can someone help me with the duffle bag, Sergeant?” asked MacQueen.

“Drag it inside the door,” replied the sergeant. “Ask your roommate to get it for you.”

A large truck was gingerly navigating the archway, and MacQueen could see an old freighter slowly making its way through the narrows towards Bedford Basin. He held the door with his back and dragged the duffle bag over the doorstep. He felt dizzy and mounted the worn stone steps slowly, holding the iron railing. The place smelled of cement and decay. The corridors were high and gloomy and totally bare. It’s like a nightmare, thought MacQueen, and a brief ghost vision of a red-coated British soldier flickered through his mind. He had heard that the coats were red so they would not show bloodstains. If history is written in young men’s blood, he reflected bitterly, they shouldn’t have had to wear red coats.

211 was stencilled in dirty yellow on the door. MacQueen pushed it open. The room contained a dozen iron double-deck bunks, each with a rolled mattress and three grey blankets. There was a high, dirty window facing a stone wall, and two bulbs hanging bare from the ceiling. A soldier lay sleeping on one of the bare springs with his head propped on the folded blankets with a towel spread over them. MacQueen read on his shoulder flash CAPE BRETON HIGHLANDERS. He selected a bunk that would give him some light for reading, put his kit bag on the floor, and laid down without removing his greatcoat. He was asleep in an instant.