"
Marie Ivanovna at the end of the first week spoke her mind. I found
her one evening before supper leaning over the fence, gazing across
the long flat field, pale gold in the dusk with the hills like grey
clouds beyond it.
"They tell me," she said, turning to me, "that we may be another
fortnight like this."
"Yes," I said, "it's quite possible, or even longer. We can't provide
wounded and battles for you if there aren't any."
"But there are!" she cried. "Isn't the whole of Europe fighting and
isn't it simply disgusting of us to be sitting down here, eating and
sleeping, just as though we were in a _dacha_ in the country? At least
in the hospital in Petrograd I was working ... here...."
"We've got to stick to our Division," I answered. "They can't have it
in reserve very long. When it goes, we'll go. The whole secret of
leading this life out here is taking exactly what comes as completely
as you can take it. If it's a time for sleeping and eating, sleep and
eat--there'll be days enough when you'll get nothing of either.
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