And it was a dry smile, a withered smile. I could guess his
thought.
"Wounded!" he must have said to himself, scornfully. And he must have
remembered the real wounds the Canadians had received on that
hillside. Aye, I could guess his thought. And I shared it, although I
did not tell him so. But I think he understood.
He was still sitting there, puffing away at his old pipe, as quiet
and calm and imperturbable as ever, when Captain Godfrey gathered us
together to go on. He gazed out over the valley.
He was a man to be remembered for a long time, that major. I can see
him now, in my mind's eye, sitting there, brooding, staring out
toward Lens and the German lines. And I think that if I were choosing
a figure for some great sculptor to immortalize, to typify and
represent the superb, the majestic imperturbability of the British
Empire in time of stress and storm, his would be the one. I could
think of no finer figure than his for such a statue. You would see
him, if the sculptor followed my thought, sitting in front of his
shell-hole on Vimy Ridge, calm, dispassionate, devoted to his duty
and the day's work, quietly giving the directions that guided the
British guns in their work of blasting the Hun out of the refuge he
had chosen when the Canadians had driven him from the spot where the
major sat.
It was easier going down Vimy Ridge than it had been coming up, but
it was hard going still.
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