This avalanche of suffering was quickly distributed throughout the
castle. In a few hours it was so completely filled that there was not a
vacant bed--the last arrivals being laid in the shadow of the trees. The
telephones were ringing incessantly; the surgeons in coarse aprons
were going from one side to the other, working rapidly; human life was
submitted to savage proceedings with roughness and celerity. Those who
died under it simply left one more cot free for the others that kept
on coming. Desnoyers saw bloody baskets filled with shapeless masses of
flesh, strips of skin, broken bones, entire limbs. The orderlies were
carrying these terrible remnants to the foot of the park in order to
bury them in a little plot which had been Chichi's favorite reading
nook.
Pairs of soldiers were carrying out objects wrapped in sheets which
the owner recognized as his. These were the dead, and the park was soon
converted into a cemetery. No longer was the little retreat large enough
to hold the corpses and the severed remains from the operations. New
grave trenches were being opened near by. The Germans armed with shovels
were pressing into service a dozen of the farmer-prisoners to aid in
unloading the dead. Now they were bringing them down by the cartload,
dumping them in like the rubbish from some demolished building. Don
Marcelo felt an abnormal delight in contemplating this increasing
number of vanquished enemies, yet he grieved at the same time that this
precipitation of intruders should be deposited forever on his property.
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