On another memorable occasion, returning from the trenches, Grace, Walton and Sayer were invited to an afternoon coffee celebration by the doctors of a different regiment, not far away. One of them had just been awarded The Cross of the Legion of Honour for great gallantry.
When they arrived he was wearing, with much embarrassment, a laurel wreath the others had made for him. An orderly had cycled 10 miles to fetch a bottle of Champagne, and it was one of those cheerful, happy occasions which suddenly spring to life in the midst of war's desolation.- six doctors, a Colonel, and an English officer who had blown in from nowhere.
"Champagne, biscuits and coffee" wrote Grace, "were passed gaily around. Speeches were made, and the cheery scenes were strange indeed." Outside, in the icy chill of winter, the guns rumbled sullenly on. The long stove in the room, red hot, spread its warmth. And Grace was vastly amused that the English officer just couldn't get over seeing three English girls, in uniform, in this lonely outpost.
Suddenly, in the midst of the festivities a frantic banging on the door brought things to an abrupt halt. It burst open and a rain-drenched, blue-uniformed Belgian soldier lurched in, one arm clutching his rifle, the other swathed in ragged, bloodstained bandages. He was followed by two stretcher-bearers with a wounded man.
The party ended abruptly.
Medics leapt into action.
Grace describes the scene: "Back went our chairs and coffee cups. In a moment the hero of the feast was ripping the trouser leg off the moaning figure on the stretcher, and we were bandaging the shoulder and hand of the other man. The leg was an ugly sight, and before it was dressed another stretcher was carried in, and a lad with half his head shot off lay at our feet. Outside a lull came in the storm, and as the rain ceased the clouds cleared and a dull red sunset flamed across the sky".
When the ambulance had finally driven away, Sayer and Grace stood for some time watching the sky. At this moment, a few hundred yards away, an armoured gun-train rolled up over the rails they had walked along that morning. Grace described it as "cumbersome, quaint and wicked-looking," The two of them stood watching it, fascinated.
For Grace it was one of the most memorable days so far. A combination of merriment, tragedy, the sudden change in the sky to a majestic orange glow, and then the battle that ensued between the great guns on the armoured train, and the prodigious German canonry away out of sight at Dixmude, recently taken by the Hun.
She revelled in the unexpected excitement, describing the scene as she saw it, and her feelings: "Then BOOM BOOM, and a cloud of smoke melted into the twilight, BRO…OOM – BROO……OOM, growled the angry guns at Dixmude, where the Boches had received the shot.
BOOM-BOOM spat the train, and BOOM-BOOM came the answer. It was an unforgettable thing. Up here alone, far from civilization, very far from the homes where, perhaps, our people thought of us, but certainly did not imagine our surroundings!"
She was carried away by this sort of personal euphoria, finding it amazing and exhilarating, experiencing: "in this atmosphere of storm and war, living what surely few women ever dreamt in their wildest fancies, until this war began."
She went on, catching this moment in stark relief, her real self surging to the surface: "My ears tingled; I breathed in long, deep breaths. Had I spoken, a sort of wild war song would have come from my lips. The Highland blood in me bubbled and frothed; I wanted to run for miles – to race, to climb – action at all costs. And then? ……well, along the road came weary, stumbling figures."
From the heights of exaltation, she was suddenly brought face to face with harsh reality – dirty, muddy, footsore men shuffling along the road, some carrying stretchers, others on them, maimed, broken, moaning. The battle between the armoured train and the German guns, in the glowing light of sunset lost its glamour. Once again the reality of war hit her, no romantic ideas of heroic deeds here, Only, she records, 'gaping wounds and quivering flesh'.
They were a long time dressing the wounds, and it was quite dark when Grace and her two FANYs made their way back to the RAP, and a meal of hot coffee and bread and syrup. Her brother Billy had arrived back with the Unic ambulance; she found him in the roadway, covered in mud changing a tyre.
Bone weary after the long, long day the girls drew their straw from the piles tossed into the room by the orderlies, collected their blankets and a cushion each, and bedded down on the floor. The doctors did the same in the next room, while in the kitchen 12 soldiers grunted and snored the night away.
This was so often the lot of those 'high-spirited, well-bred young ladies' in war-torn Flanders, - but, they coped.
Another day of meeting challenges, overcoming appalling problems, witnessing distressing sights of suffering, along with inspiring displays of courage. A few short hours, minutes, of camaraderie, cheerfulness ,laughter.
Grace remembered the unpleasant details in her book: "The guns boomed; the smells from the backyard were overpowering; the cold was horrid; our damp stockings did not keep the straw from pricking our feet; my poisoned finger was throbbing. This was War! " She ended: " And this was sleep….."