Dawn
Came

Desolation, sheer ... but not yet absolute, came into view as I rounded the corner on the muddy track. I was taking the morning walk with the rest of the platoon on our "off-duty" day. I was last in line, and had deliberately dropped back, to ponder over the past year.

Winter was almost at an end, and the snow that clung feebly to the dull grey rocks and the sparse heather was beginning to melt, and to form a muddy expanse along the edge of the cliff. There, for the moment, was my horizon, where the edge of the cliff met the heavy grey clouds, lumbering weightily across the sky. I stood, clothed in my uniform, quite adequately covered by the haggard outlines of greatcoat, officer's cap, and boots weighted down with slimy lumps of mud. I felt ashamed, a vulgar, huddled intrusion on the bold landscape.

All this time there was the muted roar of the sea beneath the cliff: the roar I knew would rent its rage upon my eardrums, dare I venture along the edge of the cliff. According to human nature, and my prevailing depression, I, uncertainly at first, and then with an aimless purpose, trudged towards the edge of the cliff.

The wind scoured my face, biting deeply into the frozen, numbed, skin. The thundering crash of the sea, beat relentlessly against the staunch walls of thee cliff: I put my hands to my ears, muffling the sound a little, but still felt the pounding and reverberation of the sea. For the first time, I looked over the edge, and stared for a long time into that boiling, blue-black cauldron, the ever-changing sea.

A sudden gust of wind, like a hand, lifted my cap off my head. It sailed gracefully through the air, on a cushion of wind, settling a foot or so from the rounded edge of the cliff. I started after it, and tried to stop myself in the same action. I fell. Being so near the edge, I could do nothing to help myself. Inevitably and slowly, ever so slowly, I slithered over the cliff.

I screamed, the apprehensive wail immediately bustled along before the wind. Tumbling, turning, twisting, into grotesque forms; bouncing from rock to rock, and battered, bruised, and bleeding, hitting the water with a comparatively insignificant clap. As the waves retreated I was left, lungs burning, on the pebbles. The waves rumbled greedily over me, and then time and sight abruptly stopped.

Dizziness and pain enveloped me as I opened my eyes. Two doctors became barely discernible. "Born to live, for the time being," I heard vaguely. "If he lives to see the morning, he'll be all right, if he doesn't ...," wafted into my subconscious mind. I don't know when I became unconscious.

Red light seared through my eyelids. I opened my eyes and saw, dimly for a moment, for I was squinting, a window. Through the window glimmered the dawn.

Laidley 2W


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