.

"No, I don't. If we get him to the hospital before morning I think he'll
pull through."

"Oh, all right." He unhooked one of the motor lanterns and handed it
over to me. "I'll do my best," he said as I turned away.

Getting back to the lines through that pitch-black forest, and finding
somebody to bring the gasolene back for me was about the weariest job I
ever tackled. I couldn't imagine why it wasn't daylight when we finally
got to the place where I had left the motor. It seemed to me as if I had
been gone twelve hours when I finally caught sight of the grey bulk of
the car through the thinning darkness.

Rechamp came forward to meet us, and took hold of my arm as I was
opening the door of the car. "The man's dead," he said.

I had lifted up my pocket-lamp, and its light fell on Rechamp's face,
which was perfectly composed, and seemed less gaunt and drawn than at
any time since we had started on our trip.

"Dead? Why--how? What happened? Did you give him the hypodermic?" I
stammered, taken aback.

"No time to. He died in a minute."

"How do you know he did? Were you with him?"

"Of course I was with him," Rechamp retorted, with a sudden harshness
which made me aware that I had grown harsh myself. But I had been almost
sure the man wasn't anywhere near death when I left him. I opened the
door of the ambulance and climbed in with my lantern. He didn't appear
to have moved, but he was dead sure enough--had been for two or three
hours, by the feel of him. It must have happened not long after I
left.... Well, I'm not a doctor, anyhow....

I don't think Rechamp and I exchanged a word during the rest of that
run. But it was my fault and not his if we didn't. By the mere rub of
his sleeve against mine as we sat side by side on the motor I knew he
was conscious of no bar between us: he had somehow got back, in the
night's interval, to a state of wholesome stolidity, while I, on the
contrary, was tingling all over with exposed nerves.

I was glad enough when we got back to the base at last, and the grim
load we carried was lifted out and taken into the hospital. Rechamp
waited in the courtyard beside his car, lighting a cigarette in the
cold early sunlight; but I followed the bearers and the surgeon into the
whitewashed room where the dead man was laid out to be undressed. I had
a burning spot at the pit of my stomach while his clothes were ripped
off him and the bandages undone: I couldn't take my eyes from the