o
lose----"

"Can you put your arms around my neck?"

"There's no time to waste! I tell you to mount and run for
it! . . . And--thank you----"

"Put both arms around my neck. . . . Quick! . . . Can you lock
your fingers? . . . This damned horse won't stand! Hold fast to
me. I'll raise you easily. . . . Get the other leg over the
saddle. Lean forward. Now I'll walk him at first--hold
tight! . . . Can you hang on, Colonel?"

"Yes--_my son_"

A wild thrill ran through the boy's veins, stopping breath and
pulse for a second. Then the hot blood rushed stinging into his
face; he threw one arm around the drooping figure in the saddle,
and, controlling the bridle with a grip of steel, started the horse
off across the field.

All around them the dry soil was bursting into little dusty
fountains where the bullets were striking; ahead, dark smoke hung
heavily. Farther on some blue-capped soldiers shouted to them from
their shallow rifle pits.

Farther on still they passed an entire battalion of regular
infantry, calmly seated on the grass in line of battle; and behind
these troops Berkley saw a stretcher on the grass and two men of
the hospital corps squatted beside it, chewing grass stems.

They came readily enough when they learned the name and rank of the
wounded officer. Berkley, almost exhausted, walked beside the
stretcher, leading the horse and looking down at the stricken man
who lay with eyes closed and clothing disordered where a hasty
search for the wound had disclosed the small round blue hole just
over the seat of the liver.

They turned into a road which had been terribly cut up by the
wheels of artillery. It was already thronged with the debris of
the battle, skulkers, wounded men hobbling, pallid malingerers
edging their furtive way out of fire. Then ahead arose a terrible
clamour, the wailing of wounded, frightened cries, the angry shouts
of cavalrymen, where a Provost Guard of the 20th Dragoons was
riding, recklessly into the fugitives, roughly sorting the goats
from the sheep, and keeping the way clear for the ambulances now
arriving along a cross-road at a gallop.

Berkley heard his name called out, and, looking up, saw Casson,
astride a huge horse, signalling him eagerly from his saddle.

"Who in hell have you got there?" he asked, pushing his horse up to
the litter. "By God, it's Colonel Arran," he added in a modified
voice. "Is he very bad, Berkley?"

"I don't know. Can