ing to see if he could break his own
records. He got a lot of fun out of it. It was like a good game of
solitaire. He was not dependent on some other fellow. The other
fellow was incidental, a sort of side issue and like a good pace-maker.
Of course you had to beat him, but the sport was in coming in ahead of
your own time.

It was for this that Zaidos had always worked. It had kept him from
feeling the petty jealousies and envy which retard the progress of so
many of the fellows. Racing with himself, in Red Cross drills, or
running, racing, riding or studying, his rival was always present,
always ready and willing to take another "try" at something. It was
like having a punching bag in his room. Every time he passed it he
took a whack or two, and developed his muscles accordingly.

So, in this unexpected and supreme test of his life, Zaidos found
himself fit. As the work went on and on, endlessly as it seemed,
Zaidos found that his brain commenced to work independently of his
hands. The unbelievable wounds of war no longer shocked his deadened
nerves. His hands worked more and more accurately and rapidly, but on
the inside of his brain was a sort of screen on which flashed the
moving picture of his life.

They started from his little boyhood, when he first crossed the ocean
up to the time of the last crossing, at the sad summons which had taken
him to his dying father. No real moving picture, thought Zaidos, had
ever been screened with so many thrills and exciting incidents as the
real life-film through which he saw himself rapidly moving. Here and
there on the bloody field he puzzled it out for himself, finding that
the plot was complete, and that Velo, his cousin, must be the villain.

Zaidos was still ignorant of the fact that Velo had stolen the papers,
but that Velo hated him and would be glad enough to get him out of the
way grew clearer and clearer, in spite of the apparent friendliness
with which he had treated him up to the present time. But now, hour by
hour, Zaidos was conscious of a sort of sour look of hatred which
seemed to grow plainer and plainer in Velo's sharp face. Zaidos had an
uncomfortable feeling that he must keep a watchful eye on Velo. It was
nothing but an instinct, but even so, he felt it, and feeling it, was
ashamed.

So the time wore on.

Bending over a soldier with a gaping, bloody hole in his side, Zaidos
turned to the hospital corps pouch spread open beside him, an