sh the trench, had been stopped, and again from
right and left the rifle-fire poured out on the heads that appeared
above the parapet. That did not seem to concern him; all he had to do
that moment was to get Hermann out of fire, and just as he dragged his
legs over the parapet, so that his weight fell firm and solid on to
him, he felt what seemed a sharp tap on his right arm, and could not
understand why it had become suddenly powerless. It dangled loosely from
somewhere above the elbow, and when he tried to move his hand he found
he could not.

Then came a stab of hideous pain, which was over almost as soon as he
had felt it, and he heard a man close to him say, "Are you hit, sir?"

It was evident that this surprise attack had failed, for five minutes
afterwards all was quiet again. Out of the grey of dawn it had come, and
before dawn was rosy it was over, and Michael with his right arm numb
but for an occasional twinge of violent agony that seemed to him more
like a scream or a colour than pain, was leaning over Hermann, who lay
on his back quite still, while on his tunic a splash of blood slowly
grew larger. Dawn was already rosy when he moved slightly and opened his
eyes.

"Lieber Gott, Michael!" he whispered, his breath whistling in his
throat. "Good morning, old boy!"

CHAPTER XVII

Three weeks later, Michael was sitting in his rooms in Half Moon Street,
where he had arrived last night, expecting Sylvia. Since that attack at
dawn in the trenches, he had been in hospital in France while his arm
was mending. The bone had not been broken, but the muscles had been so
badly torn that it was doubtful whether he would ever recover more than
a very feeble power in it again. In any case, it would take many months
before he recovered even the most elementary use of it.

Those weeks had been a long-drawn continuous nightmare, not from the
effect of the injury he had undergone, nor from any nervous breakdown,
but from the sense of that which inevitably hung over him. For he knew,
by an inward compulsion of his mind that admitted of no argument, that
he had to tell Sylvia all that had happened in those ten minutes while
the grey morning grew rosy. This sense of compulsion was deaf to all
reasoning, however plausible. He knew perfectly well that unless he told
Sylvia who it was whom he had shot at point-blank range, as he leaped
the last wire entanglement, no one else ever could. Hermann was buried
now in the same g