"Now run below and see how things are going with Mr. Lanyon."
The boy went. His passion had long passed. He was sick and weary.
Head and heart ached.
With shaking knees, he tottered below. Had a party of jabbering
Frenchmen met him, he wouldn't have minded. He was too spent.
But no.
All below was calm now and silence; smoke-drift and dying men.
The Gunner was standing at an open port, directing operations.
His passion too had passed. The giant-hero of a few minutes' back seemed almost small now. And a strange figure he made.
The sweat had coursed through the rouge on his cheeks; and the dye on his whiskers had run, dripping on to neck and shoulders. He was naked still, save for his trousers, but wearing his cocked hat a-rake.
The man at his side heaved a French corpse through the port.
"That's the lot," said the Gunner, picking his teeth, and turned with black and grinning face to the boy.