"To-day," she answered, again listlessly.
"To-day?" he cried in astonishment. "Why, my dear child——"
She sprang to her feet, fighting back tears, and faced him.
"Certainly to-day," she said quickly. "Aren't men falling to-day?—suffering and crying for help to-day? Are the Germans going to stop firing until I get there?—or any of us can get there? Don't you see the sooner everyone gets busy the sooner it will be over?—and can't you see that I—I can't stay here a minute longer than is absolutely necessary?" She looked down again at the fallen targets, and a little shiver seemed to pass over her; then she crossed to her father, tiptoed behind him and put her arms around his neck. "Your promise, Daddy?" she asked, tenderly.
He wheeled, almost savagely, and gathered her close to him, saying huskily:
"Your daddy never went back on a promise, dear."
"Damn those Hun outcasts!" the Colonel thundered, stamping from the room and banging the door after him.
CHAPTER III
Jeb had stepped out upon the street with heavy feet. There was a dull weight at his heart; a sickening weariness permeated his entire body. The Colonel's words of warning to protect his stomach, the suggestion of bullets ploughing through it, caused him to stop and loosen his belt, which had begun to feel uncomfortable. He even ran his had over that part of his anatomy and found that it seemed actually to be tender.