“I ‘eard a yell, sir. An’ a crash. I ‘adn’t ‘ardly gone ten yards, sir. So I came back with the lantern.”
“What did you find?”
“It was the cap’n, sir. Layin’ there at the foot of the ladder. Like ‘e was dead, sir. ‘E’d fallen down the ‘archway, sir.”
“What did you do?”
“I tried to turn ‘im over, sir. ‘Is face was all bloodylike. ‘E was stunned, sir. I thought ‘e might be dead but I could feel ‘is ‘eart.”
“Yes?”
“I didn’t know what I ought to do, sir. I didn’t know nothink about this ‘ere meeting, sir.”
“But what did you do, in the end?”
“I left my two men with the cap’n, sir, an’ I come up to give the alarm. I didn’t know who to trust, sir.”
There was irony in this situation—the corporal frightened lest he should be taken to task about a petty question as to whether he should have sent a messenger or come himself, while the four lieutenants eyeing him were in danger of hanging.