CHAPTER XVIII[ToC]
LEFT ON THE FIELD
THE MYSTERY OF DEATH. THE SECRET CODE. TWO TERRIBLE DAYS
I was wounded! I was blind! But the moments that followed are clear in my memory. The brain shocked by a blow works quickly and actively in its excited effort to hold its own.
I was quite conscious and thinking clearly: I knew what had happened and what would happen; I remembered every detail.
My head at the moment was inclined to the right, for I was shouting to the men. Like a flash I remembered that about fifty yards to the left of me there was a "German strong point" still occupied by the Germans. A bullet had entered my left temple; it must have come from a sniper in that strong point. The bullet had passed clean through my head; I thought it had emerged through my right temple. I was mistaken on that point, for I found some days later that it had emerged through the centre of my right eye.
I remember distinctly clutching my head and sinking to the ground, and all the time I was thinking "so this is the end—the finish of it all; shot through the head, mine is a fatal wound."
Arnold jumped up, and catching me in his arms, helped me back into the shell-hole.