But there was no arresting this last outbreak of Benham's all too impatient kingship. He pushed aside a ducking German waiter who was peeping through the glass doors, and rushed out of the hotel. With a gesture of authority he ran forward into the middle of the street, holding up his hand, in which he still held his dinner napkin clenched like a bomb. White believes firmly that Benham thought he would be able to dominate everything. He shouted out something about “Foolery!”
Haroun al Raschid was flinging aside all this sublime indifference to current things....
But the carbines spoke again.
Benham seemed to run unexpectedly against something invisible. He spun right round and fell down into a sitting position. He sat looking surprised.
After one moment of blank funk White drew out his pocket handkerchief, held it arm high by way of a white flag, and ran out from the piazza of the hotel.
17
“Are you hit?” cried White dropping to his knees and making himself as compact as possible. “Benham!”
Benham, after a moment of perplexed thought answered in a strange voice, a whisper into which a whistling note had been mixed.
“It was stupid of me to come out here. Not my quarrel. Faults on both sides. And now I can't get up. I will sit here a moment and pull myself together. Perhaps I'm—I must be shot. But it seemed to come—inside me.... If I should be hurt. Am I hurt?... Will you see to that book of mine, White? It's odd. A kind of faintness.... What?”
“I will see after your book,” said White and glanced at his hand because it felt wet, and was astonished to discover it bright red. He forgot about himself then, and the fresh flight of bullets down the street.