The return to consciousness was a painful experience. Frank's head ached violently; his nostrils stung with dust and smoke and foul gas; his ears rang with strange noises; every part of him seemed bruised. For some time he lay simply bewildered, trying to recall how he came to be on the floor, half smothered with dust and fragments of wood and stone. Two splintered beams lay criss-cross just above him: if they had not fallen one upon the other they must certainly have crushed the life out of him.
A loud bang which set the place quivering and the dust dancing about him recalled the explosion he had heard at the moment of falling. He stirred, shook off the litter half burying him, and stretched his limbs. To his joy they were sound. He took out his handkerchief and wiped the dirt from his face. It was streaked with blood.
He looked around him. The house was a mere mass of wreckage. Fragments of furniture were embedded in extraordinary positions among heaps of stone. The roof was gone, the walls had fallen in and out, forming a rampart in which here and there were chinks through which light came. He was on the level of the street.
Shaken, bruised, half-deafened, he lay staring up at the open sky. What was to be done? The bombardment had apparently ceased. He looked at his watch: it had stopped. Where was Benidin? Was the promise to stay in the house any longer binding? But he felt disinclined to move: the shock had left him listless and devoid of energy. It would be no good adventuring until he had recovered something of his strength.
Presently he heard the hum of voices outside. People were apparently moving about now that the havoc-working shells had ceased to fall. He distinguished a question, evidently from a stranger to the town.
"Whose house is this?"
"Benidin's."
"A dog of an Armenian?"
"Even so."
There was a laugh.