And before the petrified girlish gaze one--the middle one--rocked and pitched, like a corroded ship at sea, pitching to windward!
“Oh, somebody is injured--poisoned--g-gassed!”
Sesooā heard Olive’s cry, which pitched like the advancing figure, and forgot completely the informal “kit-inspection” to which she had been subjecting the buxom young woman of the skin and shoulders, who carried a feather muff under the April sky.
“Yes! Some one has got it--was muddle-headed--did not get his mask on quickly enough. Or else something was wrong with his ‘chlorine-fooler.’”
Now it was her brother’s voice, that of the boy-officer, and she realized--hot-hearted little sister--what it would mean to him that, on this day of all days, it should be that:
“The gas came down and caught the blighter slow.”
Poor Blighter! Supported on either side by his comrades, who dragged him along by the arms, he, the stumbling middle man, wildly clutched his khaki breast, as if holding it together--as if keeping it from bursting!
“Lay him on his side, men--feet higher than his head! Remove his mask, and give him air!”
Again it was the young lieutenant who spoke, and, glancing up at him, the girls saw that the silver luck of this long-anticipated day was tarnished in his eyes, as if the villainous chlorine had preyed upon that, too.
Concern was in those eyes, strong concern. Behind it lurked bitter chagrin, only needing a spark to the fire and tow of a hasty temper to ignite it to leaping anger--with a headlong haste to fix the responsibility for the most untimely accident.