“Then the English Consul.”
The officer made notes in pencil upon a piece of paper. “Word will be sent at once to your Consuls,” he said. “Now enter.”
“I’ll be darned if I enter,” the American said.
Half a dozen troopers flung him violently into the church; Hi and the Englishman were flung in on top of him, and the doors were closed and locked upon them. Two English-speaking guards in the pulpit called out to them to be quiet.
“But we insist on seeing our Consuls.”
“Consuls sent for,” the men said. “Hold your rows.”
“I’ll bet the Consuls aren’t sent for,” the American said. “I know my darned Barbarians by this time.”
XIX
It was about half-past one in the afternoon when the church doors closed: the sound of the rifle fire continued, in an irregular popping as though the people some miles away were letting off fire crackers.
“That’s not fighting,” the American said, “that’s still only skirmishing. These darned people can neither make war nor keep peace.”