"Yes."
"How many days?"
"It had begun when we came."
"And when did you come?"
"The day before yesterday."
And he repeated:
"Yes, they're falling thick!"
We restarted, again at a trot.
The clear sky, of a pure limpid blue on the northern and eastern horizon, was fleeced with the white smoke of shrapnel shell; in the distance black clouds were rising from burning buildings and high-explosive projectiles.
We were still pursued by the smell of dead flesh, which harassed and obsessed us, making us peer about in all directions for hidden corpses.