Then, as swarms of khaki-clad figures dashed from between the shattered tree-trunks, Malcolm realized that aid was forthcoming in the very nick of time. His work accomplished, he dropped inertly to the ground between the bodies of his greatest chums, and everything became a blank.
* * * * *
Up the hill leading to No. 1 General Hospital, Brockenhurst--an establishment known as Tin Town--two men in "hospital blues" were slowly making their way. Both were wearing new, stiff-brimmed New Zealand hats, adorned with scarlet puggarees. The "blues" might be ill-fitting and sloppy, but it was a point of honour amongst the "boys" that their head-gear should be smart.
One of the men had his left arm in a sling, the empty sleeve being pinned to his coat; the other, in addition to wearing a bandage round his forehead, walked with a pronounced limp and leant heavily upon a rubber-shod walking-stick.
"Think you'll manage it, Malcolm?" enquired the man with the crippled arm. "It's a stiffish pull."
"I guess I'll do it, Dick," replied Rifleman Carr. "We've tackled some job for our first walk beyond the grounds; but Fortescue will be disappointed if we don't fetch there. How much farther is it?"
"Foot a bit stiff?" enquired Selwyn as his companion paused and rested one hand on Dick's shoulder.
"It gives me gip at times; suppose I'm a bit out of training, too," replied Malcolm. "What puzzles me is how did I get that buckshie?"
"What puzzles me," rejoined Dick, "is how any of us came out of it alive. There's Fortescue, with a hole drilled completely through his chest, alive and kicking. You came off lightly, my boy; but when they carted me into the operating-room I thought it was good-bye to my arm."
At length the chums reached the portals of Tin Town. Following an asphalted path between well-kept lawns they arrived at the corrugated-iron building in which Sergeant Fortescue was to be found. Being a fine afternoon, and most of the cases convalescent, the ward was almost deserted. The object of their search was soon discovered.