Across the space, on the other side of the ravine, there came running a youngster whom the boys called "Watertown"—he was forever talking about the place. He came running to the farther edge of the ravine, swinging his bomb.
Wardwell flung his first bomb down into the cluster of guns and men, and leaped sliding, stumbling, falling down the crumbling bank.
Half way down he caught his balance, lay back a little, and steadied himself to throw the other bomb. Then without looking to see the effect he gripped his rifle, and yelling madly leaped down towards the guns.
Five seconds later he was lying quietly against the gravel of the bank. There was a hideous commotion going on about him, but he did not mind it. There was a sharp pain—it felt like a burn—in his throat, and he seemed to have trouble breathing. But it did not seem to matter. He was going to sleep anyway.
And then, presently, he would see Augusta. And then he smiled to himself. Augusta had always had her will.
X
When Wardwell awoke he was petulantly disappointed. He was not quite clear as to what he had expected, but that he should be awakened by the old hated smell of anesthetics was a distinct injury.
He did not feel any immediate physical discomfort, but he knew that this was only because his body had not yet begun to wake up. There were even now vague nerve stirrings in various scattered places through his body, though not connected with each other nor, directly, with him. He knew that these sensations would soon begin to link up with each other, and then they would connect up with him. Presently torture would begin. He knew the whole business. He had watched the process before, and he cringed at its advance.