'Felt like?' he repeated. 'I didn't register feelings. I was talking to the men.'
'What did you talk about?'
'I forget. Football, I think. And boxing. One of the men had been Army Welter Champion in India. Poor devil. I don't suppose he boxed again.'
All the same, I can't help thinking that in such a situation the alternatives of sudden death, prison or salvation must have danced their round in the brain of even the least imaginative of men.
At last darkness fell, and the enemy's fire ceased. Archie stood up and strained his ears for any sound that might betray an advance, but all he heard was the painful breathing of his wounded men, or a groan from the layer, who was hit in the stomach, and unlikely to live the night.
'Sergeant,' whispered Archie, 'time you were off.'
'Beg pardon, sir?'
'One of us is enough to stay with these chaps till help comes.'
'You don't mean me to go, sir?'
'Yes, sergeant! Get back to the battery. Besides, you can hurry them up.'