There was the sharp, shrill, growing whistle of a shell. The Herr Doktor cried out hoarsely, wheeling toward the window.
At the impact of the aerial projectile just above the stone-encased window, the château seemed to rock. Bursting inward broken stone and twisted iron clattered to the floor of the chamber. A great gap was torn in the outer wall.
Belinda and Sanderson were driven back into the far corner. The Herr Doktor, facing the bursting shell, received a part of its scattering contents in face and body.
He shrieked—an awful, soul-harrowing cry. Staggering backward, his face was revealed again to the cowering aviator and the nurse.
Blood streamed from his eyesockets. His right arm, to which that wonderfully clever hand with its dexterous fingers had been attached, was merely a bleeding stump—severed by the shell below the elbow.
The horrified nurse could not utter a sound, but Sanderson leaped to aid the falling surgeon. Herschall sank upon the American's left arm and so, muttering and moaning, slipped to the littered floor of the chamber.
"Gone! Gone!" Herschall whispered, and sank into unconsciousness. Sanderson rose slowly from his knees and looked at Belinda.
Retreating cries, hoarsely given commands, the tramp of men, the rolling of wheels, the snorting of the motors sounded clamorously outside the château. As Sanderson caught at the hand of the Red Cross nurse a bandaged head and a full, red face was thrust in at the aperture in the wall where the plaster was sifting down.
"Cousin Belinda! Herr Lieutenant! Paul told me you would be here. Come quickly. The French are dropping bombs as thick as Wurst im Schornstein. No time to lose. Come!"
"Carl! Cousin Carl!" cried the nurse, an expression of renewed hope in her voice.