But of course there wouldn't be any death. If nobody came she would walk
back to Ghent and bring out the ambulance.

If only he had shouted to her to carry the wounded man and come. In the
minute between the concussion of the shell and the cranking of the
engine. But she could see him rushing. If only she knew _why_ he had left
them.... She wanted to get back to Ghent, to see John, to know. To know
if John--if John really _was_--Nothing could be worse than not knowing.

It didn't matter so much his forgetting her. The awful thing was his
forgetting the wounded man. How could you forget a wounded man? When she
remembered the Belgian's terrified hare's eyes she hated John.

And, as she sat there supporting his head with her shoulder, she thought
again. There must have been a wounded man in the house John had come out
of. Was it possible that he had forgotten him, too?... He hadn't
forgotten. She could see him looking back over his shoulder; looking at
something that was lying there, that couldn't be anything but a wounded
man. Or a dead man. Whatever it was, it had been the last thing he had
seen; the last thing he had thought of before he made his dash. It
wasn't possible that he had left a wounded man in there, alive. It was
not possible.

And all the time while she kept on telling herself that it was not
possible she saw a wounded man in the room John had left; she saw his
head turning to the doorway, and his eyes, frightened; she felt his
anguish in the moment that he knew himself abandoned. Not forgotten.
Abandoned.

She would have to go over to the house and see. She must know whether the