of being the best judge of cattle in the neighbourhood, and a
thoroughly steady fellow, but he could see no resemblance in the
shrunk and wasted face to that he remembered.

That evening both the officers and men in the hospital were carried
away to the new one outside the town. When the doctor came in
before they were moved, he told Mallett that the man he had seen
had recovered from his swoon.

"He was very nearly gone," he said, "but we managed to get him
round, and it seems to me that he has been better since. I don't
know what he said to you or you to him, and I don't want to know;
but he seems to have got something off his mind. He is less
feverish than he was, and I have really some faint hopes of pulling
him through, especially as he will now be in a more healthful
atmosphere."

It was a comfort indeed to all the wounded when late that evening
they lay on beds in the hospital marquees. The air seemed
deliciously cool and fresh, and there was a feeling of quiet and
restfulness that was impossible in the town, with the constant
movement of troops, the sound of falling masonry, the dust and
fetid odour of decay.

A week later the surgeon told Mallett that he had now hopes that
the soldier he was interested in would recover.

"The chances were a hundred to one against him," he said, "but the
one chance has come off."