Will's returning footsteps.

"No, America. But I have to sit down when my shin hurts and I'm
seized with the gift of prophecy."

"Huh! We'll find Miss Vanderman tired of waiting for us with the
women. Since when has a crack on the shin made a baby of you? You
used to be tough enough!"

"D'you get the idea?" chuckled Fred. "We're coming, Will, we're
coming."

Perfectly unconsciously Will took the lead, and most outrageously
he drove us. Not that his driving was not shrewd, for his usually
practical and quick mind seemed to take on added brilliancy. And
since we first joined partnership--he and Monty and Fred and I--we
had always been contented to follow the lead of whichever held it
at the moment. But there was new efficiency, and impatience of a
brand-new kind that would not rest until every man and animal had
been rummaged in darkness out of that old ruin, and men, horses,
cows, goats, bags of grain, and fifty cases of cartridges were driven
down through the forest like water forced through a sieve, and were
gathered in the only open space discoverable.

There we cooled our heels, fearful and full of vague imaginings until
Miss Vanderman should bring the women, not at all encouraged by shouts
in the distance that well might be the exulting of plundering Kurds,
nor by occasional rifle-shots that sounded continually nearer, nor
by the angry crimson glow of burning roofs that lighted half
the horizon.