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me up."
"And if they are not able to--what then?" said Pen, smiling.
"Well, I shall wait till I get so hungry I can't wait any longer, and then I will cry chy-ike till the Frenchies come and pick me up. But, I say, they won't stick a bayonet through me, will they?"
"What, through a wounded boy!" said Pen angrily. "No, they are not so bad as that."
"Thank ye! I like that, private. I have often wished I was a man; but now I'm lying here, with a hole in my back, I'm rather glad that I am only a boy. Now then, catch hold of my water-bottle. It will soon be dark enough for you to get down to the river; and you mustn't lose any time. Oh, there's one thing more, though. You had better take my bugle; we mustn't let the enemy have that. I think as much of my bugle as Bony's chaps do of their eagles. You will take care of it, won't you?"
"Yes, when I carry it," said Pen quietly.
"Well, you are going to carry it now, aren't you?"
"No," said Pen quietly.
"Oh, you mean, not till you have fetched the water?"
Pen shook his head.
"What do you mean, then?"
"To do my duty, boy."
"Of course you do; but don't be so jolly fond of calling me boy. You said yourself a little while ago that you weren't much older than I am. But, I say, you had better go now; and I suppose I oughtn't to talk, for it makes my head turn swimmy, and we are wasting time; and--oh, Gray," the boy groaned, "I--I can't help it. I never felt so bad as this. There, do go now. Get the water, and if I am asleep when you come back, don't wake me so that I feel the pain again. But--but--shake hands first, and say good-bye."
The boy uttered a faint cry of agony as he tried to stretch out his hand, which only sank down helplessly by his side.
"Well, good-bye," he panted, as Pen's dropped slowly upon the quivering limb. "Well, why don't you go?"
"Because it isn't time yet," said Pen meaningly, as after a glance round he drew some of the overhanging twigs of the nearest shrub closer together, and then passed his hand across the boy's forehead, and afterwards held his wrist.
"Thank you, doctor," said the boy, smiling. "That seems to have done me good. Now then, aren't you going?"
"No," said Pen, with a sigh.
"I say--why?"
"You know as well as I do," replied Pen.
"You mean that you won't go and leave me here alone? That's what you mean."
"Yes, Punch; you are quite right. But look here. Suppose I was lying here wounded, would you go off and leave me at night on this cold mountain-side, knowing how those brutes of wolves hang about the rear of the army? You have heard them of a night, haven't you?"
"Yes," said the boy, shudderingly drawing his breath through his tightly closed teeth. "I say, comrade, what do you want to talk like that for?"
"Because I want you to answer my question: Would you go off and leave me here alone?"
"No, I'm blessed if I would," said the boy, speaking now in a voice full of animation. "I couldn't do it, comrade, and it wouldn't be like a soldier's son."
"But I am not a soldier's son, Punch."
"No," said the boy, "and that's what our lads say. They don't like you, and they say--There, I won't tell you what."
"Yes, tell me, Punch. I should like to know."
"They say that they have not got anything else against you, only you have no business here in the ranks."
"Why do they say that?"
"Because, when they are talking about it, they say you are a gentleman and a scholard."
"But I thought I was always friendly and sociable with them."
"So you are, Private Gray," cried the boy excitedly; "and if ever I get back to the ranks alive I'll tell them you are the best comrade in the regiment, and how you wouldn't leave me in the lurch."
"And I shall make you promise, Punch, that you never say a word."
"All right," said the boy, with a faint smile, "I'll promise. I won't say a word; but," he continued, with a shudder which did not conceal his smile, "they will be sure to find it out and get to like you as much as I do now."
"What's the matter, Punch?" said Pen shortly. "Cold?"
"Head's hot as fire, so's my shoulder; but everywhere else I am like ice. And there's that swimming coming in my head again.--I don't mind. It's all right, comrade; I shall be better soon, but just now--just now--"
The boy's voice trailed off into silence, and a few minutes later young Private Penton Gray, of his Majesty's newly raised --th Rifles, nearly all fresh