When coming oer the sea."

back the curtain, looked out at the evening sky. "I will be back by seven o'clock." "Seven o'clock," Mallory repeated. The sky, he could see, was darkening already, darkening with the gloom of coming snow, and the lifting wind was beginning to puff little clouds of air-spun, flossy white into the little gully. Mallory shivered and caught hold of the massive arm. "For God's sake, Andrea," he urged quietly, "look after yourself!" "Myself?" Andrea smiled gently, no mirth in his eyes, and as gently he disengaged his arm. "Do not think about me." The voice was very quiet, with an utter lack of arrogance. "If you must speak to God, speak to Him about these poor devils who are looking for us." The canvas dropped behind him and he was gone. For some moments Mallory stood irresolutely at the mouth of the cave, gazing out sightlessly through the gap in the curtain. Then he wheeled abruptly, crossed the floor of the shelter and knelt in front of Stevens. The boy was propped up against Miller's anxious arm, the eyes lack-lustre and expressionless, bloodless cheeks deep-sunken in a grey and parchment face. Mallory smiled at him: he hoped the shock didn't show in his face. "Well, well, well. The sleeper awakes at last. Better late than never." He opened his waterproof cigarette case, profferred it to Stevens. "How are you feeling now, Andy?" "Frozen, sir." Stevens shook his head at the case and tried to grin back at Mallory, a feeble travesty of a smile that made Mallory wince. "And the leg?" "I think it must be frozen, too." Stevens looked down incuriously at the sheathed whiteness of his shattered leg. "Anyway, I can't feel a thing." "Frozen!" Miller's sniff was a masterpiece of injured pride. "Frozen, he says! Gawddanined ingratitude. It's the first-class medical care, if I do say so myself!" Stevens smiled, a fleeting, absent smile that flickered over his face and was gone. For long moments he kept staring down at his leg, then suddenly lifted his head and looked directly at Mallory. "Look, sir, there's no good kidding ourselves." The voice was soft, quite toneless. "I don't want to seem ungrateful and I hate even the idea of cheap heroics, butwell, I'm just a damned great millstone round your necks and" "Leave you, eh?" Mallory interrupted. "Leave you to die of the cold or be captured by the Germans. Forget it, laddie. We can look after youand these ruddy gunsat the same time." "But, digital hd cameras review sir" "You insult us, Lootenant." Miller sniffed again. "Our feelings are hurt. Besides, as a professional man I gotta see my case through to convalescence, and if you think I'm goin' to do that in any gawddamned dripping German dungeon, you can" "Enough!" Mallory held up his hand. "The subject is closed." He saw the stain high up on the thin cheeks, the glad light that touched the dulled eyes, and felt the self-loathing and the shame well up inside him, shame for the gratitude of a sick man who did not know that their concern stemmed not from solicitude but from fear that he might betray them. . . . Mallory bent forward and began to unlace his high jack-boots. He spoke without looking up. "Dusty." "Yeah?" "When you're finished boasting about your medical prowess, maybe you'd care to use some of it. Come and have a look at these feet of mine, will you? I'm afraid the sentry's boots haven't done them a great deal of good." Fifteen painful minutes later Miller snipped off the rough edges of the adhesive bandage that bound Mallory's right foot, straightened up stiffly and contemplated his handiwork with pride. "Beautiful, Miller, beautiful," he murmured complacently. "Not even in John Hopkins in the city of Baltimore . . ." He broke off suddenly, frowned down at the thickly bandaged feet and coughed apologetically. "A small point has just occurred to me, boss." "I thought it might eventually," Mallory said grimly. "Just how do you propose to get my feet into these damned boots again?" He shivered involuntarily as he pulled on a pair of thick woollen socks, matted and sodden with melted snow, picked up the German sentry's boots, held them at arm's length and examined them in disgust. "Sevens, at the mostand a darned small sevens at that!" "Nines," Stevens said laconically. He handed overhis own jack-boots, one of them slit neatly down the side where Andrea had cut it open. "You can fix that tear easily enough, and they're no damned good to me now. No arguments, sir, please." He began to laugh softly, broke off in a sharply indrawn hiss of pain as the movement jarred the broken bones, took a couple of deep, quivering breaths, then smiled whitely. "My firstand probably my lastcontribution to the expedition. What sort of medal do you reckon they'll give me for that, sir?" Mallory took the boots, looked at Stevens a long moment in silence, then turned as the tarpaulin was pushed aside. Brown stumbled in, lowered the transmitter