Others were howling and dragging
themselves forward in a sitting position.
The old man felt an extreme sensation of heat. The pungent perfume of
explosive drugs brought the tears to his eyes and clawed at his throat.
At the same time he was chilly and felt his forehead freezing in a
glacial sweat.
He had to leave the bridge. Several soldiers were passing bearing the
wounded to the edifice in spite of the fact that it was falling in
ruins. Suddenly he was sprinkled from head to foot, as if the earth had
opened to make way for a waterspout. A shell had fallen into the moat,
throwing up an enormous column of water, making the carp sleeping in
the mud fly into fragments, breaking a part of the edges and grinding to
powder the white balustrades with their great urns of flowers.
He started to run on with the blindness of terror, when he suddenly saw
before him the same little round crystal, examining him coolly. It
was the Junker, the officer of the monocle. . . . With the end of
his revolver, the German pointed to two pails a short distance away,
ordering Desnoyers to fill them from the lagoon and give the water to
the men overcome by the sun. Although the imperious tone admitted of no
reply, Don Marcelo tried, nevertheless, to resist. He received a blow
from the revolver on his chest at the same time that the lieutenant
slapped him in the face.
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