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"You know, Sharlie, you'll be fired on"

"I know I don't ht"

"Yes You'll be all right" But by the way he kept on glancing up and down the road she could see he was uneasy "If you could have stood in front of those cars You're in the ot to be in it"

He looked at her and smiled "Jeanne," he said, "in her armour"

"Rot"

And they were silent

"I say, John--my car does cover Gwinnie's a bit, doesn't it?"

"Yes," he said abruptly

"That's all right Youfor the stretchers"

His face quivered He thrust out his hand quickly, and as she took it she thought: He thinks he isn't co back She are of Mrs Rankin and two of the McClane ; she could see Mrs Rankin looking at the the ht: They don't shake hands when they're going out They don't think whether they're co back or not They don't think at all But then, none of them were lovers as she and John were lovers

"John, you'd better go and carry Mrs Rankin's stretcher for her"

He went

She watched theht road to the battlefield at the top Sutton folloith Alice Bartrum; then the McClane men; they nodded to her and s to overtake John and Mrs Rankin, to get to the head of his unit Perhaps he was afraid that John, in his khaki, would be mistaken for the commandant

How childish he ith his fear and jealousy Childish She thought of his petulant refusal to let John come in with them As if he could really keep him out When it came to action they were one corps; they couldn't very well be divided, since McClane had more men than stretchers and John had more stretchers than ether like that, instead of standing stupidly apart, glaring and hating

Yet she knehat McClane and Mrs Rankin had been playing for McClane, if he could, would have taken their fine Roden cars from them; he would have taken Sutton She knew that Mrs Rankin would have taken John froht of the beautiful, arrogant wo up to the battlefield with John, she wondered whether, after all, she didn't hate her No No It was horrible to hate a woht be killed They said McClane didn't look after his wo; he took theer He didn't care He was utterly cold, utterly indifferent to everybody and everything except his work of getting in the wounded Well, perhaps, if he had been decent to John, she wouldn't have believed a word of it, and anyhow they hadn't come out there to be protected