"Where has it struck you?" he asked, very gently. Gall, just able to speak, faintly said he did not know. He thought in the small of the back. But this was impossible according to the doctor's views. The bullet might have come out at the back, but it certainly could not have gone in that way. As Gall lay there, hardly knowing whether he was dead or not, and the glorious sun shining right into his eyes, an awful remorse came over him. Now that it was too late, he saw how easy it would have been to refuse to fight, even at the risk of being called a coward. While some cast that reproach on him, others would have lauded him for his plain good sense. How fair, how very fair the world looked, now that he was about to quit it! "Let's see," said Mr. Robert Brown, intending to turn him on his face, but attempting it slowly and gingerly. Truth to say, the operator in embryo felt himself in a bit of a predicament: he had never extracted a ball in his life, and was rather undecided which way to begin. Gall groaned. "Why, there's no sign of any injury here," exclaimed the doctor, in a tone of surprised pleasure, as Gall went over in a lump. "The coat's not touched. See if you can get up." It was what Gall, beginning to recover the shock and his senses together, was already doing. Mr. Brown took his hand to help him, but there seemed no need for it. He was up, and stood as well as ever he had stood in his life. He walked a few paces and found he _could_ walk. The surgeon critically passed his eyes and fingers over him, and came to the conclusion that—he was not injured. "You are not hurt; you were not struck at all," he cried, and the tears actually came into Mr. Bob's Brown's eyes, so glad and great was the relief. "The bullet must have passed you." He, Robert Brown, flew off to the other wounded man, Bertie Loftus. Bertie was on his feet too, under convoy of Onions and Brown major. Very much the same ceremony had been gone through with him. A moment or two he had lain as one dead, he also having been struck (as he believed) in the small of the back, but had got upon his feet without help, though with much condolence. "Why, you are not hurt, either!" shouted Mr. Robert Brown, in his astonishment. "Where on earth can the bullets have gone?" It was quite true; they were _not_ hurt. As to the bullets—they must have gone somewhere. "What made you fall?" reiterated the surgeon, whose delight at this result caused his face to glow with a red like the early rising sun. Neither of them could say. Each thought he had been struck in the back; each had felt the shot there. Bertie repeated this aloud: Gall said nothing. Gall was wondering how he could ever be thankful enough to Heaven that he was in the world yet. How fair it was! how lovely looked the line of horizon over the dark-blue sea! "I—don't—think—there—has—been—any—duel," slowly spoke Mr. Robert Brown, when he revolved matters. "Did they forget to load the pistols?"