When Wardwell awoke again it was because his throat was hurting abominably. His mind seemed to clear instantly, and he could not remember to have felt so wide awake in a long time. He supposed that this meant that he was going to get well again. He was not pleased with the prospect, for the weeks of monotonous endurance just ahead were too well known to be welcome; but he guessed that he would have to go through with it. This confounded pain in his throat was about the worst thing he had ever experienced. His mouth was all hard and cracked inside and the big bandage above his shoulders seemed to be set on purpose to choke him. He would like to put up his hand and see if he couldn't ease it a little, but he was sure that as soon as he made a move someone would notice him, and they would begin the business of poking at him. He would rather stand this as long as he could if only he were left to himself. It was night now--he knew the shaded lights, the enforced quiet, the restless murmurings of men asleep and half asleep, the feeling of a hospital ward at night, as well as he knew the sound of his own breathing--and he had been moved since that last time when he had been awake. Maybe they had been obliged to clear him out of the receiving ward--probably that was where he had been that last time--without operating on him. Maybe the boys were coming down from the stations pretty fast. He had seen hospitals when the surgeons couldn't begin to keep up with the work as the men were brought in. In fact he had seen everything. He had seen the whole blasted wreck of war from beginning to end, and he didn't want to see any more of it. His head was propped a little, so that he could just see over the roll of bandage on his neck. A wardmaster was coming softly down the lane between the two rows of cots. "I know his kind," Wardwell muttered mentally, while he shut his eyes and waited, perfectly quiet, for the wardmaster to pass, "their idea of a good time is to pop a fellow out of a sound sleep right bang onto an operating table." He felt rather than heard the wardmaster stop an instant at the foot of the cot, looking down at him, then he heard the footfall go softly on down the lane. "Fooled you that time, old scout," thought Wardwell, with a sort of a foolish gladness and a feeling that he was just about to either laugh or cry. His throat did hurt like fury.