Page:Mary Rinehart - More Tish .djvu/191

 Rh   I perceived her bent foward [sic] over the steering wheel. The car was standing on its forward end at the time.

"Tish!" I cried. "Tish!"

She then straightened herself and put both hands over the pit of her stomach.

"I've burst something, Lizzie," she said in a strangled tone. "My gall bladder, probably."

She then leaned back and closed her eyes. We were greatly alarmed, as it is unlike our brave Tish to give in until the very last, but finally she sat erect, groaning.

"I am going back and kill that boatman," she said. "I told him to dig a shell hole, not a cellar." Here she stood up and felt her pulse. "If I've burst anything," she announced a moment later, "it's a corset steel. That boatman is a fool, but at least he has given us a chance to see if we are of the material which France requires at this tragic juncture."

"I can tell you right away that I am not," Aggie said tartly. "I'm not and I don't want to be. Though I can't see how biting my tongue half through is going to help France anyhow."

But Tish was not listening. She had lifted three shovels out of the car, and we could see her dauntless figure outlined against the darkness.

"The Germans," she said at last, "are over