“The bandage is wet. Can’t anybody make a light?”

That cannot be done either. The switch is by the door and none of us can stand up. I hold my thumb against the button of the bell till it becomes numb. Perhaps the sister has fallen asleep. They certainly have a great deal to do and are all overworked day after day. And added to that is the everlasting praying.

“Should we smash a bottle?” asks Josef Hamacher of the shooting license.

“She wouldn’t hear that any more than the bell.”

At last the door opens. The old lady appears, mumbling. When she perceives Franz’s trouble she begins to bustle, and says: “Why did not someone say I was wanted?”

“We did ring. And none of us here can walk.”

He has been bleeding badly and she binds him up. In the morning we look at his face, it has become sharp and yellow, whereas the evening before he looked almost healthy. Now a sister comes oftener.