nearly noon
With a paternal air , Mathews patted the hand with his own and reached for his pipe , explaining that he would steal a smoke before daylight . But the lad did not hear him . He was lost in a deep , dreamless sleep . It was nearly noon when the tired youth awoke . He looked wonderingly about , and there was a haunting fear in his light eyes , like those of a stag that dreads the hunters . From the north there came the sound of drum-fire , a weird , almost tedious , rhythm of guns working at a feverish pace ; and the near-by road was a mass of jumbled traffic . Ambulances , supply-wagons , field-artillery , lorries , with jingling harness or snorting engines -- streams of vehicles moved slowly up and down their channel .