Looking out on the bleak weather I shivered.

It was too grim a business, too inhuman for flesh and blood.

But Sir Walter had called it a matter of life and death, and I had told him that I was out to serve my country.

He could not give me orders, but was I not under orders--higher orders than my Brigadier's?
I thought myself incompetent, but cleverer men than me thought me competent, or at least competent enough for a sporting chance.

I knew in my soul that if I declined I should never be quite at peace in the world again.