He seemed to know that something unusual was expected of him, and wagged his tail so violently that he nearly upset the Little Colonel.

He watched every movement of the orderly, who, with a Red Cross brassard on his arm, was acting as chief of the improvised ambulance corps.
"Will you give him the order, Miss Lloyd ?" he asked, turning politely to the little girl.

Lloyd had pictured this moment several times on the way over, thinking how proud she would be to stand up like a real Little Colonel and send her orders ringing over the field before the whole admiring regiment.

But now that the moment had actually come, she blushed and shrank back, timidly.

She was not sure that she could say the strange French words just as the Major had taught them to her, when such a crowd of soldiers were standing by to hear.
"Oh, _you_ do it, please," she asked.
"If you will tell me the exact words he has been accustomed to hearing," answered the orderly.
Lloyd stammered them out, greatly embarrassed, feeling that her pronunciation must have grown quite faulty from lack of practice under the Major's careful training.