Suddenly he became alertly tense. Sound, sight, and odor had given him a simultaneous warning. His hand went back to the old man, touching him, and he was indeed, dead. Ahead, at one side of the top of the embankment, arose a crackling sound, and the boy’s gaze was fixed on the tops of the agitated bushes.  He yelled querulously at the feel of the heat against his ear. He'd been shot, or at least grazed he thought, not knowing whether to crouch or flee.