Danny still hung back. “Miss Letty,” he whispered. She went a few steps toward him, despite her aunt’s reproving voice, “You and your Uncle Tom ruin that boy, Lettice.”
“What is it, Danny?” Lettice asked.
“Ef anythin’ tur’ble happen, I skeered you all gwine leave me hyar.”
Lettice laughed. “There isn’t anything terrible going to happen to this house, and if there should, I’ll let you know, you needn’t be scared, Danny.”
The noise in the street increased. As yet no military appeared to quell the mob. Mrs. Flynn, worked up into a great state of excitement, trotted from corner to corner, coming back so often to report that it would seem as if she would wear herself out. “There be a gintleman addhressin’ the crowd, Mrs. Hopkins, mum,” she said.
“They do say they’ll be rig’lar foightin’ nixt. Glory be to Pether! but hear thim cracks av the goons!” And back she trotted to return with: “Howly mother av Moses! they’re murtherin’ the payple in the streets. A gintleman, be name Dr. Gale, is kilt intoirely, an’ siveral others is hurthed bad, an’ the crowd is runnin’ in ivery direction. Do ye hear thim drooms a-beatin’? I’ll be afther seein’ what’s that for.” And out she went again.
“Come, girls, go to bed,” said Mrs. Hopkins. “It is near midnight, and you can do no good by sitting up. I wish Mr. Hopkins would come in.”
But neither Mr. Tom Hopkins nor his brother appeared that night, and all through their troubled slumbers the girls heard groans and hoarse cries, and the sound of a surging mass of angry men bent on satisfying their lust for revenge. Even with the dawn the horrors continued to be carried on throughout the day.
It was not till late in the afternoon that Mr. Tom Hopkins returned home. He looked pale and troubled. “We have heard terrible reports, Uncle Tom,” said Rhoda. “Is it really true that some of your most respectable citizens have been murdered by a brutal horde of lawless villains, and that they have been tortured and almost torn limb from limb?”
“I fear there is much truth in it,” he replied gravely.