"Terrible slaughter, terrible slaughter of British troops!" floated up in the hideous tones.
She listened, fascinated with a nameless horror.
"A regiment cut to pieces! Death of a general! Special edition!" The fiend stood under the window, vociferating upwards.
In an instant Gertrude had slipped down the dusky staircase, and was giving the man sixpence for a halfpenny paper. Standing beneath the gas-jet in the passage, she opened the sheet and read; then, still clutching it, sank down white and trembling on the lowest stair.
Noiseless, rapid footfalls came down behind her, some one touched her on the shoulder, and a strange voice said in her ear, "Give it to me."
She started up, putting the hateful thing behind her.
"No, no, no, Lucy! It is not true."
"Yes, yes, yes! don't be ridiculous, Gerty."
Lucy took the paper in her hands, bore it to the light, and read, Gertrude hiding her face against the wall.
The paper stated, briefly, that news had arrived at head-quarters of the almost total destruction of the troops which, under General Somerset, had set out for the interior of Africa some weeks before. A few stragglers, chiefly native allies, had reached the coast in safety, and had reported that the General himself had been among the first to perish.