[VIII.]
MIDNIGHT.
“Then came a blinding flash, a deafening roar,
And dissonant cries of terror and dismay;
Blood trickled down the river’s reedy shore,
And with the dead he lay.”
A starlit sky, dead silence all around, only the river’s murmur breaking it. The moonbeams shining on the forest-path mark all the shadows with a dazzling light, bringing weird and fantastic outlines forth, where brush and hedges line the dusty road, and making the parched fields, almost destitute of vegetation, shine like burnished sheets of dead white light. And along this road came slowly, with muffled tramp, a little body of men, their dark figures darker by contrast with the gleaming barrels of their rifles, which the moonlight seemed to tinge with silvery fire. They came along so quietly, so noiselessly, now hidden from view in a curve of the road, and now appearing again. And still all was quiet.
And then a little tongue of flame ran quickly and noiselessly up into the black darkness; and in a moment more all was blaze and smoke. The work was done,—the bridge was destroyed.
Down in the road around the bridge the men were grouped,—the fire giving them a ruddy coloring,—a tint of blood. Two figures were especially prominent, and seemed to be directing their movements.
“Well, Tom,” said Ned, “does this remind you of bonfires in the yard at Cambridge?”
“Not much,” said Tom, dispiritedly.
“Why, Tom, what is the matter with you?” asked Ned, anxiously.
“I don’t know,” said Tom. “I feel nervous and apprehensive.”