"They've withdrawn," he said, "but they'll be coming on again in a moment. We are alone, dear, to defend the gate. Can you help?"
She was deathly pale, but she smiled at him bravely. He picked up the two joists and carried them outside while she followed him, listening.
"You on one side of the gate, I on the other. If they succeed in throwing a timber across, we must push it off. In this way neither of us need expose ourselves."
"I understand—and there are rifles and shotguns."
"Good! Can you load them?"
"Strohmeyer loaded them while Karl kept the gate, but Ena was afraid to take them out."
"Then bring them. You're quite safe if you keep below the wall of the rampart. Now go, dear—and God bless you!"
He reached the gate before Windt's men returned to the attack, and put one of his new weapons of defense upon each side of it. But he feared to leave the gate again and crouched, waiting. Below in the valley the commotion had increased and the sounds of firing went on unceasingly. It seemed indeed, as Marishka had said, that the end of the world had come. Beside him, the man Karl was breathing with difficulty. From his post at the loophole, Renwick heard him mutter, and as the road was still clear, he listened.
"You're Renwick—the Englishman?" he whispered hoarsely.
"I am."