"Margery!" said Patricia softly.
The mad woman, pressing in front of her mistress, looked out into the night and saw the white shining road cutting through the darkness and stretching endlessly away. She threw up her arms with a cry of rapture.
"The road to Paradise! the road to Paradise!"
An arrow whistled through the window and struck into her bosom—into her heart—the staff dropped from her hand, and she swayed forward and fell at her mistress's feet.
The night, so placid, still and beautiful, was rent and in an instant made hideous by a sound so long, loud, and dreadful, that it might have been the shriek of a legion of exultant fiends. It rose to the stars, sunk to the earth and rose again, unearthly, menacing, curdling the blood and turning the heart to stone.
"The war-whoop," said Woodson. "Close the window, quick."
CHAPTER XXVI
NIGHT
That terrible cadence preluded pandemonium, the hush of horror that followed it being broken by one deep and awful roar of voices as the insurgents, red, white, and black, joined forces and swept down upon the devoted house.
"They will try the front first," quoth the master from his loophole. "Steady, men, until I give the word! Now, let them have it with a wannion!"