None now remained but women and children.
When the Wallachians broke into the castle, the widow had taken them all to the attics, leaving the door open, that her brothers might find a refuge in case they were forced to retreat; and here the weaker members of the family awaited the issue of the combat which was to bring them life or death, listening breathlessly to the uproar, and endeavouring, from its confused sounds, to determine good or evil.
At last the voices died away, and the hideous cries of the besiegers ceased. The trembling women believed that the Wallachians had been driven out, and, breathing more freely, each awaited with impatience the approach of brother—husband—sons.
At last a heavy step was heard on the stairs leading to the garret.
"That is Barnabas's step!" cried the widow joyfully, and, still holding the pistols in her hand, she ran to the door of the garret.
Instead of her expected brother, a savage form, drunken with blood, strode towards her, his countenance burning with rage and triumph.
The widow started back, uttering a shriek of terror, and then, with that unaccountable courage of desperation, she aimed one of the pistols at the Wallachian's breast, who instantly fell backwards on one of his comrades, who followed close behind. The other pistol she discharged into her own bosom.
And now we must draw a veil over the scene that followed.
What happened there may not be witnessed by human eyes. Suffice it to say, they murdered every one, women and children, with the most refined and brutal cruelty, and then threw their dead bodies out of the window from which Barnabas had dashed down the iron fragments on the besiegers' heads.
They left the old grandmother to the last, that she might witness the extermination of her whole family. Happily for her, her eyes had ceased to distinguish the light of the sun, and ere long the light of an eternal glory had risen upon them.