Already some of the Minute Men were quitting the single, disordered rank on the green which still wavered, facing the regulars; but their captain continued in front of his men, and the drummer still drummed his hoarse challenge.
Then a British officer fired his pistol from the saddle, and, before any one could move or lift a finger, a bright sheet of flame girdled the British front, and the deafening roar of musketry shook the earth.
Through the low rushing billows of smoke that gushed out over the ground like foam, I saw the British major rise in his stirrups, and, reversing his sword, drive it downward as signal to cease firing. Other officers rode up through the smoke, shouting orders which were lost in the dropping shots from the militia, now retreating on a run past us up the Bedford Road.
"Look at Harrington," cried Mount; "he's down under that smoke!"
But Harrington rose, and reeled away towards his own house. I saw his wife at the door; the wounded man also saw her, and feebly stretched out his hands as though calling for aid, then he pitched forward on his face and lay still, one hand clutching his own door-step.
"Halt!" shouted the British major, plunging about on his wounded horse through the smoke. "Stop that firing! D'ye hear what I say? Stop it! Stop it!" And again and again he reversed his sword in frantic signals which no one heeded.
An officer cantered up, calling out: "Major Pitcairn! Major Pitcairn! Are you hit, sir?"
A volley from the British Tenth Foot drowned his voice, and the red-coated soldiers came bursting through the smoke on a double-quick, shouting and hoisting their mitre-caps on the points of their bayonets. Behind them the grenadiers rushed forward, cheering.
A soldier of the light infantry in front of the Meeting-house flung up his musket and fired at an old man who was hobbling across the street; shots came quicker and quicker; I saw my acquaintance, Monroe, attempt to traverse the road towards the tavern; he was rolling in the mud ere he had taken two steps. A grenadier ran after a lank farmer and caught him by the collar; the farmer tripped up the redcoat and started to run, but they brought him to his knees in the road, and then shot him to death under their very feet.
I galloped to the chaise and jerked the horses back, then wheeled them westward towards Bedford, where the remnants of the militia were sullenly falling back, firing across at the British, now marching on past the Meeting-house up the Concord Road.