The Riffraffs were working at the guns. Seeing her project impossible, she sat down in a dark shadow by the roadside—studied the moving figures—listened to the guns which came nearer as the hours passed.
It was long after midnight; accelerated firing was proclaiming a crisis in the battle, when, suddenly, there came the rattle of approaching wheels accompanied by a noisy rabble. Then a woman screamed.
Captain Doc was coming with a wagon-load of ammunition. The guns were to be loaded.
The moon, a faint waning crescent, faded to a filmy line as a pillar of fire, rising against the sky northward towards the city, exceeded the glare of the battle below.
The darkness was quite lifted now, up and down the levee, and Idyl, standing in the shadow, could see groups of people weeping, wringing their hands, as Captain Doc, pompon triumphant, came in sight galloping down the road.
In a second more he would pass the spot where she stood—stood unseen, seeing the sorrow of the people, heeding the challenge of the guns. The wagon was at hand.
With a faint, childish scream, raising her thin arms heavenward, she plunged forward and fell headlong in its path.
The victory was hers.
The tinselled captain was now tender surgeon, doctor, friend.
In his own arms he raised the limp little form from beneath the wheel, while the shabby gray coats of a dozen "Riffraffs," laid over the cannon-balls in the wagon, made her a hero's bed; and Captain Doc, seizing the reins, turned the horses cautiously, and drove in haste back to his drug-store.