I had never thought of escape till now; but it flashed across me that perhaps we could get away, and I went back to the foot of the stairs and followed a long passage, towards where I felt some cold air, and suddenly came to an open door, and put my head out.
You know what happens when you open the door of a rabbit hutch, and the rabbits come and pop their heads out, and swizzle their noses and blink their eyes, and look as if they didn't believe it, and run back again? Well, that was exactly how I felt and what I did. I ran back to Martin and Miller and told them, and they left off eating and came along with me, and we all three looked out.
It was quite dark, except for some stars overhead, and it seemed to be a small courtyard. We stepped out very gingerly—I had my revolver in my hand again—and we searched round, and found a high wall all round, and a very big door all studded with iron bolt heads, and with several thick beams across it.
We couldn't hear any noise near us, but there was a funny murmuring, buzzing sound some way off, and just like the sound of the mob at Tinghai that night of the fire, and far away we could hear big guns, and shells bursting.
"That's our old eight-inch, sir," Miller whispered, as one especially loud report shook the door. "I expects the old man—beggin' your pardon, sir, Captain Lester—is coming along to look for us." The smaller noises, right in the other direction, he said was probably the Ringdove and the Oh-my-eye on the other side of the island (the bluejackets called the Omaha the Oh-my-eye). We couldn't really quite understand why they were firing, but it was jolly comforting for all that.
I wondered what had become of the Englishman and the Chinaman who had been guarding us, and the servant, and wished he would come back to take us to that house on the hill. Now that I had a revolver, I thought that I might still be some use in defending Sally, if once I got there.
I slipped back into the house to see if perhaps he was lying down on the bed and I hadn't noticed him, but he wasn't. The clock showed a quarter past eight, and I knew that it must have been dark for more than an hour, and felt frightened. The noise of the mob seemed to be getting louder and nearer too, and I ran back to Miller and Martin, who were still near the gateway.
Just as I got to them we heard some feet pattering along the street outside, and then more and more, and they stopped outside it and began pressing against the gateway, and then began banging at it with something hard.
The bangs seemed to go right through me. I was awfully frightened.
More people came rushing along; there was a fearful din outside; we heard something scrape against the wall, and someone scrambling up. I looked up and saw a man's head just above me. He was crawling over the top, and was just getting his legs over. I let my revolver off and he dropped back again, though I don't think he was hit, and the crowd began yelling like mad.