As the boys set about the task, Mr. Kilburne listened again to the sad news brought by his neighbor. There was nothing to be done in the way of making ready for defence, because that had been attended to when no danger threatened.
John Pike had not finished giving his story in detail, when Mrs. Kilburne, who had stepped out of the house to get water from the pump, which stood close at hand, sprang back suddenly, her face so pale that there was no necessity of asking the cause of her alarm.
The two men were at the loop-holes in an instant, and that which he saw caused Mr. Kilburne to say sharply:
"Ben, I leave the north side of the house to you and your brother. Our lives may depend upon your vigilance, and there is to be no waste of ammunition; every bullet must strike its target. Mary," he added, to his wife, "you and your friends will keep the spare guns loaded, and finish what the boys have left undone at the fire. I do not—"
"It is a regular army that has come upon us," Mr. Pike interrupted. "I have counted not less than forty savages in the edge of the thicket, and there must be as many more on either side of the house!"
It was learned later that the enemy numbered a hundred and seventy, all well armed.
Ben and Arthur were peering eagerly out through loop-holes cut on each side of the shuttered window, and the former was the first to discharge his weapon.
"I saw a head over the top of the stockade," he said, in reply to his father's question.
"Their number is so large that they will likely put on a bolder front than usual," Mr. Kilburne muttered to himself, and despite the strength of the "garrison," he felt decidedly anxious regarding the result of the attack.
During an hour the men and boys remained on watch, while the women attended to their portion of the work, and hardly a sound was heard, save when the brothers whispered together. After the first shot had been fired the enemy remained completely hidden in the thicket which surrounded the house.