and invaded the hall within.

One of the sentinels from the terrace stood at the upper end of

the room, gesticulating and shouting something.

And all the world had changed. A kind of throbbing. She couldn't

understand. It was as if all the water-pipes and concealed

machinery and cables of the ways beneath, were beating-as pulses

beat. And about her blew something like a wind-a wind that was

dismay.

Her eyes went to the face of the Marshal as a frightened child

might look towards its mother.

He was still serene. He was frowning slightly, shethought, but

that was natural enough, for the Earl of Delhi, with one hand

gauntly gesticulating, had taken him by the arm and was all too

manifestlydisposed to drag him towards the great door that

opened on the terrace. And Viard was hurrying towards the huge

windows and doing so in the strangest ofattitudes, bent forward

and with eyes upturned.

Something up there?

And then it was as if thunder broke overhead.

The sound struck her like a blow. She crouched together against

the masonry and looked up. Shesaw three black shapes swooping

down through the torn clouds, and from a point a little below two

of them, there had already started curling trails of red…

Everything else in herbeing was paralysed, she hung through

moments that seemed infinities, watching those red missiles whirl

down towards her.

Shefelt torn out of the world. There was nothing else in the

world but a crimson-purple glare and sound, deafening,

all-embracing,continuing sound. Every other light had gone out

<<BackPagesTo menuForward>>