He sprang back for another gun, and it was Mary who was waiting for him,
head and shoulders out of the cellar-pit, the rifle in her hands. She
was sobbing as she looked straight at him, yet without moisture or tears
in her eyes.
"Keep down!" he warned. "Keep down below the floor!"
He guessed what was coming. He had shown his enemies that life still
existed in the cabin, life with death in its hands, and now--from the
shelter of the other cabins, from the darkness, from beyond the light of
his flaming home, the rifle fire continued to grow until it filled the
night with a horrible din. He flung himself face-down upon the floor, so
that the lower log of the building protected him. No living thing could
have stood up against what was happening in these moments. Bullets tore
through the windows and between the moss-chinked logs, crashing against
metal and glass and tinware; one of the candles sputtered and went out,
and in this hell Alan heard a cry and saw Mary Standish coming out of
the cellar-pit toward him. He had flung himself down quickly, and she
thought he was hit! He shrieked at her, and his heart froze with horror
as he saw a heavy tress of her hair drop to the floor as she stood there
in that frightful moment, white and glorious in the face of the
gun-fire. Before she could move another step, he was at her side, and
with her in his arms leaped into the pit.
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