Just then there was a wild cry from without, answered by a shriek from
my wife, who had been quiet till now. At first I thought that some
fellows had scaled the window; but I soon distinguished the accents of a
great joy. My poor Kate! She had roughed it in barracks too long not to
know the rattle of the steel scabbards.
When the dragoons came up at a hard gallop, there was nothing left in
the court-yard but the dead and dying. Mohun had followed the flyers to
get a last stroke at the hindmost. We clambered down into the hall, and,
just as we reached the door, we saw a miserable crippled being clinging
round his knees, crying for quarter. Poor wretch! he might as well have
asked it from a famished jungle-tiger. The arm that had fallen so often
that night, and never in vain, came down once more; the piteous appeal
ended in a death-yell, and, as we reached him, Mohun was wiping coolly
his dripping sabre: it had no more work to do.
I could not help shuddering as I took his offered hand, and I saw
Connell tremble for the first time as he made the sign of the cross.
The Dragoons were returning from the pursuit; they had only made two
prisoners; the darkness and broken ground prevented their doing more.
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