head in reply, and stood with a waiting face in prayerful
silence, not stirring save to make the Sign of the Cross. And as the long
white fingers fluttered over the bosom of the black habit, the faint cry
that Saxham's quick ear had heard before floated up from the populous
depths below.

"What is that?"

Before the question had left Saxham's lips, the monster gun spoke out in
deafening thunder from the enemy's position at East Point, nearly two
miles away. The heavy grey smoke-pillar of the driving-charge towered
against the sunbright distance, and simultaneously with the crack of the
discharge, sounding as though all the pent-up forces of Hell had burst the
brazen gates of Terror, and rushed forth to annihilate and destroy, the
ninety-four pound projectile passed overhead, sweeping half the
corrugated-iron roof from the railway-official's late dwelling with a
fiendish clatter and din, as it passed harmlessly over the Women's Laager,
and, wrecking a sentry's shelter on the western line of defences, burst
harmlessly upon the veld beyond, blotting out the low hills behind a
curtain of acrid green vapour.

"Get under cover, quick!" Saxham had shouted to his companion, as deafened
by the tremendous concussion, and dazed and half-asphyxiated by the
poisonous fumes, he strove for mastery with his maddened horse. This
regained, he looked for the figure in the black habit and white coif, and
knew a shock of horror in seeing it prone upon the ground.

"No, no, I am not hurt!" she cried, lightly rising as he hurried towards
her. The tremendous air-concussion had thrown her down, and beyond a
scratch upon her hand and some red dust on the black garments she was in
nothing the worse.

"I don't know how I kept my own legs," Saxham said, laughing.

"It went by like twenty avalanches," she agreed. "And blessed be our Lord,
excepting for the damage to the roof, no more seems to have been done. I
can see the spider stopping near the Women's Laager." She peered out
earnestly over the shimmering waste of dusty yellow-brown, and cried out
joyfully: "Ah, Sister Hilda Antony and Sister Ruperta are getting out.
All is well with them; all is well."

"But not with the washing."

Saxham had swung round his binoculars, and brought them to bear upon the
vehicle and its late occupants. A grim smile played about his mouth as he
handed her the glasses, and heard her cry of womanly distress as she
beheld the fruit of late labour scattered o