CHAPTER XXXIII

The twilight was deepening on scenes of stark horror in the streets of Babylon when Vassar slipped through the field and along the hedgerows toward the center of the town.

Flames were leaping from a dozen homes along the turnpike. He saw the brutal soldiery enter a pretty lawn, call out the occupants and as they emerged fire in volleys on old men, women and children. They fell across the doorsteps and lay where they fell. A dark figure approached the open door, hurled a quart of gasoline inside, lighted his fire ball, and walked away, his black form outlined in the night against the red glare of hell.

A crowd of panic-stricken women and children with a dozen boys of fourteen rushed down the streets toward the squad of incendiaries. Without a word they raised their rifles and fired until the last figure fell.

A child toddled from the burning home carrying her kitten in one hand and a toy lamb in another. She was sobbing bitterly in one breath, and trying to reassure her kitten in the next.

Vassar heard her as she hurried past on the other side of the hedge.

“Don’t you cry, kitty darling, I won’t let them hurt you.”

Her people were dead. She was hurrying into the night alone. From every street came the shrieks of women dragged to their doom by beasts in uniform.

Vassar set his jaw and crept along the last hedgerow to the gate of the Holland home.

The lights were burning brightly. A sentinel stood at the steps of the porch, his burly figure distinctly outlined against the cluster of electric lights in the low ceiling.

A sentry was on guard at the gate not ten feet away. A battery of artillery rolled past, its steel frames rattling and lumbering.

Vassar saw his chance.

As the last caisson wheeled away beyond the flickering street lamps the guard turned into the hedge out of the wind to light his pipe.

With a tiger spring Vassar leaped on him, gripped his throat, pressed an automatic to his breast and fired.

He took the chance that the passing battery would drown the muffled shot. The sentry crumpled in his arms and he held his breath watching his companion at the house. The steady step showed that he had not heard.

He drew the dying soldier into the shadows inside the lawn and exchanged clothes. He threw the body close under the hedge, seized the rifle and took his place at the gate.

He would side-step the officers, guard the house and make the men who dared attempt to violate it pay for their crime. It was evident that a commander had selected the house for his headquarters for the night. He watched the drunken revelers who passed and wondered what was happening inside.

So long as the officer of high rank remained and was sober the women were safe. He would stand guard until daylight and make his escape.

He watched the figures pass the lighted windows with increasing anxiety. A disturbance had occurred. The sentinel stopped, glanced toward the house, lowered his gun, watched a moment and resumed his beat.

Vassar crawled on his hands and knees halfway across the lawn, gripped his rifle, and waited.