Page 381 - nostromo-a-tale-of-the-seaboard

wife was lying down and had gone to sleep. The woman had
actually dropped off to sleep! ‘Senor Doctor,’ Viola whispers
to me, ‘it looks as if her oppression was going to get better.’
‘Yes,’ I said, very much surprised; ‘your wife is a wonderful
woman, Giorgio.’ Just then a shot was fired in the kitchen,
which made us jump and cower as if at a thunder-clap. It
seems that the party of soldiers had stolen quite close up,
and one of them had crept up to the door. He looked in,
thought there was no one there, and, holding his rifle ready,
entered quietly. The chief told me that he had just closed his
eyes for a moment. When he opened them, he saw the man
already in the middle of the room peering into the dark
corners. The chief was so startled that, without thinking,
he made one leap from the recess right out in front of the
fireplace. The soldier, no less startled, up with his rifle and
pulls the trigger, deafening and singeing the engineer, but
in his flurry missing him completely. But, look what hap-
pens! At the noise of the report the sleeping woman sat up,
as if moved by a spring, with a shriek, ‘The children, Gian’
Battista! Save the children!’ I have it in my ears now. It was
the truest cry of distress I ever heard. I stood as if paralyzed,
but the old husband ran across to the bedside, stretching
out his hands. She clung to them! I could see her eyes go
glazed; the old fellow lowered her down on the pillows and
then looked round at me. She was dead! All this took less
than five minutes, and then I ran down to see what was the
matter. It was no use thinking of any resistance. Nothing
we two could say availed with the officer, so I volunteered to
go up with a couple of soldiers and fetch down old Viola. He

0 Nostromo: A Tale of the Seaboard