Pierre and the old woman. As I crashed through the rotten timbers I saw
the old woman rise with a leap like a tiger and heard her low gasp of
baffled rage. My feet lit on something that moved, and as I jumped away
I knew that I had stepped on the back of one of the row of men lying on
their faces outside the hut. I was torn with nails and splinters, but
otherwise unhurt. Breathless I rushed up the mound in front of me,
hearing as I went the dull crash of the shanty as it collapsed into a
mass.

It was a nightmare climb. The mound, though but low, was awfully steep,
and with each step I took the mass of dust and cinders tore down with me
and gave way under my feet. The dust rose and choked me; it was
sickening, foetid, awful; but my climb was, I felt, for life or death,
and I struggled on. The seconds seemed hours; but the few moments I had
in starting, combined with my youth and strength, gave me a great
advantage, and, though several forms struggled after me hi deadly
silence which was more dreadful than any sound, I easily reached the
top. Since then I have climbed the cone of Vesuvius, and as I struggled
up that dreary steep amid the sulphurous fumes the memory of that awful
night at Montrouge came back to me so vividly that I almost grew faint.

The mound was one of the tallest in the region of dust, and as I
struggled to the top, panting for breath and with my heart beating like
a sledge-hammer, I saw away to my left the dull red gleam of the sky,
and nearer still the flashing of lights. Thank God! I knew where I was
now and where lay the road to Paris!

For two or three seconds I paused and looked back. My pursuers were
still well behind me, but struggling up resolutely, and in deadly
silence. Beyond, the shanty was a wreck--a mass of timber and moving