All at once her attention was riveted on an object up the street. Around
a bend a few hundred yards away a huge wild devil of a thing swung
unsteadily, recklessly, almost striking the curb and lamp-post; and
then, righting itself, it came on with a rush--a mindless destroyer. Now
on one side of the street, now in the middle, now on the other side;
gliding along through the twilight, barely to be seen, creeping nearer
and nearer through the shadows, now again on the wrong side of the
street where it would not be looked for.

A bolt of horror shot through her. She pressed her face quickly against
the window-panes as closely as possible, searching for the whereabouts
of the lads. As she looked, the playing struggling mass of them went
down in the road, the others piled on one. She thought she knew which
one,--he was the strongest,--then they were lost from her sight, as they
rolled in nearer to the sidewalk. And straight toward them rushed that
destroyer in the streets. She tried to throw up the sashes. She tried to
lean out and cry down to him, to wave her hands to him with warning as
she had often done with joy. She could not raise the sashes. She had not
the strength left to turn the rusty bolts. Nor was there time. She
looked again; she saw what was going to happen. Then with frenzy she
began to beat against the window-sashes and to moan and try to stifle
her own moans. And then shrill startled screams and piteous cries came
up to her, and crazed now and no longer knowing what she did, she struck
the window-panes in her agony until they were shattered and she thrust
her arms out through them with a last blind instinct to wave to him, to
reach him, to drag him out of the way. For some moments her arms hung
there outside the shattered window-glass, and a shower of crimson drops
from her fingers splashed on the paving-stones below. She kept on waving
her lacerated hands more and more feebly, slowly; and then they were
drawn inward after her body which dropped unconscious to the garret