On the northern side, the famous Loggia, built by an Italianate owner of the house, in the first half of the sixteenth century--a series of open arches, with twisted marble pillars--ran along the house from front to rear. It was approached on the south by a beautiful staircase, of which the terra-cotta balustrading had been copied from a famous villa on Como, and a similar staircase gave access to it from the garden to the north. The fight for the Great Hall which the Loggia adjoined, was being followed with agonised anxiety by the crowds. The Red Parlour, with all its carvings and mouldings had gone, the porch room was a furnace of fire, with black spars and beams hanging in ragged ruin across it. The Great Hall seemed already tottering, and in its fall, the Loggia too must go. Then, as every eye hung upon the work of the firemen and the play of the water, into the still empty space of the Loggia, and illumined by the glare of the flames, there emerged with quiet step, the figure of a woman. She came forward: she stood with crossed arms looking at the crowd. And at the same moment, behind her, there appeared the form of a child, a little fair-haired girl, hobbling on a crutch, in desperate haste, and wailing--"Father!" Delia saw them, and with one wild movement she was through the cordon of police, and running for the house. Winnington, at the head of his salvage corps, perceived her, and ran too. "Delia!--go back!--go back!" "Gertrude!" she said, gasping--and pointed to the Loggia. And he had hardly looked where all the world was looking, when a part of the roof of the Hall at the back, fell suddenly outwards and northwards, in a blaze of flame. Charred rafters stood out, hanging in mid air, and the flames leapt on triumphant. At the same moment, evidently startled by some sound behind her, the woman turned, and saw what the crowd saw--the child, limping on its crutch, coming towards her, calling incoherently. Her own cry rang out, as she ran towards the cripple, waving her back. And as she did so, came another thundering fall, another upward rush of flame, as a fresh portion of the roof fell eastwards, covering the Loggia and blotting out the figures of both woman and child. With difficulty the police kept back the mad rush of the crowd. The firemen swarmed to the spot. But the child was buried deep under flaming ruin, where her father, Daunt, who had rushed to save her, was only restrained by main force from plunging after her, to his death. The woman they brought out--alive. France, Delia and Winnington were beside her. "Stand back!" shouted the mild old Rector--transformed into a prophet-figure, his white hair streaming--as the multitude swayed against the cordon of police. "Stand back! all of you--and pray--for this woman!" In a dead silence, men, shivering, took off their hats, and women sobbed.