Again her hopes were shattered. The scampering backwards and forwards continued, one of the horses neighed, and she imagined she could almost hear the Uhlans' heavy breathing, sounds which brought back to her the danger which she had hesitated to frame in words. Very soon her fears were confirmed. A vision flashed to her brain and made her sick with fear. A faint cracking sound broke upon her ears from several points simultaneously, spreading until it seemed to envelope her on all sides, and especially over her head. By slow degrees the crackling grew to a roar, and then she fully realized what the barbarians had done. IV--"HELP! HELP!"--A VOICE FROM THE BURNING THATCH "Help, help!" called Stephania into the telephone. "They have fired the thatch. For Heaven's sake, send me help. But a few minutes and the rafters, I fear, will catch fire. Are you still there, Shavli? Oh, speak--speak!" An exclamation, mingled sorrow and anger, came from the telephonist at Shavli. "Oh, the ruffians, the abominable assassins!" he cried. "I beseech you to have courage. Help is surely on the way." "I will try to be brave and do my duty to the end, as Michael told me," replied Stephania, as though to herself. "But unless they come soon, it will be too late. The thatch has burnt like tinder. I can hear the flames roaring like a furnace underneath the rafters. There! One of them has given way and fallen on to the joists of my room. Already the heat is suffocating, the smoke almost unbearable. Holy Virgin! What a death." "Alas, what more can we do than beg you to bear up?" returned the voice at Shavli, in an agonized tone. "We have just been informed that a party of Cossacks left twenty minutes ago to rescue you. Once more, courage! And may Our Lady of Vilna indeed protect you." When Stephania Ychas next spoke through the telephone the roof fell in with a crash and pierced a hole, through which the burning embers fell, in the ceiling of her room. At the same time communication with Shavli was suddenly interrupted, either through the Uhlans having discovered and cut the wire, or, as is more probable, owing to the fire having fused the terminals. She could not, however, have sustained her appeals for help much longer. Indeed, it was not many minutes afterwards that, stupefied and blinded by the smoke, as she groped her way to the door in an instinctive movement towards the open air, she sank to the floor unconscious.