However, the authorities opined it was all right;
so, feeling very ill, I was only too glad to crawl to bed. Just as the
sun was setting, the soldiers on watch came tearing down the wooden
passage, making an awful clatter, and calling out: "The gun is pointed
on the convent!" As they spoke, the shell went off, clean over our
heads, burying itself in a cloud of dust close to a herd of cattle half
a mile distant. This did not reassure me, but we hoped it was a chance
shot, which might not occur again, and that it had been provoked by the
cattle grazing so temptingly within range. I must say there was
something very weird and eerie in those long nights spent at the
convent. At first my throat was too painful to enable me to sleep, and
endless did those dreary hours seem. We had supper usually before seven,
in order to take advantage of the fading daylight, for lights were on no
account to be shown at any of the windows, being almost certain to
attract rifle-fire. By eight we were in total darkness, except for the
dim little paraffin hand-lamp the Sisters kindly lent me, which, for
precaution's sake, had to be placed on the floor. Extraordinary noises
emanated from those long uncarpeted passages, echoing backwards and
forwards, in the ceiling, till they seemed to pertain to the world of
spirits.
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