Even when disturbed by the flutter of birds darting from top to dense green top of the orange trees, the air seemed hushed by some unholy constraint.

Through the cool morning vapors, hot smoke from smouldering wreckage mounted thin and straight, toward where the pale disk of the moon dissolved in light.

The convex field stood bare, except for a few overthrown scarecrows in naked yellow or dusty blue, and for a jagged strip of earthwork torn from the crest, over which the Black Dog thrust his round muzzle.

In a truce of empty silence, the defenders slept by turns among the sand-bags.
The day came, and dragged by without incident.

The sun blazed in the compound, swinging overhead, and slanting down through the afternoon.