But there was never a quiver of fear in her face or in her heart as she stood to her post day by day; and the walls grew, and the Commandant of the garrison came and gave warm praise and thanks, and timely cautions and instructions to the heroic girls who toiled through the hot summer days without one selfish thought of fear.
Once, as he stood beside the leader of these brave young amazons, a shell came screaming through the air, and he shouted a word of command.
"Down on your faces!" he cried, and himself set the example, to show them what to do. The shell was from a new battery, and it had been directed with a view to stopping the work on this very redoubt. The girls dropped their tools and fell flat, but Catharine was a thought too late. She had been so interested in the work of that battery that she forgot for a moment the peril in which she stood. Luckily the Commandant pulled her down beside him before it was too late; but a portion of the explosive struck her, tearing a ghastly wound from wrist to elbow. The stones and rubble seemed to fly up around them; a fragment dashed itself against Catharine's head; a blood-red mist seemed to swirl before her eyes, and blank darkness swallowed her up.
When she opened her eyes next it was to find herself at home, lying upon the wide couch beneath her favourite window which looked down the street. The light showed that the evening was advancing; May was in the room setting the table for supper, and--but was not that part and parcel of the dream which still seemed to enwrap her faculties?--Harold, her bronzed-faced soldier, was seated beside her, his eyes hungrily bent upon her face.
She smiled, half afraid to move lest the dream should vanish, and the next moment he had her fingers close in his grasp.
"Kate, my Kate!" he cried; and she smiled back, and sat up.
[Illustration: The Commandant pulled her down beside him before it was too late.
"Harold! you have done it again! and have come back safe."
"Yes, I have come back, and to find--what? That my Kate has set an example to the women of the Netherlands, that----"
But she put her hand upon his mouth and stopped him.
"It was not I more than others; and there are some who have laid down their lives for the cause. You must not praise me; why should not women do their duty to the cause of freedom as well as men? You do not praise your men for standing to their guns."