“He cannot live—not many hours more. Sir David and I have watched with him all night. He has suffered, but he is at peace now, for he is dead, poor soul, below the waist. ’Twas in shooting at the wicked men that tracked us through the tunnel that he made the explosion, for Mr. Brander says they would bring powder along with them in a barrel, and——”
“Brander? Is the rogue spared, then, when an honest soldier falls?”
“He is sore wounded, but he will recover, perhaps.”
“An idle rally that shall earn him the gallows. And so they came by the hole after all, and were caught in their own springe? He hath a soldier’s death; and tell me that is all, Betty.”
“Ah! no—the girl.”
“I remember—I remember that. She sprang from the roof.”
“Yes.”
“And she is dead? A pitiful account for a dump of red crystal. How much blood yet will it absorb before its lust is quenched? My heart cries for the unhappy child. But something comes to me, Betty, that I think I have struggled for through a fever of hours. You must go——”
“No, no! Oh, don’t bid me away from you!”
“Tush, you simple! ’Tis but a yard or two, and to ask of Dennis the bag the poor natural threw down, for I heard the women cry it.”