Another stroke of the heavy bell rang out. The prisoner started, and turning round his head, seemed to peer anxiously through the crowd behind him, when his eyes fell upon the figure of a man apparently a year or two younger than himself, and whose features, even in their livid coloring, bore a striking resemblance to his own.
“Come, Patsey,” cried he, “come along with us.” Then turning to the jailer, while his face assumed a smile, and his voice a tone of winning softness, he asked, “It is my brother, sir; he is come up nigh eighty miles to see me, and I hope you 'll let him come upon the drop.”
There was something in the quiet earnestness of his manner in such a moment that thrilled upon the heart more painfully than even the violent outbreak of his passion; and when I saw the two brothers hand in hand, march step by step along, and then disappear in the winding of the dark stair, a sick, cold feeling came over me, and even the loud shout that rent the air from the assembled thousands without scarce roused me from my stupor.
“Come, sir,” cried a man, who in the dress of an official had been for some minutes carefully reading over the document of my committal, “after me, if you please.”
I followed him across the courtyard in the direction of a small building which stood isolated and apart from the rest, when suddenly he stopped, and carefully examining the paper in his hand, he said,—
“Wait a moment; I 'll join you presently.”
With these words, he hurried back towards the gate, where Barton still' stood with two or three others. What passed between them I could not hear; but I could distinctly mark that Barton's manner was more abrupt and imperious than ever, and that while the jailer—for such he was—expressed his scruples of one kind or another, the major would not hear him with patience, but turning his back upon him, called out loud enough to be heard even where I stood,—
“I tell you I don't care, regular or irregular; if you refuse to take him in charge, on your head be it. We have come to a pretty pass. Pollock,” said he, turning to a person beside him, “when there is more sympathy for a rebel in his Majesty's jail, than respect for a Government officer.”
“I'll do it, sir,—I'll do it,” cried the jailer; saying which he motioned me to follow, while he muttered between his teeth, “there must come an end to this, one day or other.”
With that he unlocked a strongly barred gate, and led me along a narrow passage; at the extremity of which he opened a door into a small and rather comfortably furnished room.