"There's no way for her to slip us but by water or through the Cypress Swamp, Colonel. She ain't safe this side of Cantwell's bridge. Word has gone out, and every road is watched."
"But Van Dorn is beaten back; he hasn't made a single capture; the niggers drove him out of Dover with firearms, and he is wounded somewhere."
The tall kidnapper turned pale, and then consigned Van Dorn's shade to eternal torment.
"Don't swear before me, sir!" McLane, also irritated, exclaimed. "It's not conservative, and I won't permit it. How do I know Meshach Milburn is dead? who did it?"
"Black Dave fired the barker, and saw him settled."
The negro came in, red-eyed, and hoarse with diseased lungs, and stood, the wreck of a once gigantic and regular man.
"Gi' me a drink," he muttered; "I'm mos' dead wi' misery an cold."
"Tell this man what you did," Joe Johnson spoke; "you waited till you saw the hat at the window, and fired, and fetched hat an' man to the ground?"
Swallowing a thimbleful of McLane's brandy, the negro grunted "Blood!" and looked tremblingly at his hands.