"Pardon, you say—pardon?" cried he, with the roar of a tiger, "To me!"
"To you, pardieu! To whom else?"
And coolly pushing away with his wounded arm the partisan, who had darted towards him, he raised his pistol, and discharged it over his head. Don Pablo remained an instant astounded, his eyes bloodshot, his features livid, his hands clinched, incapable of understanding the grandeur of this action, but conquered spite of himself, by the ascendancy that the young man had in an instant acquired over his rude and savage nature.
"Your life, then," quietly resumed the young man "belongs to me; I have given it you back. I only demand in return one thing."
"You demand something of me?" said he, with a mocking sneer.
"Yes."
"Oh! Oh! And if I should not choose to accord you anything?"
"Oh, then," pursued he, with the greatest coolness, "as everything must have an end, and as it is always allowable to rid one's self of a wild beast, I shall blow your brains out, as though you were a mad dog."
While speaking thus, Emile had taken his gun in his hand.
The partisan found himself again at the mercy of his adversary.