"That was strange," said Gordon.
"I soon found out whither he was bound, and I was thinking of taking a straight course for the rancho, at which I saw he was aiming, when all at once I heard a yell in the forest, scarcely three hundred yards ahead of me, and before I had time to think, out galloped forty or fifty red skins from the forest, and drove right across the open ground right down upon our runaway. He felt that he was lost, I think, as soon as he saw them, for he made but a very sorry race of it, wheeling and turning to and fro, as if he knew not whither to fly, and the consequence was that they ran him down in less than ten minutes, and that within less than a hundred yards of the brake which hid me. If I had just then had ten rangers with me, armed with good western rifles, they never would have served him as they did, nor would one of them got off scot free. But what could I do? I was but one against fifty, and I knew not how soon my own turn might come: so I had only to stand by and look on while they—"
"Murdered him!" exclaimed Julia, covering both her eyes with her fair hands; "good God! how terrible!"
"Burnt him alive, lady," said the Partisan, coolly.
"Burnt him alive!" exclaimed Julia, whose hands had dropped from before her eyes into her lap at the first words of his reply. "Burnt him alive, and before your eyes!"
"Before my eyes, lady. Not a prayer, not a shriek, not a groan of the wretched devil escaped my ears, and the smell of his roasting flesh sickened and almost choked me," cried the Partisan.
"And why, why did you hold back?" exclaimed Julia, wildly catching him by the arm, "why did you not rush upon them?"
"I could but have died with him."
"Then should you have died with him," she cried, scarce knowing what she said. "Not to have done so, is not like the man I have heard you called—not like the man I took you for."
"Hush, Julia, hush!" cried her husband, springing to his feet. "Be silent, child, if you cannot speak reason—"