"Ha, villain! For thyself, then!"
A fierce broadsword combat ensued between them, and continued for a few seconds with equal skill and energy. At length the sword of Fitzroy caught in the strand of hair about Kyd's neck and severed it. Instantly the amulet it sustained dropped to the ground. Kyd's confidence and courage seemed to fail him at once, and, striking at random, he was soon disarmed by his cooler adversary, and his life placed at his mercy.
"Strike!" said the bucanier, despondingly.
The victor was about to obey, when his uplifted arm was arrested by a shriek from the balcony, and the voice of Kate Bellamont crying,
"Spare him! save him, Fitzroy!"
The point of his weapon sunk at his feet, and he bent low to her in acquiescence; then turning to his men, he said,
"Bind him. My lord, what shall be done with him? He is at your disposal."
"Bear him to the prison of the Rondeel, there to await his trial!"
Silent and desponding, yet still holding himself with a dignified and lofty bearing, the captive pirate chief was borne, with his few surviving followers, to a dungeon in the Rondeel, while the earl, Fitzroy, and Edwin (who had not participated in the contest) together entered the Hall, leaving their victorious party to clear the ensanguined field of the melancholy traces of the morning's fight.