“Would you leave them here in the thicket, Ezra Jones?”
“Why not?”
“They might starve to death, and while I’m willing to serve the king in all things, it is not my intent to be thus barbarous.”
“They can make themselves heard if any one passes by on the trail,” the third man replied very carelessly, and Ezra added quickly:
“Ay! I had not thought of that. They 191 must be gagged, or, what may be better for us, shot offhand.”
“Are you willing to kill two boys in cold blood, Ezra Jones?”
There was no reply to this question, and Jason Wentworth turned round to the other man.
“Matthew White, will you take it upon yourself to do what is little less than murder?”
“No; carry them further into the thicket, where they cannot be heard from the trail, and there tie them up.”
“It were better we shot them at once, than leave them to starve,” Jason Wentworth said much as if speaking to himself, and during this conversation the feelings of the two lads can be faintly imagined.