"What do you mean?" said the old man, turning, in sharp surprise.
A roar of rifle-shots drowned any reply that Irene might have made.
Oleah had escaped the deadly bullet of the old scout, but some of the many shots, that immediately followed, struck him. The revolver dropped from his hand, his horse reared and plunged in terror, and then both rider and steed fell, a helpless mass, to the ground.
Then all eyes were astonished at the sight of a slender figure, with loosened hair streaming in the wind, hastening through the deadly shower of balls to the fallen man's side; and all ears were astonished by her wild cry:
"Spare, oh, spare his life! He is my husband!"
CHAPTER XXV. AT HOME AGAIN.
When their leader fell, the Confederate cavalry wheeled about and galloped away toward the mountain. Uncle Dan ordered his men to cease firing, as Irene was directly between them and the flying enemy, and her life would be endangered by every shot.
Stunned, confounded, and nonplussed by Irene's sudden and unexpected action, the old man, without loading his rifle, hurried after her. She was kneeling by the side of the insensible soldier, holding his bleeding head on her knee. The horse was struggling in the last throes of death, the blood streaming from two wounds in his breast. Oleah had fallen clear of his horse and had struck his head in falling on a large stone.