“Edward Crozier and Carmen Montijo. You may do as you please. I’ve marked out my pair, and mean to have their lives before yielding up my own—hers, if I can’t his. She sha’n’t live to triumph over me. No; by the Almighty God!”
While speaking, the desperado has taking out his revolver, and holding it at half-cock, spins the cylinder round, to see that all the six chambers are loaded, with the caps on the nipples. Assured of this, he returns it to its holster; and then glances at his macheté, hanging on his left hip. All this with a cool carefulness, which shows him determined upon his hellish purpose.
Calderon, trembling at the very thought of it, endeavours to dissuade him; urging that, after all, they may be only made prisoners, and leniently dealt with.
He is cut short by De Lara crying out:
“You may go to prison and rot there, if it so please you. After what’s happened, that’s not the destiny for me. I prefer death, and vengeance.”
“Better life, and vengeance,” cries Rocas, coming up, Diaz along with him, both in breathless haste. “Quick, comrades!” he continues; “follow me! I’ll find a way to save the first, and maybe get the last, sooner than you expected.”
“It’s no use, Rafael,” argues De Lara, misunderstanding the speech of the seal-hunter. “If we attempt flight, they’ll only shoot us down the sooner. Where could we flee too?”
“Come on; I’ll show you where. Carajo! Don’t stand hesitating; every second counts now. If we can but get ther in time—”
“Get where?”
“Al boté!”