As he made this answer, he gave a powerful jerk to extricate himself from the unpleasant position in which he was held. Mr. Burton drew a revolver from his breast-pocket, remarking,
“I will not hold you, Thorley; but just as sure as you make an attempt to get away, I will shoot you. Supposing you succeeded in getting free from me—what good would that do you? Your prospects here would be ruined; for I should expose you to Don Miguel. You would have to flee from wife, country and fortune; all you would preserve would be your rascally life, which I do not propose, at present, to take.”
“A man’s life is his best possession.”
“A truth you would have done well to remember before you took away the life of another. I can’t talk to such a scoundrel as you, Thorley; I fairly ache to inflict upon you the punishment you deserve. It is for the sake of others, in whom I am interested, that I give you this one chance of mercy. Here is paper, pen and ink; sit down on that stone there, and write what I asked of you.”
“What security do you offer me against the consequences of criminating myself? I want you to promise I shall be none the worse off for it.”
“You are too fully in my power to demand promises of me. Yet this I will consent to, as I said before, for the sake of others—to let you go unprisoned by the warrant I hold against you, and never to put the officers of justice on your track. One thing, however, I must and shall do. I can not leave this Paradise, into which you have crept like the serpent, without warning Don Miguel what manner of creature he is trusting and sheltering.”
“Oh, don’t do that, Mr. Burton! He’ll turn me off on the world again, and I shall be exposed to the same temptations as ever—and here I was leading a better life—I was indeed—reformed, quite reformed and repentant.”
“So reformed and repentant, so very excellent, that you were only prevented, but now, from killing me and tumbling me into this convenient ravine, by my own prudence.”
“Every thing was at stake, you know. I was desperate. You must forgive me. It would not be natural for me to submit to see all I had gained snatched away from me—my life periled. I recognized you within five minutes after sitting down to the supper-table last night.”
“I had no idea you had ever seen me,” said Mr. Burton, willing to hear how it was that this man knew him, when he had never met Thorley until yesterday.