"The villain who struck me down!"
Renie uttered a scream, and oaths fell from the lips of the men.
"Out with him! out with him!" came the cry, and oaths and curses and shouts of vengeance filled the air.
The men started to turn the detective toward the door, determined to hang him without further hindrance or delay.
The wounded man as he uttered the fatal words had fallen back, seemingly into a dead faint.
It was a terrible moment; the maddened men had reached the door with their prisoner when Renie called out in a frantic voice:
"Hold! do not take him away, my father has a word to say to him."
The girl's quick wit and readiness of expedient were wonderful.
At first, when the fatal words fell from her father's lips, her blood ran cold with horror; but quickly came the recollection that the detective had changed his appearance, and that she herself had failed to recognize him. Garcia was a dark-complexioned man, and the thought came to her that here was a possibility that, in a moment of excitement and bewilderment, the injured old smuggler had mistaken the detective for Garcia.
Her device to stay the maddened men was a rare example of quickness of thought at a critical moment; indeed, it was the only appeal that would have caused the men to delay their fell purpose.