"Misery! misery!" cried the unhappy youth: "and to this I have brought myself! the death, the ignominy, of a felon! I know it, I see it very clearly," he added with indescribable emotion, "I see how it must end—good God, upon the gallows! But it shall not be; I will die first—thank heaven, I am dying already! Put but the trial off—they say the court opens this day!—put it off but a week; you shall have an hundred guineas, five hundred, a thousand, all that I have!—only put off the trial a week, that I may die before they drag me into the light again! I deserve to die, I am willing to die, but not, oh heaven! not upon a gibbet!"
"Zounds!" cried Affidavy, who strove in vain to interrupt this burst of frenzied feelings, "you are taking the best way to reach a gibbet, notwithstanding. You are mad, I believe; botheration, sir, if you talk this way, there will be no saving you"—
"Saving me! Can I be saved? that is, not from death, but from ignominious death? Hark you, sir,—they have taken away my money, but I have enough more. Get me a knife, a pistol, a rope, a dose of poison"——
"Tush; if you do not cease this mad raving, and let me speak, I will be gone; you are making the case desperate. Be silent, and listen. Your case is bad, sir, very bad, I must confess, sir. But you have friends, sir; and you may hope; yes, you may hope—if you are wise, sir, you may hope.—You have——Now don't start, or cry out, or I'll leave you—Ehem, sir, I must whisper—you have relations,—a brother, sir"—
"Oran!" cried the prisoner, who would have again started up, had he not been held in his seat by Affidavy: "oh, heaven be thanked! he has not deserted me! Have you seen him? where is he? what can he do for me? will he rescue me?"
"Tush, you must be quiet. If you will speak, let it be in a whisper. As for the trial, why we will stop that if we can. A British officer, with a king's commission in his hand, taken in arms, cannot be shuffled into a cart by a civil tribunal, for following his vocation, and slitting a throat or two. Now, Mr. Lieutenant Gilbert, you understand me? You have a commission."
"No, by heaven! I refused it: I am no officer, and this will not avail me. I am no officer, I was none; nor was I so much even as a volunteer. I refused the commission up to the last moment, and this is the end of it: I would not be the enemy of what was my native country,—of my countrymen; and now they are all enemies of mine! I was not a member of the band; I never acted with it,—never save that fatal once, and then I went not to make war,—no, not even upon the poor wretch I killed—Would to God the pistol had been turned against my own breast!"
"Tush," said Affidavy, interrupting what bade fair to end in another violent paroxysm, "that's wide of the question. The band looked upon you as officer; and unless that fellow, Sterling"—
"The villain! it is he has ruined me!"
"Unless he can swear to the contrary, which he can't, (and, botheration, there's a way of stopping his mouth altogether;) who will be the wiser? Now if we could get Dancy Parkins admitted, along with Sterling, as evidence for the commonwealth—However, we can't; and we'll say no more about it: the prosecuting attorney swears he'll hang him. His mouth is, at all events, sealed. We are safe enough. Here is the commission: Now, sir, you will put a bold face on the matter, insist upon your privilege, and"——