"Talk not thus! See, tears are in the child's eyes."
"So is it, my son, and not otherwise. The robber has none to whom to pray, early and late, for protection to his life."
"But you are no murderer, Sandor! You have no man's blood upon your hands!"
"Seek not to palliate my offence, dear wench! Sooner or later, the gallows and the ravens will claim me."
Again the woman began to sob; the child cried when it saw its mother weep; with deep feeling the robber caressed and comforted them.
"Go home, dear ones!" he said, "and be not uneasy. Tell no one that you have seen me. And His blessing be upon you, whose blessing I dare not ask!"
The woman and child departed. The robber sprang into the saddle, and, standing up in the stirrups, listened, as long as they were audible, to the infantine tones of his child. Suddenly an icy-cold hand was laid upon his. Startled, but without uttering a sound, he turned his head. A man stood beside his horse. It was the fugitive from St Thomas.
"Fear nothing from me, Rosa! Handle not your pistols. Mine shall not be the first blood you shed. Not to that end has your life been preserved through sixteen years of peril. Your destiny is not that of a common malefactor."
"You know me, then?"
"By report, as an outlaw, with a price upon your head. I know, too that you have a beloved wife and a darling child, to see whom once in every year you risk your life—here, where all know you, and any might betray you."