"To the nation, mother—where else? I must fly somewhere—give myself up to justice, or—" and he paused in the sentence so unpromisingly begun, while his eyes rolled with unaccustomed terrors, and his voice grew thick in his throat.
"Or what—what mean you by that word, that look, Mark? I do not understand you; why speak you in this way, and to me?" exclaimed the maiden, passionately interrupting him in a speech, which, though strictly the creature of his morbid spirit and present excitement, was perhaps unnecessarily and something too wantonly indulged in.
"Forgive me, Katharine—dear Katharine—but you little know the madness and the misery at my heart."
"And have you no thought of mine, Mark? this deed of yours has brought misery, if not madness, to it too; and speech like this might well be spared us now!"
"It is this very thought, Kate, that I have made you miserable, when I should have striven only to make you happy. The thought, too, that I must leave you, to see you perhaps never again—these unman—these madden me, Katharine; and I feel desperate like the man striving with his brother upon the plank in the broad ocean."
"And why part, Mark? I see not this necessity!"
"Would you have me stay and perish? would you behold me, dragged perhaps from your own arms before the stern judge, and to a dreadful death? It will be so if I stay much longer. The state will not suffer this thing to pass over. The crime is too large—too fearful. Besides this, the Pony Club have lately committed several desperate offences, which have already attracted the notice of the legislature. This very guard had been ordered to disperse them; and this affair will bring down a sufficient force to overrun all our settlements, and they may even penetrate the nation itself, where we might otherwise find shelter. There will be no safety for me."
The despondence of the woodman increased as he spoke; and the young girl, as if unconscious of all spectators, in the confiding innocence of her heart, exclaimed, while her head sunk up in his shoulder:—
"And why, Mark, may we not all fly together? There will be no reason now to remain here, since the miners are all to be dispersed."
"Well said, Kate—well said—" responded a voice at the entrance of the apartment, at the sound of which the person addressed started with a visible trepidation, which destroyed all her previous energy of manner; "it is well thought on Kate; there will, sure enough, be very little reason now for any of us to remain, since this ugly business; and the only question is as to what quarter we shall go. There is, however just as little reason for our flight in company with Mark Forrester."