"
"Well," said he, speaking slowly, as one who thinks the path out word by
word, "what if she believes 'tis you who want your freedom? What if you
have made her that bitterest thing in all the world--a woman scorned?"
I would not listen to him more.
"This is all the merest folly, Richard, as I will prove to you beyond
the question of a doubt. Do you mind that little interval in the
Cherokees' torture-play when they came to bind us afresh for the
burning?"
"I mind no more of that horror-night than I can help."
"Well, in that hour, when death was waiting for all three of us, she
wrote a little farewell note to the man she loved. 'Twas for you, Dick,
but her Indian messenger blundered and gave it me."
He got upon his feet at that and began to pace slowly back and forth
under the gloomy archings. But ere long he paused to grasp and wring my
hand most lovingly, saying, "Who am I, Jack, to buy my happiness at such
a price?"
"Nay, lad; 'tis neither you nor I who should figure greatly in the
matter; 'tis our dear lady. She must e'en have what she longs for, if
you, or I, or both of us, should have to go above stairs and put our
necks into my Lord Cornwallis's noose."
"Now, by heaven, Jack Ireton, 'tis you who are the true lover and the
gentleman; and I am naught but a selfish churl with my face in my own
trencher!" he burst out, wringing my hand yet again. "'Tis as you say;
yet I will not be driven from this; for aught you have told me to prove
it otherwise, Madge has yet to choose between us, and she shall have
that choice, fairly and squarely, and knowing that you love her, before
we three go apart again.
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