and wit--would it had always been put, to good purposes!--and saw at once
Faddo's treachery. Like winking he fired at the traitor, who was almost
as quick to return the fire. What made you do it I know not, unless it
was you hated treachery; but, sliding in at the open door behind the
coast-guards, you snatched the lantern from the hands of one, threw it
out of the open door, and, thrusting them aside, called for Tom to follow
you. He sprang towards you over Faddo's body, even as you threw the
lantern, and, catching his arm, you ran with him towards the dyke.

"'Ready for a great jump!' you said. 'Your life hangs on it.' He was even
longer of leg than you. 'Is it a dyke?' he whispered, as the shots from
three muskets rang after you. 'A dyke. When I count three, jump,' you
answered. I have read somewhere of the great leap that one Don Alvarado,
a Spaniard, made in Mexico, but surely never was a greater leap than you
two made that night, landing safely on the other side, and making for the
sea-shore. None of the coast guardsmen, not even Lancy, could make the
leap, for he was sick and trembling, though he had fired upon his own
brother. And so they made for the bridge some distance above, just as the
faint moon slipped behind a cloud and hid you from their sight.

"That is no country to hide in, as you know well, no caves, or hills, or
mazy coombes, just a wide, flat, reedy place, broken by open woods. The
only refuge for both now was the sea. 'Twas a wild run you two made, side
by side, down that shore, keeping close within the gloom of the
sand-hills, the coast-guards coming after, pressing you closer than they
thought at the time, for Tom Doane had been wounded in the leg. But Lancy
sent one back for the horses, he and the other coming on; and so, there
you were, two and two. 'Twas a cruel task for Lancy that night, enough to
turn a man's hair grey. But duty was duty, though those two lads were
more to each other than most men ever are. You know how it ended. But I