pistol in his left hand, a sword in his right; a bludgeon severed in two
lay at his feet, and on the floor within two yards of him, towards the
window, drops of blood yet warm, showed that the pistol had not been
discharged in vain.

"And is it you, my brave friend, that I have to thank for our safety?"
cried Lester in great emotion.

"You, Eugene!" repeated Madeline, sinking on his breast.

"But thanks hereafter," continued Lester; "let us now to the pursuit,--
perhaps the villain may have perished beneath your bullet?"

"Ha!" muttered Aram, who had hitherto seemed unconscious of all around
him; so fixed had been his eye, so colourless his cheek, so motionless
his posture. "Ha! say you so?--think you I have slain him?--no, it cannot
be--the ball did not slay, I saw him stagger; but he rallied--not so one
who receives a mortal wound!--ha! ha!--there is blood, you say, that is
true; but what then!--it is not the first wound that kills, you must
strike again--pooh, pooh, what is a little blood!"

While he was thus muttering, Lester and the more active of the servants
had already sallied through the window, but the night was so intensely
dark that they could not penetrate a step beyond them. Lester returned,
therefore, in a few moments; and met Aram's dark eye fixed upon him with
an unutterable expression of anxiety.

"You have found no one," said he, "no dying man?--Ha!--well--well--well!
they must both have escaped; the night must favour them."