"Well, young fellow, what do you think of yourself for having given us such a chase as this? Aren't you ashamed of yourself?"
Alec made no reply. He thought, and rightly so, that this sort of remark required no answer. Starlight did not seem to notice the omission, but went on in the same light, bantering tone--
"Don't look so sullen; you have done very well for a beginner. We have killed your brother--oh, you need not lock surprised, I know all about you, and besides you are as like as two peas--but you have killed two of my men in return, and that ought to satisfy you. Now one of you fellows there, just look about and see if you can find a little water for the horses. I suppose it is no use asking you where we can find it, Mr. Law, though it would only be hospitable of you on your own run to show us where there is some."
Although Starlight spoke so lightly and, seemingly, was so careless of what went on around him, he kept a keen watch over every one and everything, and the quick catch in the breath that Alec made when he spoke of Geordie did not escape his rapid glance. Like the brute that he was, he determined to torture the poor lad with references to his dead brother from a sheer love of cruelty. Whilst some two or three of the men went to search for water, giving the bridles of their horses to the others to hold, Starlight continued his cruel amusement. To see him, as he leaned so carelessly and gracefully against the burnt stump, with the moonlight falling on his young and handsome face, and lighting up the dimple that fluttered in his cheek when he smiled, one would have thought him some happy fellow talking with a friend instead of the cruel, heartless outlaw that he was.
"It was hardly a fair struggle, was it, for Pearson was so much stronger than your brother, who must have been tired too? It must be unpleasant to have one's brother killed before one's face. Do you find it so?" He looked up with a simple, inquiring glance at Alec as he spoke, and laughed to see how white the boy had grown.
Whilst he was speaking, one of the men who was holding the horses walked up to him and remonstrated with him for his brutal behaviour. He was a great, big, honest-looking fellow, with kind blue eyes and a short curly yellow beard, who looked strangely out of place in the company he was with, and whose reckless, dare-devil expression did not seem quite natural to him. Alec could not hear what he said, but he recognised the voice as being that of the man who had shouted out an answer to Keggs when he was boasting that he was equal with the boys at last.