"He is trying to speak," answered Reed. "He is saying, 'No, no.'"
Thoms bent eagerly over him, with murderous look in his eyes.
The man was dying; his half-closed eyes were glazing fast, but his bloodless lips moved convulsively, and though his life-blood welled forth at every effort, he still strove to utter some frantic word.
Thoms' trembling fingers were at his throat in a moment--Thoms' tigerish eyes flashed out their rage.
"Let him alone," expostulated Reed. "Let the poor wretch speak."
"Off, Thoms!" thundered St. Udo, with a terrible frown.
Both colonels stooped over the Confederate soldier. St. Udo put his ear close to the twitching lips.
"He shot the pistol off himself," muttered the man. "Before Heaven, I swear it! He stabbed me to save himself. He did--he did!"
The life-blood oozed into his lungs and choked him; he clasped his hands and threw them up toward Heaven, as if he called on his creator to witness his innocence, and immediately expired.
The two friends rose and looked at Thoms.
Whiter in his grave he would never be. The veins stood out on his damp forehead like whipcord, but he returned their fierce gaze with a dogged firmness.
"What do you say to this charge?" demanded St. Udo.
"I say nothing," mumbled Thoms, showing his long, cruel teeth. "If you're ready to believe a rebel against your own servant, I needn't expect much fair play. What else would he say to revenge his death, I'd like to know? Of course, if you're a-going to shoot me, nothing that I can say will stop you--you're master here, as well as everywhere else."
He ground the last words out through his teeth with a venom, a fury which belonged more to a madman than to a man supposed to be in possession of his ordinary sanity, and he addressed them to St. Udo exclusively.
"You deserve to die," said St. Udo, "if you have attempted our lives."
"By gar! ve vill court-martial the rogue!" cried Calembours. "He shall be shot, the traitor!"
"If you shoot me, you shoot an innocent man," protested the old man. "Surely Colonel Brand will give me fair play? I swear I never attempted your lives!"
St. Udo scrutinized the eager face doubtfully, and frowned.
"You say that the Confederate, not you, fired that pistol-shot?" he demanded.