40+ Adventure Novels & Lost World Mysteries in One Premium Edition. Henry Rider Haggard

and placed him by one of the sticks, and then handed him a revolver.

      "Stand sideways, and remember what I told you," whispered Mr. Alston.

      "Are you ready, gentlemen?" asked Captain Justice presently.

      There was no answer; but Ernest felt his heart stand still, and a mist gathered before his eyes. At that moment he heard a lark rise into the air near him and begin to sing. Unless he could get his sight back he felt that he was lost.

      "/One:/" The mist cleared away from his eyes; he saw his adversary's pistol-barrel pointing steadily at him.

      "/Two:/" A ray broke from the rising sun, and caught a crystal pin Hugh Kershaw incautiously wore. Instinctively Ernest remembered Mr. Alston's advice, and lowered the sight of his long barrel till it was dead on the crystal pin. Curiously enough, it reminded him at that moment of the eyes in the witch's head at Dum's Ness. His vital forces rose to the emergency, and his arm grew as steady as a rock. Then came a pause that seemed hours long.

      "/Three:/" There was a double report, and Ernest became aware of a commotion in his hair. Hugh Kershaw flung up his arms wildly, sprang a few inches off the ground, and fell backwards. Great God, it was over!

      Ernest staggered a moment from the reaction, and then ran with the others towards his cousin--nay, towards what had been his cousin. He was lying on his back upon the sand, his wide-opened eyes staring up at the blue sky, as though to trace the flight of the spirit, his arms extended. The heavy revolver-ball had struck near the crystal pin, and then passed upwards through the throat and out at the base of the head, shattering the spinal column.

      "He is dead," said Captain Justice, solemnly.

      Ernest wrung his hands.

      "I have killed him," he said--"I have killed my own cousin!"

      "Young man," said Mr. Alston, "do not stand there wringing your hands, but thank providence for your own escape. He was very near killing you, let me tell you. Is your head cut?"

      Instinctively Ernest took off his hat, and as he did so some fragments of his curly hair fell to the ground. There was a neat hole through the felt, and a neat groove along his thick hair. His cousin /had/ meant to kill him; and he /was/ a good shot--so good that he thought that he could put a ball through Ernest's head. But he forgot that a heavy American revolver, with forty grains of powder behind the ball, is apt to throw a trifle high.

      They all stood silent and looked at the body; and the lark, that had been frightened by the noise, began to sing again.

      "This will not do," said Mr. Alston presently. "We had better move the body in there," and he pointed to the deserted hut. "Captain Justice, what do you intend to do?"

      "Give myself up to the authorities, I suppose," was the gallant Captain's scared answer.

      "Very well. I don't advise you to do that, but it you are determined to, there is no need for you to be in a hurry about it. You must give us time to get clear first."

      They lifted the corpse, reverently bore it into the deserted hut, and laid it on the floor. Ernest remained standing looking at the red stain where it had been. Presently they came out again, and Mr. Alston kicked some sand over the stain and hid it.

      "Now," he said, "we had better make an addition to those documents, to say how this came about."

      They all went back to the hut, and the addition was made, standing there by the body. When it came to Ernest's turn to sign, he almost wished that his signature was the one missing from the foot of that ghastly postscriptum. Mr. Alston guessed his thoughts.

      "The fortune of war," he said, coolly. "Now, Captain Justice, we are going to catch the early boat, and we hope that you will not give yourself up before midday, if you can help it. The inquiry into the affair will not then be held before to-morrow; and by eleven to-morrow morning I hope to have seen the last of England for some years to come."

      The Captain was a good fellow at bottom, and had no wish to see others dragged into trouble.

      "I shall certainly give myself up," he said; "but I don't see any reason to hurry about it. I don't think that they can do much to me here. Poor Hugh! he can well afford to wait," he added, with a sigh, glancing down at the figure that lay so still, with a coat thrown over the face. "I suppose that they will lock me up for six months--pleasant prospect! But I say, Mr. Kershaw, you had better keep clear; it will be more awkward for you. You see, he was your cousin, and by his death you become, unless I am mistaken, next heir to the title."

      "Yes, I suppose so," said Ernest, vaguely.

      Here it may be stated that Captain Justice found himself sadly mistaken. Instead of the six months he expected, he was arraigned for murder, and finally sentenced to a term of penal servitude. He received a pardon, however, after serving about a year of his time.

      "Come, we must be off," said Mr. Alston, "or we shall be late for the boat;" and, bowing to Captain Justice, he left the hut.

      Ernest followed his example, and, when he had gone a few yards, glanced round at the hateful spot. There stood Captain Justice in the doorway of the hut, looking much depressed, and there, a few yards to the left, was the impress in the sand that marked where his cousin had fallen. He never saw either the man or the place again.

      "Kershaw," said Mr. Alston, "what do you propose doing?"

      "I don't know."

      "But you must think; remember, you are in an awkward fix. You know by English law duelling is murder; and now I come to think of it, I expect that this place is subject to the English law in criminal matters, or at least that the law is identical."

      "I think I had better give myself up, like Captain Justice."

      "Nonsense. You must hide away somewhere for a year or two till the row blows over."

      "Where am I to hide?"

      "Have you any money, or can you get any?"

      "Yes, I have nearly two hundred and fifty pounds on me now."

      "My word, that is fortunate! Well, now, what I have to suggest is, that you should assume a false name, and sail for South Africa with me. I am going up country on a shooting expedition, outside British territory, so there will be little fear of your being caught and extradited. Then, in a year or so, when the affair is forgotten, you can come back to England. What do you say to that?"

      "I suppose I may as well go there as anywhere else. I shall be a marked man all my life, anyhow. What does it matter where I go?"

      "Ah, you are down on your luck now; by-and-by you will cheer up again."

      Just then they met a fisherman, who gazed at them, wondering what the two gentlemen were doing out walking at that hour; but concluding that, after the mad fashion of Englishmen, they had been to bathe, he passed them with a civil "Bonjour." Ernest coloured to the eyes under the scrutiny; he was beginning to feel the dreadful burden of his secret. Presently they reached the steamer, and found Mr. Alston's little boy Roger, who, though he was only nine years old was as quick and self-reliant as many English lads of fourteen, waiting for them by the bridge.

      "Oh, here you are, father; you have been walking so long that I thought you would miss the boat. I have brought the luggage down all right, and this gentleman's too."

      "That's right, my lad. Kershaw, do you go and take the tickets; I want to get rid of this;" and he tapped the revolver-case, that was concealed beneath his coat.

      Ernest did so, and presently met Mr. Alston on the boat. A few minutes more and, to his intense relief, she cast off and stood out to sea. There were not very many passengers on board, and those there were, were too much taken up in making preparations to be sea-sick to take any notice of Ernest. Yet he could not shake himself free from the idea that everybody knew that he had just killed a man. His own self-consciousness was so intense that he saw his guilt on the faces of all he met. He gazed around him in awe, expecting every moment to be greeted as a murderer. Most people who have ever done anything they should not are acquainted with this sensation.

      Overcome