He rode away--it was but a step: the trample of a body of horse was now plainly heard--he looked back upon her--his countenance was bathed in tears. She stretched forth her arms, and murmuring, in a broken voice, "I will go with you--take me, Herman, take me!"--was in a moment locked in his own embrace. He snatched her from the saddle, and, as she clung to his neck, dashed the spurs into his good roan steed. Had the words been pronounced a moment earlier, nay, but an instant, he might have made his escape, and borne her off in safety. But the decision was as late as it proved to be fatal. Phoebe had already heard the trampling of the approaching horsemen, and Hyland had called them friends. She could scarce repress a cry of delight; but when, catching Catherine's last words, she looked round and beheld her, as she thought, in the act of being again snatched away, she raised her voice in a scream that was heard by the most distant of the approaching party, and was echoed by a shout coming from fifty voices. Again Hyland struck the spurs into his horse, and the fire sparkled from his hoofs as he dashed down the hill; but fire flashed immediately after from the hoofs of twenty others, fresher and perhaps fleeter. "Shoot not, or you will kill the lady!" roared a voice in his ear. "Surrender, dog, or die!" shouted another, who was indeed no other than Henry Falconer; and almost in the same instant, as three or four closed upon the unfortunate fugitive, a strong arm snatched the fainting Catherine from his grasp, and a pistol, held by Falconer, was thrust into his face. The young Gilbert was weak with wounds and sickness, and worn out with toil, watching, and grief; his native spirit was thus in a manner crushed and prostrated; and he would perhaps have yielded himself passively up, if not too bitterly goaded by the taunts and violence of his captors. Such was the opinion of two of them, who, supposing he had already yielded, withdrew their hands, that they might give assistance to the fainting Catherine, whom captain Caliver had so fortunately redeemed from the midst of the fray. But Gilbert had not yet rendered himself. The sight of his rival, exulting in his capture, and menacing him with voice and weapon, inflamed his dying passions. He turned with sudden fierceness, checked and spurred his steed at the same time, and thus caused him to vault into the air with a violence which would have speedily released him from Falconer's grasp, had not his purpose been rather to attack than fly. As he executed this feat, he presented his own pistol, and drew the trigger. The explosion of two pistols at once was followed by the rush of a dozen men to separate the combatants; and the next moment both were seen rolling upon the ground, Falconer lying clear of the melée, and Hyland in the hands of the vengeful Sterling, whose horse, White Surrey, had overthrown the youth, together with his roan steed.