Almost as Lord Sherbrooke spoke, however, and before Wilton could reply, the lady made a slight movement of her hand, and raised her head. Her eyes were open, and she turned to Lord Sherbrooke, gazing on his face for a moment, as if to be certain who he was. "Oh, Sherbrooke," she said at length, in a faint voice, "fly, fly!--I was very foolish to faint.--I am better now. The men will be upon you in a minute--Oh Heaven, they are all round us! Oh how weak it was to faint and keep you here till they have taken you.--I am better now," she said, in answer to a whispered inquiry of Lord Sherbrooke, as he pressed her to his heart. "But I must have hurt my shoulder in falling, for it pains me very much." And putting her hand towards it, she drew it suddenly away, exclaiming, "Good Heaven, it is blood!" "Yes, dearest--yes, beloved," replied Lord Sherbrooke--"it is blood--blood shed by your husband's hand; but oh, inadvertently, clear girl. I rashly fired amongst the men that were pursuing me, and have killed the only woman that I ever loved!" And he struck his hand vehemently against his forehead, with a gesture of despair that could not be mistaken. "Come, come, young gentleman," said a man who seemed the leader of the bluff sailors around him, "don't take on so. Some one has gone for a surgeon. There's a clever one at Halstow, I know, and mayhap the young lady is not so much hurt. At all events, you did not do it to hurt her, that's clear enough; and I rather fancy we've all been in a mistake together. For if you were flying from people looking out to take you, you were not the goods we were after--for we were looking for people that were coming to take us. "They came down and said that a gentleman had come down with a Messenger to look after our little traffic, and have some of us up for it. Now we intended to plant the Messenger in the bog till we had got all things ready and the ship off, and it was him and his people we were after. But come along--bring down the lady to Master Plessis's. She will be taken good care of there, I warrant you. Here, Jack Vanoorst!--you're a bit of a surgeon yourself, for you doctored my head when the Frenchman broke my crown one day. See if you can't stop the blood, at least till we get the lady to old Plessis's, and the surgeon comes." A broad-built elderly man advanced, and, with whatever materials could be obtained upon the spot, made a sort of bandage and compress by the dim light, and applied it dexterously enough, while Caroline lay with her head upon her husband's bosom, and her hand clasped in his. Sherbrooke looked down in her face while this was done with agony depicted in his countenance; nor was that agony rendered the less by seeing a faint look of happiness come over her face as she thus rested, and by feeling her hand press gently upon his. It all seemed to say, "I could willingly die thus."