"Good, generous massa, and we shall go back to Africa?" "You shall." CHAPTER XXXIV. FAREWELL TO LOUISIANA. Gerald Leslie, William Bowen, and Philip Treverton accompanied Silas Craig to the attorney's office, where the wretched man refunded the hundred thousand dollars, and wrote a long and detailed confession of his guilt, which he signed in the presence of three witnesses. This done, Gerald and his partner returned to the house of Augustus Horton, where they had left Mortimer Percy. They found Augustus, Adelaide, and Mrs. Montresor seated in a brilliantly lighted apartment, communicating with the morning room that opened upon the garden. Mortimer Percy was seated a little distance from his cousin, and it was evident that no reconciliation had taken place between them. Adelaide and Mrs. Montresor were both engaged in some elegant needle-work, which afforded them an excellent excuse for silence. Augustus stood near the open window smoking his cigar in moody stillness. It was thus the group was occupied when Gerald Leslie and Philip Treverton returned from the lawyer's house. Gerald was the first to speak: "You will be surprised, perhaps, to see me again, Mr. Horton?" he said to Augustus. "I will freely own that I am so," answered the planter; "though the conduct of my cousin, Mr. Percy, has made me accustomed to surprises. The revelations of this morning have nothing to do with me, and I cannot imagine what can have brought Mr. Leslie and Mr. Treverton to this house." Gerald Leslie smiled. "Indeed, Mr. Horton! You forget, then, that I have a daughter?" "I do not," answered Augustus. "I have very good reason to remember that fact, Mr. Leslie. The purchase of the Octoroon slave, Cora, cost me fifty thousand dollars, and there appears considerable chance of my losing every cent." "Not if you can capture your runaway slave," said Gerald Leslie. "Not if I can recapture her. No, let her once fall into my hands, and it shall be my fault if she escapes again. As for the Englishman, Gilbert Margrave--" "You will have no mercy upon him?" asked Gerald. "By Heaven I will not. We Southerners are in no humor just now to put up with any of your abolitionist tricks, and Mr. Margrave shall pay dearly for breaking the laws of Louisiana." Augustus walked up and down the room as he spoke, and every accent revealed his rage, at the defeat and humiliation he had sustained since the preceding night. "Mr. Horton," said Gerald Leslie gravely, "Philip Treverton and I had a very serious purpose in coming to you here this evening. We come to make an appeal to your generosity, and your sense of manly honor. Will you listen patiently to that appeal?" "You are free to speak," replied Augustus, haughtily, and throwing away his cigar, he folded his arms, and placed himself against a pillar that bordered the window, as if prepared to listen, but as if determined not to be convinced.