I ventured but one: "Where is O'Neill's daughter ?" I asked in his ear.
He turned his head and stopped his panting for a moment.
"I could not save her," he gasped; "Merrim--" and here he fell back in my arms a dead man.
We covered him hastily with the fallen leaves, and, taking his horse for our guide's use, spurred grimly on.
There was no doubt now.

The villain's plot had succeeded only too well, and the fair innocents were already delivered over to his clutches.
At a little cluster of houses in the valley we halted a moment longer.
"Has a troop passed this way ?" asked our guide of a cow-herd.
"Surely," said he, "they will scarce be over the hill by now." "Carried they two women in their company ?" He laughed and said no.
"Have not two women been carried this way lately ?" "I'll be hanged if there was a sign of a woman," said he.
We looked blank at one another.

The fellow seemed to speak true.

Yet his story agreed not with that of the dying man.
There was naught but to spur on, and by all means come level with the villain, wherever he was.
As we commenced the steep ascent, we could discern the moving figures of horsemen on the skyline above--as it seemed to us, in two bands, one of which suddenly disappeared on the other side, while the other, numbering some half-dozen men, made southward along the ridge.

As we came higher we saw these last still there, moving hurriedly to and fro, as though seeking what they found not.