s he
staggered. The swift descending blade split the right hand open and
severed the left from the body before he crumpled in a heap on the
ground. The assassin placed his knee on the prostrate figure and plunged
his knife three times in the breast,--once through the heart and once
through each lung. He had learned the art in butchering cattle.

Fifty yards away the mangled bodies of William and Drury Doyle lay on
the ground with the dim figure of the assassin bending low to make sure
that no sign of life remained.

John Brown raised the wick of his lantern and walked coolly up to
the body of the elder Doyle. He flashed the lantern on the distorted
features. A look of religious ecstasy swept the stern face of the
Puritan and his eyes glittered with an unearthly glare.

He uttered a sound that was half a laugh and half a religious shout,
snatched his pistol from his belt, placed the muzzle within an inch of
the dead skull and fired. The brains of the corpse splashed the muzzle
of the revolver.

The trembling mother inside the cabin uttered a low cry of horror and
crumpled in the arms of her son.

The boy dragged her to the bed and rushed to the kitchen for a cup of
water. He dashed it in her face and cried for joy when she breathed
again. He didn't mind the moans and sobs. The thought that she, too,
might be dead had stopped his very heartbeat.

He soothed her at last and sat holding her hand in the dark. The girls
nestled against her side. The mother gave no sign that she was conscious
of their presence.

Her spirit was outside the cabin now, hovering in the darkness mourning
her dead. Through the dread hours of the night she sat motionless,
listening, dreaming.

No sounds came from the darkness. The coyote had ceased to call. The
cricket in the chimney slept at last.

CHAPTER XIX

The dark figures secured the horses, bridles and saddles and moved to
the next appointed crime.

The stolen horses were put in charge of the two sons, who had refused to
take part in the events of the night. They were ordered to follow the
huntsmen carefully.

Again they crept through the night and approached the home of Wilkinson,
the member of the Legislature from the County. Brown had carefully
surveyed his place and felt sure of a successful attack unless the house
should be alarmed by a surly dog which no member of his surveying party
had been able to approach.

When they arrived within two hundred yards of the ga