For this have I
forsworn my race, and become--what you now behold me--a
savage both in garb and character. But this matters not,"
he continued, fiercely and impatiently, "your doom is
sealed; and before another sun has risen, your stern
father's gaze shall be blasted with the sight of the
mangled carcase of his first born. Ha! ha! ha!" and he
laughed low and exultingly; "even now I think I see him
withering, if heart so hard can wither, beneath this
proof of my undying hate."
"Fiend!--monster!--devil!" exclaimed the excited officer,
now losing sight of all considerations of prudence in
the deep horror inspired by his captor:--"Kill me--torture
me--commit any cruelty on me, if such be your savage
will; but outrage not humanity by the fulfilment of your
last disgusting threat. Suffer not a father's heart to
be agonised--a father's eye to be blasted--with a view
of the mangled remains of him to whom he has given life."
Again the savage rudely pulled the thong that bound his
prisoner to his girdle, and removing his tomahawk from
his belt, and holding its sullied point close under the
eye of the former, exclaimed, as he bent eagerly over
him,--
"See you this, Captain de Haldimar? At the still hour of
midnight, while you had abandoned your guard to revel in
the arms of your Indian beauty, I stole into the fort by
means of the same rope that you had used in quitting it.
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