enly slackened his
pace, and with a vicious tug settled his wool hat more firmly upon his
small skull. He went now at a dog trot and Oscar was closing upon him
rapidly; then, quite near the sheds, Zmai wheeled about and charged his
pursuer headlong. At the moment he turned, Oscar's revolver bit keenly
into the night. Captain Claiborne, looking toward the slope, saw the
flash before the hounds at the stables answered the report.

At the shot Zmai cried aloud in his curiously small voice and clapped his
hands to his head.

"Stop; I want the letter!" shouted Oscar in German. The man turned
slowly, as though dazed, and, with a hand still clutching his head,
half-stumbled and half-ran toward the sheds, with Oscar at his heels.

Claiborne called to the negro stable-men to quiet the dogs, snatched a
lantern, and ran away through the pergola to the end of the garden and
thence into the pasture beyond. Meanwhile Oscar, thinking Zmai badly
hurt, did not fire again, but flung himself upon the fellow's broad
shoulders and down they crashed against the door of the nearest pen. Zmai
swerved and shook himself free while he fiercely cursed his foe. Oscar's
hands slipped on the fellow's hot blood that ran from a long crease in
the side of his head.

As they fell the pen door snapped free, and out into the starry pasture
thronged the frightened sheep.

"The letter--give me the letter!" commanded Oscar, his face close to the
Servian's. He did not know how badly the man was injured, but he was
anxious to complete his business and be off. Still the sheep came
huddling through the broken door, across the prostrate men, and scampered
away into the open. Captain Claiborne, running toward the fold with his
lantern and not looking for obstacles, stumbled over their bewildered
advance guard and plunged headlong into the gray fleeces. Meanwhile into
the pockets of his prostrate foe went Oscar's hands with no result. Then
he remembered the man's gesture in pulling the hat close upon his ears,
and off came the hat and with it a blood-stained envelope. The last sheep
in the pen trooped out and galloped toward its comrades.

Oscar, making off with the letter, plunged into the rear guard of the
sheep, fell, stumbled to his feet, and confronted Captain Claiborne as
that gentleman, in soiled evening dress, fumbled for his lantern and
swore in language unbecoming an officer and a gentleman.

"Damn the sheep!" roared Claiborne.

"It is sheep--yes?