“Well, gentlemen,” demanded McBane impatiently, “what are we going to do with the scoundrel when we catch him?”

“They’ve got the murderer,” announced a reporter, entering the room.

“Who is he?” they demanded in a breath.

“A nigger by the name of Sandy Campbell, a servant of old Mr. Delamere.”

“How did they catch him?”

“Our Jerry saw him last night, going toward Mrs. Ochiltree’s house, and a white man saw him coming away, half an hour later.”

“Has he confessed?”

“No, but he might as well.  When the posse went to arrest him, they found him cleaning the clothes he had worn last night, and discovered in his room a part of the plunder.  He denies it strenuously, but it seems a clear case.”

“There can be no doubt,” said Ellis, who had come into the room behind the reporter.  “I saw the negro last night, at twelve o’clock, going into Mr. Delamere’s yard, with a bundle in his hand.”

“He is the last negro I should have suspected,” said Carteret.  “Mr. Delamere had implicit confidence in him.”

“All niggers are alike,” remarked McBane sententiously.  “The only way to keep them from stealing is not to give them the chance.  A nigger will steal a cent off a dead man’s eye.  He has assaulted and murdered a white woman,—­an example should be made of him.”

Carteret recalled very distinctly the presence of this negro at his own residence on the occasion of little Theodore’s christening dinner.  He remembered having questioned the prudence of letting a servant know that Mrs. Ochiltree kept money in the house.  Mr. Delamere had insisted strenuously upon the honesty of this particular negro.  The whole race, in the major’s opinion, was morally undeveloped, and only held within bounds by the restraining influence of the white people.  Under Mr. Delamere’s thumb this Sandy had been a model servant,—­faithful, docile, respectful, and self-respecting; but Mr. Delamere had grown old, and had probably lost in a measure his moral influence over his servant.  Left to his own degraded ancestral instincts, Sandy had begun to deteriorate, and a rapid decline had culminated in this robbery and murder,—­and who knew what other horror?  The criminal was a negro, the victim a white woman;—­it was only reasonable to expect the worst.

“He’ll swing for it,” observed the general.

Ellis went into another room, where his duty called him.

“He should burn for it,” averred McBane.  “I say, burn the nigger.”

“This,” said Carteret, “is something more than an ordinary crime, to be dealt with by the ordinary processes of law.  It is a murderous and fatal assault upon a woman of our race,—­upon our race in the person of its womanhood, its crown and flower.  If such crimes are not punished with swift and terrible directness, the whole white womanhood of the South is in danger.”

“Burn the nigger,” repeated McBane automatically.