Notwithstanding the seriousness of the occasion, the optimistic
Ebearhard laughed, although every one else was grave enough.
"Thank you, Kurzbold, for your suggestion. We have come forward, not to
use force, but to try persuasion. Roland, you cannot desert to death the
men whom you conducted out of Frankfort."
"Why can I not?"
"I should have said a moment ago that you will not, but now I say you
cannot. Kurzbold has just shown what an irreclaimable beast he is, and
on that account, because birth, or training, or something has made you
one of different caliber, you cannot thus desert him to the reprisal of
that red fiend up the hill."
"If I save him now, 'twill be but to hang him an hour later. I am no
hangman, while the Margrave is. I prefer that he should attend to my
executions."
Again Ebearhard laughed.
"'Tis no use, Roland, pretending abandonment, for you will not abandon.
I thoroughly favor choking the life out of Kurzbold, and one or two of
the others, and will myself volunteer for the office of headsman,
carrying, as I do, the ax, but let everything be done decently and in
order, that a dignified execution may follow on a fair trial.
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