Does it strike you that you, in fact, killed the five to enable you to run away with the girl you loved ?" It hadn't struck me in that light, but it was quite irrelevant.
"But for your scheme I should have come back without a blow," he continued; "but then I should have shot McGregor just the same." "Because he led the revolt ?" "Because," said the President, "he has been a traitor from the beginning even to the end--because he tried to rob me of all I held dear in the world.

If you like," he added, with a shrug, "because he stood between me and my will.

So I went up to him and told him his hour was come, and I shot him through the head.

He died like a man, Martin; I will say that." I could not pretend to regret the dead man.

Indeed, I had been near doing the same deed myself.