Her ready decision and unerring aim had saved her lover's life.

She threw the smoking pistol she had used with such effect down at her feet, and, seizing the other, she stepped over to the side of her unconscious lover.
"I swear," she said, in a shrill, high-pitched voice which just escaped a scream, and which trembled with the agitation of the moment, "by my hope of heaven, if a single man of you lay hands on him, he shall have this bullet also, you cowards!" After a moment's hesitation, amid shouts of "Kill the girl!" the men surged toward her.

Chloe, her black maid, flung herself upon her mistress' breast.
"Oh, honey, I let dem kill me fust." "Well done, Kate! It's the true Wilton blood.

Oh, if I had a free arm, you villains!" cried the still struggling colonel.
"Seize the girl," Johnson commanded promptly, "and let us get out of this." The men made a rush toward the table where Katharine stood undaunted, her face flushed with excitement, her mouth tense with resolution.

She cried,-- "Have a care, men! have a care!" One life she could still command with her loaded pistol.