In an instant Courtland had regained complete possession of himself.

His distracting passion--how distracting he had never before realized--was gone! His clear sight--no longer distorted by sentiment--had come back; he saw everything in its just proportion--his duty, the plantation, the helpless freedman threatened by lawless fury; the two women--no longer his one tantalizing vision, but now only a passing detail of the work before him.

He saw them through no aberrating mist of tenderness or expediency--but with the single directness of the man of action.
The shot had clearly been intended for Cato.

Even if it were an act of mere personal revenge, it showed a confidence and security in the would-be assassin that betokened cooperation and an organized plan.
He had availed himself of the thunderstorm, the flash and long reverberating roll of sound--an artifice not unknown to border ambush--to confuse discovery at the instant.

Yet the attack might be only an isolated one; or it might be the beginning of a general raid upon the Syndicate's freedmen.