Then a howl of anguish rung through the Indian village. The braves stopped their sports to listen. They knew the signal well: it was the wail for the dead. It told that some Shawnee warrior had gone to the spirit-land.
The cry of anguish came from a party of braves entering the village from the south. In their midst they bore what seemed, to the eyes of the renegades, a human body.
The warriors deposited their burden before the door of the council-lodge.
Attracted by the death-note, Ke-ne-ha-ha, the great chief of the Shawnees, came from his lodge.
The chief was a splendid specimen of a man. He stood nearly six feet in hight, and was as straight as an arrow. He was quite light in hue for an Indian, and his features were intelligent and finely cut.
Astonishment flashed from his eyes as he gazed upon the face of the dead Indian, around whom, at a respectful distance, were grouped the Shawnee warriors.
The chief recognized the features of the brave known as Little Crow, a stout warrior, and reputed to be one of the best fighting-men in all the Shawnee nation.
“Wah!” said the chief, in a tone that betrayed deep astonishment, “the soul of the Little Crow has gone to the spirit-land—he rests in Manitou’s bosom. Let my braves speak—who has taken the life of the Shawnee warrior?”
“Let the chief open his ears and he shall hear,” replied one of the braves, a tall, muscular warrior, known as Watega. “Little Crow went forth, last night, to hunt the deer in the woods of the Scioto. He was a great warrior; his arm was strong—his feet swift on the trail. He told his brothers that he would return before the spirit-lights (stars) died. He did not come. His brothers sought for him. By the banks of the Scioto they found him, but the hatchet of a foe had taken the life of the Little Crow.”
Then the chief knelt by the side of the body and examined the wound in the head; the clotted blood marked the spot.