“The red war-club will be lifted up for this, Sevier.”
“Hayi! Yu!” sneered Sevier, using the introduction of the sacred formula for going to war. “I know your heart well. You wait and long to hear the red war-whoop, but your soul shall become blue. So shall it be.” Then to the others, “It’s time now, my friends, to visit the spot where this Indian is said to have been killed.”
“Said to have been killed?” choked Polcher. “And the poor devil’s scalp is before you on that table.”
Sevier picked it up and examined it curiously and invited:
“Stetson, you know scalps and Indians. Come up here.”
The settler advanced and bowed his broad shoulders over the table and held the scalp up to the candle and examined it closely. Then in surprise:
“This ain’t no fresh scalp. It was took from a Injun who’d been dead for hours. Huh! Looks like it was took off by a blind man. No border-man would scalp like that. Besides, the Injun was so long dead no blood come. What kind of a game is this, anyway?” And he turned and glared angrily at the tavern-keeper.
“So much for Stetson. And he knows what he is talking about,” said Sevier. “Now we’ll take torches and go down the trail to where the Indian was killed. The three oaks make the spot easy to find.”
“I can lead you there in the dark,” Stetson assured.
“But we’ll carry lighted torches, and Polcher will go with us,” Sevier significantly ruled.