Long-Hair sprang in at the last moment to make doubly certain the securing of his most important captive. He flung his long and powerful arms around Beverley from behind and made a great effort to throw him upon the ground. The young man, feeling this fresh and vigorous clasp, turned himself about to put forth one more mighty spurt of power. He lifted the stalwart Indian bodily and dashed him headlong against the buttressed root of a tree half a rod distant, breaking the smaller bone of his left fore-arm and well-nigh knocking him senseless.
It was a fine exhibition of manly strength; but there could be nothing gained by it. A blow on the back of his head the next instant stretched Beverley face downward and unconscious on the ground. The savages turned him over and looked satisfied when they found that he was not dead. They bound him with even greater care than they had shown in securing the others, while Long-Hair stood by stolidly looking on, meantime supporting his broken fore-arm in his hand.
"Ugh! dog!" he grunted, and gave Beverley a kick in the side. Then turning a fiendish stare upon Oncle Jazon he proceeded to deliver against his old, dry ribs three or four like contributions with resounding effect. "Polecat! Little old greasy woman!" he snarled, "make good fire for warrior to dance by!" Kenton also received his full share of the kicks and verbal abuse, after which Long-Hair gave orders for fires to be built. Then he looked to his hurt arm and had the bone set and bandaged, never so much as wincing the while.
It was soon apparent that the Indians purposed to celebrate their successful enterprise with a feast. They cooked a large amount of buffalo steak; then, each with his hands full of the savory meat, they began to dance around the fires, droning meantime an atrociously repellant chant.
"They're a 'spectin' to hev a leetle bit o' fun outen us," muttered Oncle Jazon to Beverley, who lay near him. "I onderstan' what they're up to, dad dast 'em! More'n forty years ago, in Ca'lina, they put me an' Jim Hipes through the ga'ntlet, an' arter thet, in Kaintuck, me an' Si Kenton tuck the run. Hi, there, Si! where air ye?"
"Shut yer fool mouth," Kenton growled under his breath. "Ye'll have that Injun a kickin' our lights out of us again."
Oncle Jazon winked at the gray sky and puckered his mouth so that it looked like a nutgall on an old, dry leaf.
"What's the diff'ence?" he demanded. "I'd jest as soon be kicked now as arter while; it's got to come anyhow."
Kenton made no response. The thongs were torturing his arms and legs. Beverley was silent, but consciousness had returned, and with it a sense of despair. All three of the prisoners lay face upward quite unable to move, knowing full well that a terrible ordeal awaited them. Oncle Jazon's grim humor could not be quenched, even by the galling agony of the thongs that buried themselves in the flesh, and the anticipation of torture beside which death would seem a luxury.
"Yap! Long-Hair, how's yer arm?" he called jeeringly. "Feels pooty good, hay?"