It is his scalp that hangs from the point of a spear, stuck upright in the ground, not ten paces from where she sits!
There is yet another group equally easy to guard; for the individuals composing it are all securely tied, hand, neck, and foot.
There are six of them, and all white men. There had been nine in the emigrant party. Three are not among the prisoners; but besides the white scalp accounted for, two others, similarly placed on spears, tell the tale of the missing ones. They have shared the fate of the leader of the caravan, having been killed in the attack upon it.
Among the six who survive are Snively, the overseer, and Blount Blackadder, the former showing a gash across his cheek, evidently made by a spear-blade. At best it was but an ill-favoured face, but this gives to it an expression truly horrible.
A top belonging to one of the wagons has been brought away—the wagons themselves having been set on fire, out of sheer wanton wickedness; such cumbrous things being of no value to the light cavalry of the Cheyennes.
The single tilt appears in the camping-place, set up as a tent; and inside it the chief, somnolent after a sleepless night, and wearied with the work of the morning, is reclining in siesta.
Waboga, with the body-servant, keeps sentry outside it. Not that they fear danger, or even intrusion; but both know there is a spectacle intended—some ceremony at which they will be wanted, and at any moment of time.
Neither can tell what it is to be—whether tragic or comic; though both surmise it is not likely to be the latter.
The white men are not so fast bound, as to hinder them from conversing. In a low tone, telling of fear, they discuss among themselves the probability of what is to be done with them.
That they will have to suffer punishment, is not the question; only what it is to be, and whether it is to be death. It may be even worse: death preceded by torture. But death of itself is sufficient to terrify them; and beyond this their conjectures do not extend.