“I don’t think they’ll kill us,” said Snively. “As for myself, they ought to be satisfied with what they’ve done already. They could only have wanted the plunder—they’ve got all that; and what good can our lives be to them?”
“Our lives, not much,” rejoins a disconsolate planter. “You forget our scalps! The Indians value them more than anything else—especially the young braves, as these appear to be.”
“There’s reason in that, I know,” answers the overseer. “But I’ve heard that scalps don’t count, if taken from the heads of prisoners; and they’ve made us that.”
“It won’t make much difference to such as them,” pursues the apprehensive planter. “Look at them! Three-fourths of them drunk, and likely at any minute to take the notion into their heads to scalp us, if only for a frolic! I feel frightened every time they turn their eyes this way.”
Of the six men, there are four more frightened when the carousing savages turn their eyes in another direction—towards the group of white women. One of these is a widow, made so that same morning, her husband at the time lying scalped upon the prairie—his scalp of luxuriant black curls hanging before her face, upon the bloody blade of a lance!
Three others have husbands among the men—the fourth a brother!
The men regarding them, and thinking of what may be their fate, relapse into silence, as if having suddenly bet speech. It is the speechlessness of despair.
