Roughly he tore apart his prisoner's shirt and drove the blunt, white hot iron against his chest.
The iron hissed again. But this time a little thin line of blue smoke curled upward.
Great Bear inhaled a deep breath of heavenly satisfaction as the odour of burning flesh permeated his nostrils.
Jesse steeling himself, glared back at his tormentor. He gave no sign that he sensed the excruciating torture. But the lines of his mouth drew tense and hard.
The redskin replaced the iron in its heating pot and sat gloating over his victim as it burned again to a white heat.
Next he bared the left side of the outlaw and carefully selected his spot with the eyes of an expert, he applied the torture rod, holding it in place with steady, resistless pressure.
The agony that the victim suffered was almost more than human being could endure.
But still the man of iron there at the stake made no outcry, gave no sign, still smiling up at his tormentor. But the eyes were not in sympathy with the smile on the lips. They were cold and steely—they were the eyes of the gun-expert at the moment when he is about to take the life of a human being.
"Great Bear," began Jesse in an even, emotionless voice. "I shall be going away from here pretty soon. You will be dead then. I shall kill you. But before I go I am going to cut out your tongue and feed it to the dogs. Then I shall cut off your other ear and give it to the first drove of hogs that I meet. You'll be up in the Happy Hunting grounds then and you can't help yourself."