“They were enemies,” said the girl simply.
“But they had not come out to disturb the red men.”
“Why were they here?”
“To find and take prisoner that villain yonder!” exclaimed Buffalo Bill, scowling at Boyd Bennett in his war-paint and feathers. “That man who is neither white nor red, but a squaw-man! He had committed crimes against the white man’s law and should be punished by that law.”
“My father heard that the palefaces were coming to seize him.”
“Another lie of that renegade!” exclaimed the scout. “And while I mourned over the body of this young man, the villain came upon me, returning, as he declares, to tear the scalp from the head of the white chief whom he was not brave enough himself to kill!”
The girl seemed to understand. She glanced from the body of Danforth to the rage-inflamed face of Boyd Bennett.
“Is it from this dead white chief’s head the Killer would take the scalp?” she asked haughtily.
“Aye; and I will have it!” cried Bennett.
“Did the young paleface fall by thy hand, Death Killer?” demanded the maiden, with all the dignity of a judge.