He'll see that he just hit my ear, and that will be the end.
Should he jump up and run for it? No, Greenglove would not miss a second time. Let the Bear spirit dim Greenglove's sharp eyes. Let him be deceived into thinking White Bear dead. There was no other way he could escape.
He waited for the shot that would smash into his brain.
"Right through the skull," Greenglove called out. "Ain't even enough left to scalp him."
Amazement flooded through White Bear. That couldn't be what Greenglove saw. Unless he was blind drunk. Or blinded by the Bear.
Or he doesn't want to kill me.
Hadn't he tried to talk Raoul out of shooting the three of them?
White Bear remembered Greenglove swinging the rifle at him the day of his father's funeral. If Greenglove hadn't knocked him out, Raoul would have shot him.
He was too frightened to try to understand it. He was alive, that was all he could be sure of. Alive for a little while longer.
"He's in the happy hunting ground." Greenglove's voice faded a little as he walked away. "Want us to dig a hole for him?"