"When did Sir William—die?" I muttered, painfully.
Mr. Duncan looked at me with tears in his eyes.
"On Monday, the 11th of July."
"Tell me—all," I motioned, with quivering lips.
"It is history," he said, simply. "I will tell you what I heard and what I witnessed.
"On the 1st of July we received news of the murder of Bald Eagle, a friendly Delaware chief. Rumour had it that one of my Lord Dunmore's agents had slain the old man, but that, of course, is preposterous. It is hard to sift truth out of rumours. Why, the wildest statements were openly made in some taverns that young Walter Butler had murdered the old man. What reason could Walter Butler have to slay a friendly chief in Pennsylvania?"
"Go on," I said, grimly.
"Well, then, this murder was committed while the poor old man was sitting in his canoe on one of the streams near Fort Pitt. After tearing the scalp from the old man the murderer set him afloat in his canoe. The ghastly progress of the dead was seen by Indians and whites, and the news, following the report of the outrage on Logan by that creature Daniel Greathouse, roused the Six Nations to fury.
"You know that even after the Logan outrage Sir William had held back the warriors of the Long House; but this fresh crime drove them frantic. They might still have held off had not Bald Eagle been scalped, but you know, Mr. Cardigan, that the Six Nations always regard the scalping of a murdered person as a national act, not an individual one, and always accept it as a declaration of war."
"I know," I said.