I was instantly by his side, and we strained our eyesight in an attempt to count the shifting figures. Pine’s vision was better and more practised than mine.
“They are all thar,” said he, “and they’re driving extry hosses.”
Ten minutes later the cavalcade stopped and the men dismounted wearily. They were, as the old man had said, driving before them a half dozen ponies, which Governor Boggs herded into the corral. Nobody said a word. One or two stretched themselves. Johnny seized the cup and took a long drink. Yank leaned his rifle against the wall. Old man Pine’s keen, fierce eye had been roving over every detail, though he, too, had kept silent.
“Well, Old,” he remarked, “I see you obeyed orders like a good sojer.”
The boy grinned.
“Yes, dad,” said he.
And then I saw what I had not noticed before: that at 240 the belt of each of the tall, silent young backwoodsmen hung one or more wet, heavy, red and black soggy strips. The scalping had been no mere figure of speech! Thank heaven! none of our own people were similarly decorated!
So horrified and revolted was I at this discovery that I hardly roused myself to greet the men. I looked with aversion, and yet with a certain fascination on the serene, clear features of these scalp takers. Yet, since, in the days following, this aversion could not but wear away in face of the simplicity and straightforwardness of the frontiersmen, I had to acknowledge that the atrocious deed was more a product of custom than of natural barbarity.
Old Pine, of course not at all affected, bustled about in the more practical matter of getting coffee and cutting meat; and after a moment I aroused myself to help him. The men lay about on the ground exhausted. They drank the coffee and ate the meat, and so revived, little by little, arrived at the point of narration.
“It’s sure one hell of a ride down there,” remarked McNally with a sigh.