Then the cave resounded with wild yells, and the parties closed in the final combat.
The battle raged for many minutes, but the hunted ones fought with a fury that had never nerved their arms before, and, at last, they stood over the victorious ground.
Rigid in death lay Mossuit, and Silver Rifle bent tenderly over him.
“He saved my life once,” she said, pushing aside the scalp-lock that shaded the stony face. “Peace to his ashes.”
A wounded savage told the victors that Mossuit had overcome Wildcat, and, with a few of his braves, had trailed them to the cave. The Indian whom Ahdeek slew when returning with the “talking-papers,” was Mossuit’s spy, and after waiting beyond patience for his return, the chief and his warriors sought the foe themselves.
“Our last battle has been fought,” said Dorsey Webb. “How I wish Cromer could share this hour with us.”
But such wishes were vain ones, for Doc Cromer had taken his last scalp, and peacefully slept in the top of a tree.
Luther Knight, Silver Rifle’s father, before confiding the ring to Ahdeek, told him who he was, and made him swear that after three years of vengeance he would seek out his daughter and surrender to her the talking bauble. And Ahdeek had confided the maps to Snowbeard.
It had passed through its last adventure. It had proved fatal to more than one person—indeed, it seemed death to possess it.
Dohma, waking from his trance in the grove in Silver Rifle’s cave, allured by the glitter of its diamond, stole it from the shelf whereon Ahdeek had placed it until he could find the Girl Trailer, and carried it to the spot where he was choked to death, by the ill-fated trader.