The chieftain was not in the humor to carry out his plans of punishment at present. He pressed his hand to his head, but quickly removed it, and saw it covered with blood.
“Look!” he cried, putting forth the gory member. “Mouseh’s blood is flowing. Come, Modocs, swear that for every drop that falls from his head, a blue-coat shall die!”
Then the cave resounded with shouts of vengeance; and stepping toward the wall, with his own blood the murderer of Canby traced the outlines of a gallows on the gray stone.
Then he turned to his braves, but spoke not.
They read the significance of the horrid design, and swore, for the hundredth time, to die with rifles in their hands.
Some kept their oaths; but how Jack and others kept theirs, the reader of the Modoc war has seen.
CHAPTER XIII.
THE TRAITOR’S FLIGHT.
“Pale-faces stay here till Harry see if path clear. Jack’s spies may be near.”
The speaker was the individual known as New York Harry, who had surrendered to the troops on the morning of Kit South’s return to camp, and he addressed the three men whom he had led to the lava-beds, for the purpose, as he averred, to surprise a small detachment of Modocs.