Adventure Magazine Cover — page 118: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

I1t2 “Ts the trail of those men being followed?”’ harshly demanded Pontiac. ‘Four of my best scouts are trying to find the signs. The signs are few and faint and look to be old. Yet the scalps were not there when the rit. went toward the Cuya- hoga. Very soon it will be too dark in the woods to look for signs. My men will sleep in the woods and look with sharp eyes when the. sun comes back,” replied the Wolf. Pontiac took the scalps .and examined them closely. Sleeping Wolf had reasoned well. Some one had dropped them very recently. The chief and the Wolf exchanged glances. Each was thinking the same thought, and each knew it was better to leave it unsaid: The scalps had been mounted by a red man. Some white men on the border affected the Indian mode of dress and some adopted the red men’s cruel ways of making war. But neither Pontiac nor the Wolf believed that any white man, while in proximity to a large camp of warri- ors, would take the time to dress and paint and mount the trophies. The chief swept his gaze over the silent assemblage and wondered if any of his young men in the Cuyahoga party had given way toa terrible blood lust and had killed Tamaque’s men. It was very possible that the killings were so many cold-blooded murders. If any of the Ottawas were guilty then one of them was among the scouts sent out by the Wolf, and either had lost the scalps on returning from the scout, or had become imgnicncd and had thrown them away. “A red man dressed those scalps,” up Ballou. “White. men stretch scalps and paint them,” said Pontiac. spoke “They have been in the smoke,” said Ballou. ‘“‘White men make smokes,” retorted Pontiac. ‘“How many of the scouts were among the warriors going with the four Leni-lenape to meet Tamaque?”’ persisted Ballou. _ This was the question Pontiac had in- tended to put to the Wolf when they were alone. “None of the, scouts were among the Cuyahoga warriors,” replied the chief. ‘“‘Tamaque will look at the scalps very close,”’ said Ballou. “He will want to know what Indians killed his warriors.”’ Inwardly the chief raged. He was being placed in a humiliating position. He was Adventure answering questions instead of putting them. The insolence of the Knife was in- tolerable. Yet his face remained impassive until he had bowed his head over the scalps for a moment, when his eyes flashed, and shaking the four hoops he announced: “These scalps were not taken from the Leni-lenape. They are too old. They have been in the smoke a long time. They were taken and smoked and painted before Pon- tiac brought his warriors to Sandusky.” He gave a hoop to Sleeping Wolf, one to Ninivois, and another to Take, and waited for their opinion. Each man studied a scalp slowly and carefully. Then, commencing with Ninivois, each gave the same response: The scalp$ were cured before Pontiac’s camp was pitched at the bay. Ballou smiled grimly at this subterfuge, yet did not object to it. Fearing Tamaque’s displea- sure Pontiac was seeking to establish an alibi for his followers. After the hoops had been handed back Pontiac gave them to Sleepmg Wolf and said: ‘“‘That hair never grew on the heads of Tamaque’s men. Let them be fed to the big fire.” As the crowd slowly moved to the central fire Take of the Hurons spoke up and said— “‘The white prisoner can tell us the truth.” “The white man belongs to the Trade Knife. It is for him to make the man talk if he would open Tamaque’s eyes,” haughtily retorted Pontiac. Then in a lower tone and with his gaze directed toward Rickards he added, “But there is another man, one who talks with the manitos. Some time he will tell.”’ Halting before the fire, and waiting until closely hemmed in by the Wyandotte and the northern Indians, Pontiac loudly an- nounced: k “We burn this hair because it is old hair. So long as we thought it might come from the heads of the four dead men we planned to keep it to show to Tamaque. But now we know it was smoked and painted before the Leni-lenape men, killed near Cuyahoga, left Sandusky with my children to look for Tamaque at Presqu’ Isle. Tamaque will not care to look at this hair, but he will ask for the men who killed his.men. Let many scouts take to the woods after the next sleep and look for signs of white men.”’ One by one Black Beaver’s trophies were tossed into the flames under the big kettle. COnniclboooks C@