17/32 It had been left in his belt by Clark's order, as the best justification of his doom. "I jes' hankers to chop a hole inter it. An' besides I want 'is scelp to hang up wi' mine an' that'n o' the Injun what scelped me. He kicked me in the ribs, the stinkin' varmint." Beverley pleaded eloquently and well, but even the genial Major Helm laughed at his sentiment of gratitude to a savage who at best but relented at the last moment, for Alice's sake, and concluded not to sell him to Hamilton. It is due to the British commander to record here that he most positively and with what appeared to be high sincerity, denied the charge of having offered rewards for the taking of human scalps. |