The moment was ripe for the finishing stroke.

They say it is genius that avails itself of opportunity.
Beverley knew the fight was won when he saw what followed.

Alice suddenly left Long-Hair and ran to Colonel Clark, who felt her warm, strong arms loop round him for a single point of time never to be effaced from his memory; then he saw her kneeling at his feet, her hands upstretched, her face a glorious prayer, while she pleaded the Indian's cause and won it.
Doubtless, while we all rather feel that Clark was weak to be thus swayed by a girl, we cannot quite blame him.

Alice's flag was over him; he had heard her history from Beverley's cunning lips; he actually believed that Hamilton was the real culprit, and besides he felt not a little nauseated with executing Indians.

A good excuse to have an end of it all did not go begging.
But Long-Hair was barely gone over the horizon from the fort, as free and as villainous a savage as ever trod the earth, when a discovery made by Oncle Jazon caused Clark to hate himself for what he had done.
The old scout picked up the scalp, which Long-Hair had flung at Hamilton, and examined it with odious curiosity.