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. He had lingered on the
spot with no other purpose than to get possession of that ghastly
relic. Since losing his own scalp the subject of crownlocks had grown
upon his mind until its fascination was irresistible. He studied the
hair of every person he saw, as a physiognomist studies faces. He held
the gruesome thing up before him, scrutinizing it with the expression
of a connoisseur who has discovered, on a grimy canvas, the signature
of an old master.

"Sac' bleu!" he presently broke forth. "Well I'll be--Look'ee yer,
George Clark! Come yer an' look. Ye've been sold ag'in. Take a squint,
ef ye please!"

Colonel Clark, with his hands crossed behind him, his face thoughtfully
contracted, was walking slowly to and fro a little way off. He turned
about when Oncle Jazon spoke.

"What now, Jazon?"

"A mighty heap right now, that's what; come yer an' let me show ye. Yer
a fine sort o' eejit, now ain't ye!"

The two men walked toward each other and met. Oncle Jazon held up the
scalp with one hand, pointing at it with the index finger of the other.

"This here scalp come off'n Rene de Ronville's head."

"And who is he?"

"Who's he? Ye may well ax thet. He wuz a Frenchman. He wuz a fine young
feller o' this town. He killed a Corp'ral o' Hamilton's an' tuck ter
the woods a month or two ago. Hamilton offered a lot o' money for 'im
or 'is scalp, an' Long-Hair went in fer gittin' it. Now ye knows the
whole racket. An' ye lets that Injun go. An' thet same Injun he mighty
nigh kicked my ribs inter my stomach!"

Oncle Jazon's feelings were visible and audible; but Clark could not
resent the contempt of the old man's looks and words. He felt that he
deserved far more than he was receiving. Nor was Oncle Jazon wrong.
Rene de Ronville never came back to little Adrienne Bourcier, although,
being kept entirely ignorant of her lover's fate, she waited and
dreamed and hoped throughout more than two years, after which there is
no further record of her life.

Clark, Beverley and Oncle Jazon consulted together and agreed among
themselves that they would hold profoundly secret the story of the
scalp. To have made it public would have exasperated the creoles and
set them violently against Clark, a thing heavy with disa