It was a sickening disappointment. He quit, breathless, and they seized him, put a rope around his neck, this time, and led him to the town.
The village was Pickaway or Piqua, just south of present Springfield in west central Ohio, on the road to Wakatomica. They tied him to a post in front of the council-house here, and held another debate. After that the village and its visitors danced around him and threatened him and scolded him, until late at night. Simon really did not care. He had done his best, they might do their worst.
In the morning he was taken on up to Wakatomica. It was a larger town. On this trip he had been closely watched; and here he was punished by the gauntlet in earnest. It about finished him. Then they painted him black, the death color. Half clothed, battered and spent, he was sitting upon the dirt floor of the bark council-house, while the Shawnees squatted in a circle and discussed the next event (which probably was to be the burning at the stake), when a new party entered the doorway.
They were three white men in Indian garb, a white woman and seven children as prisoners, and one Indian bearing a bunch of seven fresh scalps!
The woman's name proved to be Mrs. Mark Kennedy. A pitiable object she was, too. Simon recognized the three white men: Simon Girty himself (his scout-partner at Fort Pitt), James Girty, a brother, and John Ward--all squaw-men who were aiding the Shawnees against the Americans.
None of them appeared to know him; and before they spoke to him he was put outside, while the council heard their report and decided what to do with the women and children.
Surely, Simon Butler-Kenton realized that he was in a very nest of trouble. The council-talk continued for a long, long time. It was late in the afternoon before he was hauled inside again, to hear his fate pronounced. He had given up hope. He could expect mercy from the Girtys least of all. They had deserted the American service in a huff, and were noted as the bitterest enemies of everything and everybody connected with it. Their hearts were hot and red.
He was greeted with a general, savage scowl. Simon Girty pointed to a dirty blanket spread upon the floor.
Simon the victim tottered a moment; the insulting tone angered him. Girty grabbed him by the shoulder and forced him down.