A pulse pounded in his brain. It did not matter that he was fighting in the dark; fury blinded him anyway. He forgot everything but the knife in his hand and the soft, bloody body under him. He screamed with rage and triumph, drowning out the agonized shrieks of his enemy. After a while, no more cries. The body under him did not move. Raoul lay on top of the Indian, panting. He began to think again. Carefully he slid his hand over the Indian's chest, the buckskin shirt slippery with warm blood. No heartbeat, no lifting of lungs. _By God, I did it, I killed him!_ He felt as if rockets were going off in his head, and he laughed aloud. He'd fought for his mine and spilled his enemy's blood to make it his own. _No goddamned Indian is ever going to steal what belongs to me._ He climbed to his feet. His knees were shaking violently under him. His head ached so badly he felt as if his eyes were being pushed out of his skull. He realized that in the fight he'd completely lost control of himself. He'd become a wild thing, a creature without a mind. It had happened to him several times before, in fights that had ended with his killing a man. Thoughts of triumph that he had killed his enemy, of terror at the realization that this fight could have gone the other way, chased each other around in his brain, but he felt even more alive and happier than he had last night with Clarissa. Sudden light dazzled him. An arrow of fear shot through him. More Indians? "Raoul!" It was Eli Greenglove's voice. His eyes adjusted, and he could see Eli, Hodge Hode and Levi Pope standing at the entrance to the side tunnel. They looked at the body at his feet and the bloody knife in his hand, and then up at him and their eyes were wide and their lips parted. _Those looks are worth as much to me as this whole mine._ "You really chopped him into mincemeat," Eli said. "I'll have to get me one of them Arkansas toothpicks." "Get the other two bodies in here," Raoul said, making an effort to keep his voice steady. "We'll find some place to bury them." "Better search the whole mine, make sure there's no more redskins," said Eli. Raoul agreed, but he felt certain this one he'd killed was the only one in the mine. He looked down at the dead face. The Indian wasn't much more than fifteen or sixteen years old. Good, he thought. Hadn't had long enough to do much harm. But why, Raoul wondered, had this young buck thrown his life away attacking him near the entrance to the mine? He'd have had more of a chance of escaping if he'd hidden deeper. Maybe he'd figured there was at least a little light to see and fight by near the entrance. If he'd gotten Raoul, then somehow managed to get away, he'd probably have claimed the right to wear a brave's feather. The thought of himself lying dead in the dark and his scalp hanging on a pole in front of a lodge down at Saukenuk made Raoul shudder. But it was Raoul who'd won his feather. No Indian would ever kill Raoul de Marion.