At least, it was the head of Gogoomy--the dark object they had seen hanging in the smoke.

It was fresh--the smoke-curing had just begun--and, save for the closed eyes, all the sullen handsomeness and animal virility of the boy, as Joan had known it, was still to be seen in the monstrous thing that twisted and dangled in the eddying smoke.
Nor was Joan's horror lessened by the conduct of the Poonga-Poonga boys.
On the instant they recognized the head, and on the instant rose their wild hearty laughter as they explained to one another in shrill falsetto voices.

Gogoomy's end was a joke.

He had been foiled in his attempt to escape.

He had played the game and lost.