IN COUNCIL
The next morning showed the face of War without her mask. The Indians
sat in open council, and the tom-toms sounded from lodge to lodge. In
the Huron camp there were council rings of the women; it was a tribal
crisis and was met by a frenzy of speech-making. As a rival interest
Singing Arrow's wedding made little stir.
I went to the wedding and saw Pierre the savage transformed into Pierre
the citizen, the yoke-bearer. I feared the transformation was not
final. Yet I could never read my giant. There were unexpected ridges
of principle in the general slough of his makeup and perhaps the Indian
girl was resting on one of them.
The woman came to the wedding, Starling with her. I bowed to them
both, but I would do no more, for the Indians were watching. The woman
looked pale and grave. I had seen her angry and I had seen her
despairing, but I had never before seen her dispirited. She looked so
now.
And then came the general council with Cadillac in the chair. It was
held in a barrack room and the tribes had forty chiefs in waiting.
There were Ottawas, Hurons, and the party of Senecas. Feathered and
painted, they were as expressionless as the stone calumets in their
hands; by contrast, our French faces were childishly open and
expressive.
Cadillac looked them over and began his speech. Commonly his tongue
ran trippingly, but with the opening words his speech halted. I knew
he was moved. With all his volubility the man took responsibility
heavily, and these strange bronze men with their cruel eyes and
impassive faces were his wards. He spoke in French, and I translated
first to the Hurons, then to the Ottawas. He called the tribes to aid
him in brightening the covenant chain, and his rhetoric mounted with
his theme till I felt my blood heat with admiration for him. He
concluded with a plea for loyalty, and he gave each nation a belt to
bind his words.
And then the chiefs rose in reply. The Hurons spoke first, and though
they hedged their meaning by look and word I could feel the sentiment
swaying toward our side. They brought up many minor points and gave
belts in confirmation. Kondiaronk's clan were openly friendly, openly
touched by Cadillac's speech, and when one of the Baron's band took the
cue and gave a wampum necklace, "to deter the French brothers from
unkind thoughts," I felt that the worst of the day was over, and
welcomed the Ottawa speakers with a relaxation of the tension that had
held me, for I had been upon the rack. Mind and ear had been taxed to
miss no word or intonation, for a slighted syllable might lose our
cause. The speeches had droned like flies at midday, but all the
verbiage had been heavy with significance. I spoke French, Huron, and
Ottawa in turn, and through it all I listened, listened for the opening
of the door.
For Cadillac had told me that Madame de Montlivet had asked if she
might come in for a moment and listen to the council, and he had
referred the matter to me. It had seemed a strange request, but I
could see no reason for refusing it. The woman had seen Indians in
camp and field; it was perhaps no wonder that she wished to see the
machinery of their politics. It was agreed that Dubisson should bring
her in for a short time.
Yet when she did come in I could not look at her. Longuant had just
finished speaking, and I had all my mind could handle to do him justice
as I wished. He spoke as the moderate leader who desired that his
people leave the hatchet unlifted if they could do so with safety. He
gave a robe stained with red to show that his people remembered the
French who had died for them.
I knew, as I repeated Longuant's speech, that I was doing it well,
helping it out with trick and metaphor. And I also knew, with a shrug
for my childishness, that my wits were working more swiftly than they
had, because the woman was listening. I saw the whole scene with added
vividness and significance because her eyes rested on it, too. Once I
glanced up and looked at her briefly. Day had slipped into dusk, and
the bare, shadow-haunted room was lighted with torches stuck in the
crannies of the log walls. The flaring light lapped her like a waving
garment and showed her daintily erect, silk-clad, elate and resolute, a
flower of a carefully tended civilization. And then my eyes went back
where they belonged, to the lines of warriors robed like senators,
attentive and august, full of wisdom where the woman knew nothing, yet
blank as animals to the treasures of her mind. The contrast thrilled
through me like a violin note. I heard my tongue use imagery that I
did not know was in me. The woman waited till I was through, and I
could feel that she was listening. Then she turned with Dubisson and
they went out of the door.
Longuant was the last of our garrison Indians to speak, and when he
finished it remained to Cadillac to sum up the situation. He picked
out the oldest men from each delegation and stood before them. Yet,
though he spoke to all, it was at Longuant that he looked.
"Listen," he said. "Hast ever seen the moon in the lake when the
evening is clear and the weather calm? It appears in the water, yet
nothing is truer than that it is in the sky. Some among you are very
old; but know, that were you all to return to early youth and take it
into your heads to fish up the moon in the lake, you would more easily
succeed in scooping that planet up in your nets than in effecting what
you are ruminating now. In vain do you fatigue your brains. You
cannot live with the bear and share your food with the wolf. You must
choose. Be assured of this; the English and French cannot be in the
same place without killing one another."
There was more in the same vein. Only one nation could hold the
country for the fur trade. If the French were that nation the Indians
would be protected, their fighting men would be given arms, their
families would be cared for, the great father at Quebec would reward
them as brothers. He gave the Hurons and Ottawas each a war belt to
testify to his intention.
Here was the crisis. But each tribe took the belt and kept it. I
could scarcely forbear glancing at Cadillac. But I dared not be too
elated, for we had yet the Senecas to deal with. Cadillac turned to
them and asked their mission among us. He did it briefly, and I hoped
they would answer with equal bluntness, for I dreaded this part of the
council. All of the Iroquois nations were trained rhetoricians, and I
would need a long ear to catch their verbal quibbles and see where
their sophistry was hiding.
Cannehoot, their oldest chief, spoke for them all. He made proposal
after proposal with belts and tokens to seal them. His speech was
moderate, but his ideas crowded; it was hard to keep them in sequence.
They had come to learn wisdom of us. They gave a belt.
They had come to wipe the war paint from our soldiers' faces. They
gave another belt.
They wished the sun to shine on us. They gave a large marble as red as
the sun.
They wished the rain of heaven to wash away hatred. They gave a chain
of wampum.
And so on and on and on. They gave belts, beavers, trinkets. They had
peace in their mouths and kindness in their hearts. They desired to
tie up the hatchet, to sweep the road between the French and themselves
free from blood. But with that clause they gave no belt. They made no
mention of the English prisoners, and they desired to close their
friendly visit and to go home.
Cadillac looked at them with contempt. He was always too choleric to
hide his mind, and he answered with little pretense at civility. He
gave them permission to go home, and sent a knife by them to their
kindred. It was not for war, he told them, but that they might cut the
veil that hung before their eyes, and see things as they really were.
He left their belts lying on the floor, and dismissed the council. He
motioned to me to follow, and we went at once to his room.
And alone in his room we looked at each other with relief. We had
gained one point, and though the road was long ahead, we could breathe
for a moment. We had not healed the sore, but it was covered,
cauterized. We dropped into chairs and sought our pipes.
But Cadillac's fingers were soon drumming. "It was odd that they did
not demand the English prisoners," he said.
I felt placid enough as regarded that point. "They did not dare. When
do the Senecas leave?"
"To-morrow morning. Oh, Montlivet, it grinds me to let them go!"
I shrugged at his choler. "We will follow," I comforted. "We will
overtake them at La Baye."
"But suppose they leave La Baye. They may break camp at once and push
on. We may miss them."
I smoked, and shook my head. "If they do, we cannot help it. But I
think there is no danger. They will want to halt some time at La Baye,
and try for terms with those tribes. My work there has been
secret,--even Pemaou does not seem to know of it,--and they do not
suspect a coalition. So they feel safe. I think that we shall find
them."
And then we sat for a time in silence. I stared at the future, and saw
a big decision beetling before me. When I dread a moment, I rush to
meet it, which is the behavior of a spoiled boy.
"You will get rid of Starling to-morrow?" I asked.
Cadillac nodded. "Yes. He is best out of the way, and, though I see
nothing to mistrust in the man, I shall feel better if he goes east
while the Senecas go west."
"How will you send him?"
"To Montreal with an escort of Ottawas. From there he can make his own
way."
I looked down. "Madame de Montlivet may wish to go at the same time.
You must arrange for her also if she wishes."
Cadillac shrugged. "You leave the decision with her?"
"Absolutely, monsieur."
Cadillac rapped his knuckles together. "Don't run romanticism into the
ground, Montlivet."
But my inflammable temper did not rise. "A woman certainly has some
right of selection. Starling says that I forced her to marry me. That
is substantially true. What time do you plan to have Starling leave?"
"As early as possible. I shall not tell him tonight. It will take a
little time to get the canoes in readiness."
"Then I shall see Madame de Montlivet in the morning, as early as
possible. I shall let you know her decision at once, monsieur."
"Montlivet, she will need time to consider."
I shook my head. "She has thought the matter out. I think her answer
will be ready." And then we said good-night.