AMONGST THE SAVAGES
The moon was waning and the stars disappearing when the movements of
the Indians told us that the journey was to be resumed. All night
those who had not acted as a watch over the party had laid like
statues folded in their blankets, but now they arose as one man and
set about preparations for our departure. With their awakening we,
too, roused ourselves. Food had been given us over night, consisting
of wheaten cakes and dried deer's flesh, accompanied by gourds of
fresh water, and this was again offered to us ere we set out. Mary and
I scarce ate on either occasion, though the water was indeed welcome,
but Mr. Kinchella made a good meal while Buck and his companions ate
heartily, the ex-highwayman contriving as usual to regard all that
occurred as something to be made light of.
"'Tis better than prison fare, anyway," he said to his companions in
the dawn, as they fell to on the meat and bread, "but the devil take
the water! 'Tis cold to the stomach even on so fine a summer morning,
and a tass of Nantz or of Kill-devil from the islands would improve it
marvellously. However, that we must not look for till we get back to
freedom."
"You think, then," Mr. Kinchella asked him, "that to freedom we shall
get back?" The man had proved himself so loyal to us that he was now
admitted to almost familiarity and indeed, it could not be otherwise.
If ever we returned in safety to Pomfret, or to the spot where Pomfret
once stood, these men had my word that they were free; they were,
therefore, no longer our inferiors, while, at the present moment, all
who were prisoners in the hands of the Indians were on a most decided
equality. Yet, let me say it to the honour of all who had been my
bond-servants but a day or two before, none presumed upon their being
so no longer, or treated us with aught but respect.
"I feel sure of it, reverend sir. As I said before, if the chief is
thinking of anything it is not of killing or torturing us; while, if I
had any money, I would bet it all that there would be a pretty scene
when once Roderick is safely back in their encampment."
It seemed, indeed, as though this man had, in his shrewdness,
penetrated the innermost thoughts of the Bear, for ere we had been an
hour on the march he, halting his horse so as to send the advance
party of his warriors on ahead, drew alongside of us and, after a
silence of some minutes, said:
"White people who have dwelt for so long on the lands that once were
ours, know you why your village, which has been spared by us for now
so many moons, has been once more attacked and put to the slaughter by
the braves of my tribe?"
No one answered him for some short space of time, but at last I, to
whom he seemed particularly to address himself, said:
"We have no knowledge of why this should be, seeing that 'tis now
almost two generations since those who were once our forefathers'
friends attacked us. We had hoped that never would they do so again,
since we have kept to our own lands and never sought to do evil to you
or those of your race."
"Never sought to do evil, maiden! Nay, pause. Have 'you not now for
more than fifty moons been dreaming of a raid to be made on us, of
more red men to be slaughtered, more lands to be seized?"
"Never," I replied. "Never. I know all that has been thought of and
every scheme that has been projected in our midst, yet there was never
aught of this. Nay, so little did we dream of such an attack as you
have made on us that, though we went always armed, 'twas more because
of the custom which had grown upon us than for any other reason, and,
if Indians came about we thought 'twas to take our cattle and our
herds more than to massacre us."
"Yet it was told to us that your men were projecting a great war
against us; that even from your other land beyond the deep waters
warriors were being sent forth who should come and slay us all. That
strange implements of war were being devised for our certain
destruction, and that all of us were to be slaughtered and our lands
and wives taken from us."
"Then," I replied, "you were told a base lie."
"Ay," exclaimed Buck from behind, "and I'll bet a guinea I know who
told it."
The chief's eyes fell on him and rested on his face; then he spoke
again, bidding him, since he said he knew who 'twas, to name the
person.
"Name him," said Buck, "name him. Ay, that can I in the first guess.
Why, 'twas that cursed, cringing hound, Roderick St. Amande, who fled
from my pretty mistress's house when her father smote off his ear for
daring to insult her. That's who it was, my noble chief."
"Smote off his ear!" exclaimed Anuza, while in his face there came the
nearest approach to astonishment that I saw there during the time I
was brought into contact with him. "Smote off the ear of the Child of
the Sun. Yet he told us--he--is this the word of truth?"
"If that cursed impostor is the Child of the Sun--the Child of the
Devil, ho, ho!--then 'tis most certainly the truth. Here's my lady who
can tell you 'tis true. She saw it done. And, noble chief, is _that_
the one, that poor, miserable hound, who told you of the attack that
was to be made on you and yours?"
The chief replied not but rode on by our side, his eyes bent on his
horse's mane and he seemingly wrapped in thought. But he spake no more
to us that day, and we knew that he was meditating on how he and all
his tribe had been imposed on by the wretch Roderick. So we journeyed
on until at last we stood at the foot of the mountains, and with,
before us, the town of the Shawnees. 'Twas a strange sight to our
eyes!
All around a vast space sheltered or, at least, surrounded by
countless trees, amongst which were the long-leaved pine, the great
cypress and the greater cedar, with some sweet orange trees as well as
myrtles and magnolias, we saw the Indian stockades, their great
protections from man or beast. For over those pointed poles, topped in
many cases with iron barbs, neither foeman nor fierce animal could
spring or make their way through. Then, within these, there came the
tents or houses of the ordinary fighting men, the latter being little
huts, yet large enough, perhaps, for four or five to repose within. A
circle of chiefs' tents succeeded next to these, the sheafs of poles
gathered together at the top being decorated sometimes with banners,
sometimes with gaudy silken drapery, sometimes, alas! with human heads
from which the hair had been torn. That hair had another destination.
It was to decorate the interior of the tents--to be gloated over by
the savage chiefs within and by their squaws, or wives. In the middle
of all was--regardlessly of the health of the encampment--a tomb of
the chiefs, a horrid erection of wood in which the shrivelled remains
were laid side by side to the number of a dozen, their heads towards
the passers-by, their mummified bodies naked, and before them a wood
fire burning--perhaps to dispel any vapours. Thus they lay in the
exact interior of the camp, each one remaining there through the four
seasons and then being buried in the earth. And to guard over and
preserve them, as the savages thought, was a hideous painted figure of
wood, rudely carved, which they call Kyvash, or the God of the Dead.
And now we were to learn what had been the amount of destruction done
to the homes where we had all dwelt so peacefully and happily
together; we of our party were to learn that which we had so much
longed to know, namely, what had happened to those of our friends and
neighbours who dwelt in and around Pomfret. For in that encampment we
met other prisoners like ourselves who had been brought away by the
detachments of the band who had stormed their houses. We saw, alas!
the best of our men captives in the hands of the savages. Seated on a
log outside a tent, his hands tied cruelly behind his back, I saw
Bertram Pringle, a fair-haired young man who was the leader of all the
diversions of our neighbourhood, and the best dancer as well as
sportsman for miles around. There, too, was Roger Clibourne, one of
our largest estate owners and wealthiest of planters; there was one of
the Byrds of Westover (he being sadly wounded) as well as several
rough backwoodsmen, who must have fought hard ere they surrendered;
and many other owners and white servants were also prisoners. But, I
thanked God, there were no other women but ourselves, and my cousin
was not, as the wretch Roderick had said, amongst them.
"Why, Joice," said Roger, calling to me as I passed by with the
others, "why, my dear"--we had grown up boy and girl together--"this
is, indeed, a sorry sight. Oh! Mr. Kinchella, could you not put a
bullet in their brains or a knife to their throats ere you let Joice
and your sweetheart be captured and brought here."
"Hush! Hush!" I said to him, pausing on my way, as we all did, our
guards making no resistance. "Hush! Indeed, I think we are in no such
great danger. Anuza, the chief, who stormed my house, has found out
that their great medicine man, who was undoubtedly the instigator of
the attack upon us all, is none other than that horrid villain,
Roderick St. Amande."
"Roderick St. Amande!" the others, including the backwoodsmen,
exclaimed, "Roderick St. Amande. Nay, 'tis impossible."
"Indeed, indeed 'tis true. We of our party have all seen him and
spoken with him; nay, heard him gloat over all the horrors of the
attack and threaten us with what awaits us here. But, but--the chief
heard him too, and also heard Mary denounce him, and, I think, he
meditates worse against him than any of us because he hath deceived
them so."
"Is your chief powerful enough to do thus?" Bertram Pringle asked.
"Ours, our captor, is, we have heard, the head of the whole tribe and
the greatest friend of their medicine man. Suppose he believes not
what your conqueror tells him?"
"Then," said Buck, "we will give him some proofs that shall make him
believe. I can do any trick Mr. Roderick St. Amande can, either with
cards, palming, or what not, and if they place faith in him for any of
his hanky-panky, hocus-pocus passes, why, they'll fall down and
worship me! I wasn't the conjurer at many a booth for nothing before I
took to more elevating pursuits."
And now the lads asked us how we had parted from that other one of
whom I thought hourly and only--though they knew it not!--and when I
told them how I had left him wounded and bleeding their sorrow was
great. But they said that, if the Indians did not proceed to any
violence towards us, a rescue must be attempted before long, since
every other hamlet and town would know by now what had befallen us of
Pomfret, and doubtless an expedition would soon set out to seek for
us.
So we passed on to where our guards led us, namely, to a great tent
made of hay and straw, and then we composed ourselves for the night
and, after Mr. Kinchella had said a prayer for our safety in which we
most fervently joined, got what sleep we might. But once during that
night I woke and then screamed aloud, for as I turned my eyes to the
opening of the tent I saw, gazing in, the horrid face of Roderick St.
Amande, and his own eyes gloating over us. But at my scream, and
almost ere the others were aroused, the face was withdrawn, and
nothing more was seen at the opening but the figure of the Indian
sentry outside as he paced to and fro in the moonlight, and nought
heard but the soft fall of his moccasined feet on the earth, or
sometimes the cry of an Indian child or dog.
That the next day was to be one of great importance was easy to see
from the moment it dawned. Towards a belt of pines which grew upon the
rise of the hills there were already proceeding groups of Indians,
some bearing in their hands the skins of animals and blankets dyed
divers colours; banners, too, were being affixed to the trees as
though in preparation for some great feast. We noted, also, that many
of the Indian women and maidens--with, alas! amongst them some girls
and women who were not Indian born, but white women--were finely
dressed as though for a gala. As we ate of the food which our guards
brought us--though three, at least, of our little band had no appetite
for it--the door was darkened by the form of Anuza, and, a moment
later, his great body stood within the tent, while we observed that
he, too, was now arrayed in all the handsome trappings that bespoke
the rank of a great chief. His short-sleeved tunic of dressed
deer-skin was ornamented with the polished claws of his totem, the
Grizzly Bear; on the shield he bore were the same emblems; even his
long black hair, twisted up now like a coronet beneath his plumed
bonnet of feathers, was decorated with one claw set in gold. In his
wampum belt, fringed and tasselled with bright shells, he carried a
long knife and a pair of pistols richly inlaid with silver and
ivory-won, doubtless, in some earlier foray with our race--at his back
hung down a bleached bearskin cloak to which, by a sash or loop, were
suspended his tomahawk and bow. As I gazed on him I understood, if I
had never understood before, what our forefathers meant when sometimes
they spoke of the Indian as a splendid, or a noble, savage.
Behind him, borne upon a litter by two other Indians, came one the
like of whom I had never seen, an old Indian of surely a hundred years
of age; his eyes gone and, in their place, nought but the white balls
to be observed. His head, with still some few sparse hairs left on it,
bent on his breast, his hands were shrivelled like unto those of the
mummies of which I have read, and his body, even on so hot a day as
this, was enveloped in a great bearskin adorned with the gay plumage
of many bright-coloured birds.
As Anuza strode into the tent, or Wigwam, leaving the old man outside
in the sun, he made a grave salutation to us all; but it seemed
directed to me more especially, and then he said:
"Peace be with you all. And, white maiden," he went on, addressing me,
while to my surprise he bent his knee before me, "though death awaits
you and yours to-day, yet it shall not claim you while the Bear is by.
Nor, had I known that which he, my father, has told me, should the
hand of Anuza have been raised against you or your house, or aught
within it." While, as he spoke, I gazed wonderingly at him, not
knowing what his words might mean.