In which my Friend becomes my Foe
In the centre of the wigwam the customary fire burned clear and bright,
showing the white mats, the dressed skins, the implements of war hanging
upon the bark walls,--all the usual furniture of an Indian
dwelling,--and showing also Nantauquas standing against the stripped
trunk of a pine that pierced the wigwam from floor to roof. The fire was
between us. He stood so rigid, at his full height, with folded arms and
head held high, and his features were so blank and still, so forced and
frozen, as it were, into composure, that, with the red light beating
upon him and the thin smoke curling above his head, he had the look of a
warrior tied to the stake.
"Nantauquas!" I exclaimed, and striding past the fire would have touched
him but that with a slight and authoritative motion of the hand he kept
me back. Otherwise there was no change in his position or in the dead
calm of his face.
The Indian maid had dropped the mat at the entrance, and if she waited,
waited without in the darkness. Diccon, now staring at the young chief,
now eyeing the weapons upon the wall with all a lover's passion, kept
near the doorway. Through the thickness of the bark and woven twigs the
wild cries and singing came to us somewhat faintly; beneath that distant
noise could be heard the wind in the trees and the soft fall of the
burning pine.
"Well!" I asked at last. "What is the matter, my friend?"
For a full minute he made no answer, and when he did speak his voice
matched his face.
"_My friend_," he said, "I am going to show myself a friend indeed to
the English, to the strangers who were not content with their own
hunting grounds beyond the great salt water. When I have done this, I do
not know that Captain Percy will call me 'friend' again."
"You were wont to speak plainly, Nantauquas," I answered him. "I am not
fond of riddles."
Again he waited, as though he found speech difficult. I stared at him in
amazement, he was so changed in so short a time.
He spoke at last: "When the dance is over, and the fires are low, and
the sunrise is at hand, then will Opechancanough come to you to bid you
farewell. He will give you the pearls that he wears about his neck for a
present to the Governor, and a bracelet for yourself. Also he will give
you three men for a guard through the forest. He has messages of love to
send the white men, and he would send them by you who were his enemy and
his captive. So all the white men shall believe in his love."
"Well," I said dryly as he paused. "I will take his messages. What
next?"
"Those are the words of Opechancanough. Now listen to the words of
Nantauquas, the son of Wahunsonacock, a war chief of the Powhatans.
There are two sharp knives there, hanging beneath the bow and the quiver
and the shield. Take them and hide them."
The words were scarcely out of his mouth before Diccon had the two keen
English blades. I took the one he offered me, and hid it in my doublet.
"So we go armed, Nantauquas," I said. "Love and peace and goodwill
consort not with such toys."
"You may want them," he went on, with no change in his low, measured
tones. "If you see aught in the forest that you should not see, if they
think you know more than you are meant to know, then those three, who
have knives and tomahawks, are to kill you, whom they believe unarmed."
"See aught that we should not see, know more than we are meant to know?"
I said. "To the point, friend."
"They will go slowly, too, through the forest to Jamestown, stopping to
eat and to sleep. For them there is no need to run like the stag with
the hunter behind him."
"Then we should make for Jamestown as for life," I said, "not sleeping
or eating or making pause?"
"Yea," he replied, "if you would not die, you and all your people."
In the silence of the hut the fire crackled, and the branches of the
trees outside, bent by the wind, made a grating sound against the bark
roof.
"How die?" I asked at last. "Speak out!"
"Die by the arrow and the tomahawk," he answered,--"yea, and by the guns
you have given the red men. To-morrow's sun, and the next, and the
next,--three suns,--and the tribes will fall upon the English. At the
same hour, when the men are in the fields and the women and children are
in the houses, they will strike,--Kecoughtans, Paspaheghs,
Chickahominies, Pamunkeys, Arrowhatocks, Chesapeakes, Nansemonds,
Accomacs,--as one man will they strike; and from where the Powhatan
falls over the rocks to the salt water beyond Accomac, there will not be
one white man left alive."
He ceased to speak, and for a minute the fire made the only sound in the
hut. Then, "All die?" I asked dully. "There are three thousand
Englishmen in Virginia."
"They are scattered and unwarned. The fighting men of the villages of
the Powhatan and the Pamunkey and the great bay are many, and they have
sharpened their hatchets and filled their quivers with arrows."
"Scattered," I said, "strewn broadcast up and down the river,--here a
lonely house, there a cluster of two or three; they at Jamestown and
Henricus off guard,--the men in the fields or at the wharves, the women
and the children busy within doors, all unwarned--O my God!"
Diccon strode over from the doorway to the fire.
"We'd best be going, I reckon, sir," he cried. "Or you wait until
morning; then there'll be two chances. Now that I've a knife, I'm
thinking I can give account of one of them damned sentries, at least.
Once clear of them----"
I shook my head, and the Indian too made a gesture of dissent. "You
would only be the first to die."
I leaned against the side of the hut, for my heart beat like a
frightened woman's. "Three days," I exclaimed. "If we go with all our
speed, we shall be in time. When did you learn this thing?"
"While you watched the dance," he answered, "Opechancanough and I sat
within his lodge in the darkness. His heart was moved, and he talked to
me of his own youth in a strange country, south of the sunset, where he
and his people dwelt in stone houses and worshipped a great and fierce
god, giving him blood to drink and flesh to eat. To that country, too,
white men had come in ships. Then he spoke to me of Powhatan, my
father,--of how wise he was and how great a chief before the English
came, and how the English made him kneel in sign that he held his lands
from their King, and how he hated them; and then he told me that the
tribes had called me 'woman,' 'lover no longer of the warpath and the
scalp dance,' but that he, who had no son, loved me as his son, knowing
my heart to be Indian still; and then I heard what I have told you."
"How long had this been planned?"
"For many moons. I have been a child, fooled and turned aside from the
trail; not wise enough to see it beneath the flowers, through the smoke
of the peace pipes."
"Why does Opechancanough send us back to the settlements?" I demanded.
"Their faith in him needs no strengthening."
"It is his fancy. Every hunter and trader and learner of our tongues,
living in the villages or straying in the woods, has been sent back to
Jamestown or to his hundred with presents and with words that are
sweeter than honey. He has told the three who go with you the hour in
which you are to reach Jamestown; he would have you as singing birds,
telling lying tales to the Governor, with scarce the smoking of a pipe
between those words of peace and the war whoop. But if those who go with
you see reason to misdoubt you, they will kill you in the forest."
His voice fell, and he stood in silence, straight as an arrow, against
the post, the firelight playing over his dark limbs and sternly quiet
face. Outside, the night wind, rising, began to howl through the naked
branches, and a louder burst of yells came to us from the roisterers in
the distance. The mat before the doorway shook, and a slim brown hand,
slipped between the wood and the woven grass, beckoned to us.
"Why did you come?" demanded the Indian. "Long ago, when there were none
but dark men from the Chesapeake to the hunting grounds beneath the
sunset, we were happy. Why did you leave your own land, in the strange
black ships with sails like the piled-up clouds of summer? Was it not a
good land? Were not your forests broad and green, your fields fruitful,
your rivers deep and filled with fish? And the towns I have heard
of--were they not fair? You are brave men: had you no enemies there, and
no warpaths? It was your home: a man should love the good earth over
which he hunts, upon which stands his village. This is the red man's
land. He wishes his hunting grounds, his maize fields, and his rivers
for himself, his women and children. He has no ships in which to go to
another country. When you first came, we thought you were gods; but you
have not done like the great white God who, you say, loves you so. You
are wiser and stronger than we, but your strength and wisdom help us
not: they press us down from men to children; they are weights upon the
head and shoulders of a babe to keep him under stature. Ill gifts have
you brought us, evil have you wrought us----"
"Not to you, Nantauquas!" I cried, stung into speech.
He turned his eyes upon me. "Nantauquas is the war chief of his tribe.
Opechancanough is his king, and he lies upon his bed in his lodge and
says within himself: 'My war chief, the Panther, the son of
Wahunsonacock, who was chief of all the Powhatans, sits now within his
wigwam, sharpening flints for his arrows, making his tomahawk bright and
keen, thinking of a day three suns hence, when the tribes will shake off
for ever the hand upon their shoulder,--the hand so heavy and white that
strives always to bend them to the earth and keep them there.' Tell me,
you Englishman who have led in war, another name for Nantauquas, and ask
no more what evil you have done him."
"I will not call you 'traitor,' Nantauquas," I said, after a pause.
"There is a difference. You are not the first child of Powhatan who has
loved and shielded the white men."
"She was a woman, a child," he answered. "Out of pity she saved your
lives, not knowing that it was to the hurt of her people. Then you were
few and weak, and could not take your revenge. Now, if you die not, you
will drink deep of vengeance,--so deep that your lips may never leave
the cup. More ships will come, and more; you will grow ever stronger.
There may come a moon when the deep forests and the shining rivers know
us, to whom Kiwassa gave them, no more." He paused, with unmoved face,
and eyes that seemed to pierce the wall and look out into unfathomable
distances. "Go!" he said at last. "If you die not in the woods, if you
see again the man whom I called my brother and teacher, tell him ...
tell him _nothing_! Go!"
"Come with us," urged Diccon gruffly. "We English will make a place for
you among us----" and got no further, for I turned upon him with a stern
command for silence.
"I ask of you no such thing, Nantauquas," I said. "Come against us, if
you will. Nobly warned, fair upon our guard, we will meet you as
knightly foe should be met."
He stood for a minute, the quick change that had come into his face at
Diccon's blundering words gone, and his features sternly impassive
again; then, very slowly, he raised his arm from his side and held out
his hand. His eyes met mine in sombre inquiry, half eager, half proudly
doubtful.
I went to him at once, and took his hand in mine. No word was spoken.
Presently he withdrew his hand from my clasp, and, putting his finger to
his lips, whistled low to the Indian girl. She drew aside the hanging
mats, and we passed out, Diccon and I, leaving him standing as we had
found him, upright against the post, in the red firelight.
Should we ever go through the woods, pass through that gathering storm,
reach Jamestown, warn them there of the death that was rushing upon
them? Should we ever leave that hated village? Would the morning ever
come? When we reached our hut, unseen, and sat down just within the
doorway to watch for the dawn, it seemed as though the stars would never
pale. Again and again the leaping Indians between us and the fire fed
the tall flame; if one figure fell in the wild dancing, another took its
place; the yelling never ceased, nor the beating of the drums.
It was an alarum that was sounding, and there were only two to hear;
miles away beneath the mute stars English men and women lay asleep, with
the hour thundering at their gates, and there was none to cry, "Awake!"
When would the dawn come, when should we be gone? I could have cried out
in that agony of waiting, with the leagues on leagues to be travelled,
and the time so short! If we never reached those sleepers---- I saw the
dark warriors gathering, tribe on tribe, war party on war party, thick
crowding shadows of death, slipping though the silent forest ... and
the clearings we had made and the houses we had built ... the goodly
Englishmen, Kent and Thorpe and Yeardley, Maddison, Wynne, Hamor, the
men who had striven to win and hold this land so fatal and so fair, West
and Rolfe and Jeremy Sparrow ... the children about the doorsteps, the
women ... one woman....
It came to an end, as all things earthly will. The flames of the great
bonfire sank lower and lower, and as they sank the gray light faltered
into being, grew, and strengthened. At last the dancers were still, the
women scattered, the priests with their hideous Okee gone. The wailing
of the pipes died away, the drums ceased to beat, and the village lay in
the keen wind and the pale light, inert and quiet with the stillness of
exhaustion.
The pause and hush did not last. When the ruffled pools amid the marshes
were rosy beneath the sunrise, the women brought us food, and the
warriors and old men gathered about us. They sat upon mats or billets of
wood, and I offered them bread and meat, and told them they must come to
Jamestown to taste of the white man's cookery.
Scarcely was the meal over when Opechancanough issued from his lodge,
with his picked men behind him, and, coming slowly up to us, took his
seat upon the white mat that was spread for him. For a few minutes he
sat in a silence that neither we nor his people cared to break. Only the
wind sang in the brown branches, and from some forest brake came a
stag's hoarse cry. As he sat in the sunshine he glistened all over,
like an Ethiop besprent with silver; for his dark limbs and mighty chest
had been oiled, and then powdered with antimony. Through his scalp lock
was stuck an eagle's feather; across his face, from temple to chin, was
a bar of red paint; the eyes above were very bright and watchful, but we
upon whom that scrutiny was bent were as little wont as he to let our
faces tell our minds.
One of his young men brought a great pipe, carved and painted, stem and
bowl; an old man filled it with tobacco, and a warrior lit it and bore
it to the Emperor. He put it to his lips and smoked in silence, while
the sun climbed higher and higher, and the golden minutes that were more
precious than heart's blood went by, at once too slow, too swift.
At last, his part in the solemn mockery played, he held out the pipe to
me. "The sky will fall, and the rivers run dry, and the birds cease to
sing," he said, "before the smoke of the calumet fades from the land."
I took the symbol of peace, and smoked it as silently and soberly--ay,
and as slowly--as he had done before me, then laid it leisurely aside
and held out my hand. "My eyes have been holden," I told him, "but now I
see plainly the deep graves of the hatchets and the drifting of the
peace smoke through the forest. Let Opechancanough come to Jamestown to
smoke of the Englishman's _uppowoc_, and to receive rich presents,--a
red robe like his brother Powhatan's, and a cup from which he shall
drink, he and all his people."
He laid his dark fingers in mine for an instant, withdrew them, and,
rising to his feet, motioned to three Indians who stood out from the
throng of warriors. "These are Captain Percy's guides and friends," he
announced. "The sun is high; it is time that he was gone. Here are
presents for him and for my brother the Governor." As he spoke, he took
from his neck the rope of pearls and from his arm a copper bracelet, and
laid both upon my palm.
I thrust the pearls within my doublet, and slipped the bracelet upon my
wrist. "Thanks, Opechancanough," I said briefly. "When we meet again, I
shall not greet you with empty thanks."
By this all the folk of the village had gathered around us; and now the
drums beat again, and the maidens raised a wild and plaintive song of
farewell. At a sign from the werowance men and women formed a rude
procession, and followed us, who were to go upon a journey, to the edge
of the village where the marsh began. Only the dark Emperor and the old
men stayed behind, sitting and standing in the sunshine, with the peace
pipe lying on the grass at their feet, and the wind moving the branches
overhead. I looked back and saw them thus, and wondered idly how many
minutes they would wait before putting on the black paint. Of Nantauquas
we had seen nothing. Either he had gone to the forest, or upon some
pretence he kept within his lodge.
We bade farewell to the noisy throng who had brought us upon our way,
and went down to the river, where we found a canoe and rowers, crossed
the stream, and, bidding the rowers good-bye, entered the forest. It was
Wednesday morning, and the sun was two hours high. Three suns,
Nantauquas had said: on Friday, then, the blow would fall. Three days!
Once at Jamestown, it would take three days to warn each lonely
scattered settlement, to put the colony into any posture of defence.
What of the leagues of danger-haunted forest to be traversed before even
a single soul of the three thousand could be warned?
As for the three Indians,--who had their orders to go slowly, who at any
suspicious haste or question or anxiety on our part were to kill us whom
they deemed unarmed,--when they left their village that morning, they
left it for ever. There were times when Diccon and I had no need of
speech, but knew each other's mind without; so now, though no word had
been spoken, we were agreed to set upon and slay our guides the first
occasion that offered.