Wacora came from the council chamber, where the warriors had assembled,
and passed over to the house where dwelt his white captive.
This was no unusual thing for him when he deemed himself safe from her
observation. Upon the day in question, however, he had resolved to see
her.
The time had come when active measures were about to be taken by the
United States Government in order to "suppress" (such was the term used)
the Indians in Florida, and although none could know at that moment how
difficult the undertaking would prove, all were alive to the fact that
the work was about to commence in earnest.
Information of this had reached the young Seminole chief; and he saw the
necessity of removing his tribe from their present residence.
Hence the council--hence, also, his visit to Alice Rody.
He had determined to lay the facts fully before her, in order that she
might name the time of return to her own people.
Thus reflecting, he walked on towards the house tenanted by his captive.
On arriving at the place he found she was not there; but some children
playing near told him she had gone into the woods, and pointed in the
direction she had taken.
The young chief hesitated about following her. He was unwilling to
thrust himself into her presence at a time she had, perhaps, devoted to
self communion and repose.
Turning in another direction, he wandered for some time purposelessly,
taking no note of the locality, until he had reached the belt of the
woods which Alice had herself traversed on her road to the old ruin.
Wacora, however, entered it at some distance farther off from the skirts
of the town.
Once under the shadow of the trees he abated his pace, which, up to this
time, had been rapid. Now walking with slow step, and abstracted air,
he finally stopped and leant against a huge live oak, his eyes wandering
afar over the sylvan scene.
"Here," he soliloquised in thought, "here, away from men and their
doings, alone is there peace! How my heart sickens at the thought that
human ambitions and human vanities should so pervert man's highest
mission--peace--turning the world into scenes of strife and bloodshed!
I, an Indian savage, as white men call me, would gladly lay down this
day and for ever the rifle and the knife; would willingly bury the war
hatchet, and abandon this sanguinary contest!
"Could I do so with honour?" he asked, after a pause of reflection.
"No! To the end I must now proceed. I see the end with a prophetic
eye; but I must go on as I've begun, even if my tribe with all our
people should be swept from the earth! Fool that I've been to covet the
leadership of a forlorn hope!"
At the end of this soliloquy he stamped the ground with fury.
Petty dissensions had arisen among the people he deemed worthy of the
highest form of liberty. By this his temper had been chafed--his hopes
suddenly discouraged. He was but partaking of the enthusiast's fate,
finding the real so unlike the ideal. It is the penalty usually paid by
intelligence when it seeks to reform or better the condition of fallen
humanity.
"And she," he continued, in his heart's bitterness, "she can only think
of me as a vain savage; vain of the slight superiority education appears
to give me over others of my race. I might as well aspire to make my
home among the stars as in her bosom. She is just as distant, or as
unlikely to be mine."
In the mood in which the Indian was at that moment, the whole universe
seemed leagued against him.
Bitterly he lamented the fate that had given him grand inspirations,
while denying him their enjoyment.
As he stood beneath the spreading branches of the live oak a double
shadow seemed to have fallen upon him--that of his own thoughts, and the
tree thickly festooned with its mosses. Both were of sombre hue.
He took no heed of the time, and might have stood nursing his bitter
thoughts still longer, but for a sound that suddenly startled him from
his reverie.
It was a shriek that came ringing through the trees as if of one in
great distress.
The voice Wacora heard was a woman's.
Lover-like, he knew it to be that of Alice Rody in peril.
Without hesitating an instant he rushed along the path in the direction
from which it appeared to come.
In that direction lay the stream.
His instinct warned him that the danger was from the water. He
remembered the rain and storm just past. It would be followed by a
freshet. Alice Rody might have been caught by it, and was in danger of
drowning.
He made these reflections while rushing through the underwood, careless
of the thorns that at every step penetrated his skin, covering his
garments with blood.
His demeanour had become suddenly changed. The sombre shadow on his
brow had given place to an air of the wildest excitement. His white
captive, she who had made him a captive, was in some strange peril.
He listened as he ran. The swishing of the branches, as he broke
through them, hindered him from hearing. No sound reached his ears; but
he saw what caused him a strange surprise. It was the form of a man,
who, like himself, was making his way through the thicket, only in a
different direction. Instead of towards the creek the man was going
from it, skulking off as if desirous to shun observation.
For all this Wacora recognised him. He saw it was Maracota.
The young chief did not stay to inquire what the warrior was doing
there, or why he should be retreating from the stream? He did not even
summon the latter to stop. His thoughts were all absorbed by the shriek
he had heard, and the danger it denoted. He felt certain it had come
from the creek, and if it was the cry of one in the water, there was no
time to be lost.
And none was lost--not a moment--for in less than sixty seconds after
hearing it he stood upon the bank of the stream.
As he had anticipated, it was swollen to a flood, its turbid waters
carrying upon their whirling surface trunks and torn branches of trees,
bunches of reeds and grass uprooted by the rush of the current.
He did not stand to gaze idly upon these. The bridge was above him.
The cry had come from there. He saw that it was in ruins. All was
explained!
But where was she who had given utterance to that fearful shriek?
He hurried along the edge of the stream, scanning its current from bank
to bank, hastily examining every branch and bunch borne upon its bosom.
A disc of whitish colour came before his eyes. There was something in
the water, carried along rapidly. It was the drapery of a woman's
dress, and a woman's form was within it!
The young chief stayed not for further scrutiny; but plunging into the
flood, and swimming a few strokes, he threw his arms around it.
And he knew that in his arms he held Alice Rody! In a few seconds after
her form lay dripping upon the bank, apparently lifeless!