Was there an ambush there, prepared for us? God knew. Yet, we must approach and examine that ford, and pass it, too, and resume our march on the right bank of the river to avoid the hemlock swamps and rocky hills ahead, which no wagons or artillery could hope to pass.

My first and naturally cautious thought was to creep nearer and then send the Wyandotte out under cover of our clustered rifles. But if he were truly in any collusion with an unseen enemy they would never fire on him, and so it would be useless to despatch him on such a mission.

"Wait for the moon," said the Sagamore very quietly.

His low, melodious voice startled me from my thoughts, and I looked around at him inquiringly.

"I will go," said the Wyandotte, smiling.

"One man will never draw fire from an ambush," said the Grey-Feather cunningly. "The wild drake swims first into the net; the flock follows."

"Why does my younger brother of the Oneida believe that we need fear any ambush at yonder ford?" asked the Wyandotte so frankly that again I felt that I could credit no ill of any man who spoke so fairly.

"Listen to the crows," returned the Oneida. "Their evening call to council is long and deliberate—Kaah! Kaah! Kaah—h! What are they saying now, Black-Snake, my elder brother?"

I glanced at the Mohican in startled silence, for we all were listening very intently to the distant crows.

"They have discovered an owl, perhaps," said the Wyandotte, smiling, "and are tormenting him."

"Or a Mountain Snake," said the Sagamore blandly.

Now, what the Sagamore said so innocently had two meanings. He might have meant that the cawing of the crows indicated that they were objecting to a rattlesnake sunning on some rock. Also he might have meant to say that their short, querulous cawing betrayed the presence of Seneca Indians in ambush.

"Or a Mountain Snake," repeated the Siwanois, with a perfectly blank face. "The red door of the West is still open."

"Or a bear," said the Grey-Feather, cunningly slurring the Canienga word and swallowing the last syllable so that it might possibly have meant "Mohawk."

The Wyandotte turned good-humouredly to the Mohican, not pretending to misunderstand this subtle double entendre and play upon words.

"You, Sagamore of the Loups," he said, carrying out the metaphor, "are closer to the four-footed people than are we Wyandottes."

"That is true," said the Grey-Feather. "My elder brother, the Black-Snake, wears the two-legged hawk."

Which, again, if it was meant that way, hinted that the Hawk was an alien clan, and neither recognized nor understood by the Oneida. Also, by addressing the Wyandotte as "elder" brother, the Oneida conveyed a broad hint of blood relationship between Huron and Seneca. Yet, there need have been nothing definitely offensive in that hint, because among all the nations a certain amalgamation always took place after an international conflict.

The Wyandotte did not lose his temper, nor even, apparently, perceive how slyly he was being baited by all except myself.

"What is the opinion of the Loup, O Sagamore?" he asked lightly.

"Does my brother the Black-Snake desire to know the Sagamore's opinion concerning the cawing of yonder crows?"

The Wyandotte inclined his ugly head.

"I think," said the Mohican deliberately, "that there may be a tree-cat in their vicinity."

A dead silence followed. The Wyandotte's countenance was still smiling, but I thought the smile had stiffened and become fixed, though not a tremour moved him. Yet, what the Mohican had said—always with two meanings, and one quite natural and innocent—meant, if taken in its sinister sense, that not only might there be Senecas lying in ambush at the ford, but also emissaries from the Red Priest Amochol himself. For the forest lynx, or tree-cat, was the emblem of these people; and every Indian present knew it.

Still, also, every man there had seen crows gather around and scold a lynx lying flattened out on some arching limb.

Whether now there was any particular suspicion of this Wyandotte among the other Indians; whether it was merely their unquenchable and native distrust of any Huron whatever; whether the subtle chaff were playful or partly serious, I could not determine from their manner or expression. All spoke pleasantly and quietly, and with open or expressionless countenances. And the Wyandotte still smiled, although what was going on under that urbane mask of his I had no notion whatsoever.

I turned cautiously, and looked behind us. We were gathered in a kind of natural and moss-grown rocky pulpit, some thirty feet above the stream, and with an open view down its course to the distant riffles. Beyond them the river swung southward, walling our view with its flanking palisade of living green.

"We camp here," I said quietly. "No fire, of course. Two sentinels—the Night Hawk and the Black-Snake. The guard will be relieved every two hours. Wake me at the first change of watch."

I laid my watch on a rock where all could see it, and, opening my sack, fished out a bit of dried beef and a handful of parched corn.

Mayaro shared with me on my motioned invitation; the others fell to in their respective and characteristic manners, the Oneidas eating like gentlemen and talking together in their low and musical voices; the Wyandotte gobbling and stuffing his cheeks like a chipmunk. The Stockbridge Mole, noiseless and mum as the occult and furry animal which gave to him his name, nibbled sparingly all alone by himself, and read in his Algonquin Testament between bites.

The last level sun rays stripped with crimson gold the outer edges of the woods; the stream ran purple and fire, and the ceaseless sighing of its waters sounded soft as foliage stirring on high pines.

I said to the Mole in a low voice:

"Brother in Christ, do you find consolation and peace in your Testament when the whole land lies writhing under the talons and bloody beak of war?"

The Stockbridge warrior looked up quietly:

"I read the promise of the Prince of Peace, brother, who came to the world not bearing a sword."

"He came to fulfill, not to destroy," I said.

"So it is written, brother."

"And yet you and I, His followers, go forth armed to slay."

"To prepare a place for Him—His humble instruments—lest His hands be soiled with the justice of God's wrath. What is it that we wade in blood, so that He pass with feet unsoiled?"

"My brother has spoken."

The burning eyes of the calm fanatic were fastened on me, then they serenely reverted to the printed page on his knees; and he continued reading and nibbling at his parched and salted corn. If ever a convert broke bread with the Lord, this red disciple now sat supping in His presence, under the immemorial eaves of His leafy temple.

The Grey-Feather, who had been listening, said quietly:

"We Iroquois alone, among all Indians, have always acknowledged one Spirit. We call Him the Master of Life; you Christians call Him God. And does it truly avail anything with Tharon, O my brother Loskiel, if I wear the Turtle, or if my brother the Mole paints out the Beaver on his breast with a Christian cross?"

"So that your religion be good and you live up to it, sign and symbol avail nothing with God or with Tharon," said I.

"Men wear what they love best," said the Mole, lightly touching his cross.

"But under cross and clan ensign," said I, "lies a man's secret heart. Does the Master of Life judge any man by the colour of his skin or the paint he wears, or the clothing? Christ's friends were often beggars. Did Tharon ever ask of any man what moccasins he wore?"

The Sagamore said gravely:

"Uncas went naked to the Holder of the Heavens."

It was a wonderful speech for a Sagamore and an Algonquin, for he used the Iroquois term to designate the Holder of Heaven. The perfect courtesy of a Christian gentleman could go no further. And I thought of our trivial and petty and warring sects, and was silent and ashamed.

The Wyandotte wiped his powerful jaw with a handful of dead leaves, and looked coldly around at the little circle of men who differed with one another so profoundly in their religious beliefs.

"Is this then the hour and the place to discuss such matters, and irritate the Unseen?"

All eyes were instantly turned on the pagan; the Oneidas seemed troubled; the Sagamore serious. Only the Christian Indian remained placid and indifferent, his Testament suspended in his hand. But he also was listening.

As for me, I knew as well as did the others what the pagan and burly Wyandotte meant.

To every Indian—even to many who had been supposedly converted—air, earth, and water still remained thronged with demons. The vast and sunless wilderness was peopled with goblins and fairies. No natural phenomenon occurred except by their agency. Where the sun went after it had set, where the moon hid, the stars, the four great winds, the eight thunders—all remained mysteries to these red children of the forest. And to these mysteries demons held the keys. For no star fell, showering the night with incandescence, no comet blazed aloft, its streaming hair sweeping from zenith to horizon, no eclipse devoured sun or moon, no sunrise painted the Long House golden, no sunset stained its lodge-poles crimson, no waters ran, no winds blew, no clouds piled up quivering with lightning, no thunder rumbled, except that it was done by demons.

Fur, feather, and silver-scale also had souls, and slyly took council together when alone; the great trees talked to one another in forest depths; moonlit rocks conversed in secret; and peak whispered to peak above the flowing currents of the mist.

It was useless to dispute such matters with them, while every phenomenon of nature remained to them a mystery. For they had brains and a matchless imagination, and they were obliged to solve these things for themselves as best they knew how, each people according to its personal characteristics.

So, among the Onondagas, Oneidas, and Mohawks, evil demons were few, and good fairies many; among the Cayugas good and bad seemed fairly balanced; but among the sullen, brutal, and bestial Senecas, devils, witches, demons, and goblins were in the vast majority. And their perverted Erie priesthood, which had debauched some of their own Sachems, was a stench in the nostrils of any orthodox Sachem, and, to an ordained Sagamore, an offense and sacrilege unspeakable.

I sat looking hard at the Wyandotte, inclined to speak, yet unwilling to meddle where intervention must be useless.

His small, unwinking eyes met mine.

"There are demons," he said in a low voice.

"Demons in human form," I nodded. "Some were at Cherry Valley a year ago."

"There are witches," he said.

I shook my head: "None."

"And Giants of Stone, and Flying Heads, and the Dead Hunter, and the Lake Serpent," he persisted sullenly.

"There never were either giants or witches," I replied.

The Mole looked up from his Testament in surprise, but said nothing. Yet, by his expression I knew he was thinking of the Witch of Endor, and the Dukes of Edom, and the giants of the scriptures. But it seemed hopeless to modify his religious teachings by any self-developed theories of mine.

All I desired to do was to keep this pagan Huron from tampering with my warriors' nerves. And it required but little of the supernatural to accomplish this.

No Indian, however brave and faithful and wise in battle, however cunning and tireless and unerring on forest trail or on uncharted waters, could remain entirely undisturbed by any menace of invisible evil. For they were an impulsive race, ever curbing their impulses and blindly seeking for reason. But what appealed to their emotions and their imagination still affected them most profoundly, and hampered the slow, gradual, but steady development of a noble race emerging by its own efforts from absolute and utter ignorance.

I said quietly: "After all, the Master of Life stands sentry while the guiltless sleep!"

"Amen," said the Mole, lifting his calm eyes to the roof of leaves above.

An owl began to hoot—one of those great, fierce cat-owls of the North. Every Indian listened.

The Sagamore said pleasantly to the Wyandotte:

"It is as though he were calling the lynxes together—as Amochol the Accursed summons his Cat-People to the sacrifice."

"I know nothing of Amochol and his sacrifices," said the Wyandotte carelessly.

"Yet you Wyandottes border the Western Gate."

The Huron shrugged.

"Hear the Eared One squall," said Grey-Feather, as the great owl yelled through the darkening forest.

"One would think to hear an Erie speaking," said the Sagamore, looking steadily at the Black-Snake. But the latter seemed totally unaware of what amounted now to a persistent baiting.

"They say," continued the Sagamore, "that the Erie priesthood learned from the Nez Perces a strange and barbarous fashion."

"What fashion?" asked Grey-Feather, so innocently that I could not determine whether he was playing into the Sagamore's hands.

"The fashion of wearing the hair in a short, stiff ridge," said the Mohican. "Has the Black-Snake ever seen it worn that way?"

"Never," said the Huron. And there was neither in his voice nor on his features the slightest tremour that we could discover in the fading light of the afterglow.

I rose to put an end to this, for my own nerves were now on edge; and I directed the two sentinels to their posts, the Wyandotte and the Oneida, Tahoontowhee.

Then I lay down beside the Mohican. All the Indians had unrolled and put on their hunting shirts; I spread my light blanket and pillowed my head on my pack.

In range of my vision the Mole had dropped to his knees and was praying with clasped hands. Shamed, I arose and knelt also, to say in silence my evening prayer, so often slurred over while I lay prone, or even entirely neglected.

Then I returned to my blanket to lie awake and think of Lois, until at last I dreamed of her. But the dream was terrible, and I awoke, sweating, and found the Sagamore seated upright in the darkness beside me.

"Is it time to change the guard?" I asked, still shivering from the horror of my dream.

"You have scarce yet closed your eyes, Loskiel."

"Why are you seated upright wide awake, my brother?"

"There is evil in the wind."

"There is no wind stirring."

"A witch-wind came slyly while you slept. Did you not dream, Loskiel?" In spite of me I shivered again.

"That is foolishness," said I. "The Wyandotte's silly talk has made us wakeful. Our sentinels watch. Sleep, Mayaro."

"Have you need of sleep, Loskiel?"

"I? No. Sleep you, then, and I will sit awake if it reassures you."

The Sagamore set his mouth close to my ear:

"The Wyandotte is not posted where you placed him."

"What? How do you know?"

"I went out to see. He sits on a rock close to the water."

"Damn him," I muttered angrily. "I'll teach him——"

"No!"

The Mohican's iron grip held me in my place.

"The Night-Hawk understands. Let the Wyandotte remain unrebuked and undisturbed while I creep down to yonder ford."

"I do not intend to reconnoitre the ford until dawn," I whispered.

"Let me go, Loskiel."

"Alone?"

"Secretly and alone. The Siwanois is a magic clan. Their Sagamores see and hear where others perceive nothing. Let me go, Loskiel."

"Then I go, also."

"No."

"What of our blood-brotherhood, then?"

There was a silence; then the Mohican rose, and taking my hand in his drew me noiselessly to my feet beside him.

By sense of touch alone we lifted our rifles from our blankets, blew the powder from the pans, reprimed. Then, laying my left arm lightly on his shoulder, I followed his silent figure over the moss and down among the huge and phantom trees faintly outlined against the starlit water.



CHAPTER XII

AT THE FORD

When at length from the forest's edge we saw star-beams splintering over broken water, cutting the flat, translucent darkness of the river with necklaces of light, we halted; for this was the ford foaming there in obscurity with its silvery, mellow voice, unheeded in the wilderness, yet calling ever as that far voice called through the shadows of ages dead.

Now, from where we stood the faint line of sparkles seemed to run a little way into the darkness and vanish. But the indications were sufficient to mark the spot where we should enter the water; and, stepping with infinite precaution, we descended to the gravel. Here we stripped to the clout and laid our rifles on our moccasins, covering the pans with our hunting shirts. Then we strapped on our war-belts, loosening knife and hatchet, pulled over our feet our spare ankle-moccasins of oiled moose-hide soled with the coarse hair of the great, blundering beast himself.

I led, setting foot in the icy water, and moving out into the shadow with no more noise than a chub's swirl or a minnow's spatter-leap when a great chain-pike snaps at him.

Feeling my way over bed stones and bottom gravel with my feet, striving in vain to pierce the dense obscurity, I moved forward with infinite caution, balancing as best I might against the current. Ankle-deep, shin-deep, knee-deep we waded out. Presently the icy current chilled my thighs, rising to my waistline. But it grew no deeper.

Yet, here so swift was the current that I scarcely dared move, and was peering around to find the Sagamore, when a shape loomed up on my left. And I reached out and rested my hand on the shadowy shoulder, and stood so, swaying against the stream.

Suddenly a voice said, in the Seneca dialect:

"Is it thou, Butler?"

And every drop of blood froze in my body.

God knows how I found voice to answer "Yes," and how I found courage to let my hand remain upon my enemy's shoulder.

"It is I, Hiokatoo," said the low voice.

"Move forward," I said; and dropped my hand from his shoulder.

Somehow, although I could see nothing, all around me in the water I felt the presence of living creatures. At the same moment somebody came close to me from behind, and the Sagamore breathed his name in my ear.

I managed to retain my presence of mind, and, laying my mouth against his ear in the darkness, I whispered:

"The Seneca Hiokatoo and his warriors—all around us in the water. He mistakes me for Walter Butler, They have been reconnoitring our camp."

I felt the body of the Mohican stiffen under my grasp, Then he said quietly:

"Stand still till all have passed us."

"Yes; but let no Seneca hear your Algonquin speech. If any speak I will answer for you."

"It is well," said the Sagamore quietly. And I heard him cautiously loosening his hatchet.

Presently a dark form took shape in the gloom and passed us without speaking; then another, and another, and another, all wading forward with scarce a ripple sounding against their painted bodies. Then one came up who spoke also in Seneca dialect, saying to the Mohican that the canoe was to be sent up stream on observation, and asking the whereabouts of McDonald.

So they were all there, the bloody crew! But once more I found voice to order the Seneca across, saying that I would attend to the canoe when the time came to employ it.

This Indian seemed to understand very little English, and he hesitated; but I laid my hand flat on his naked back, and gave him a slight shove toward the farther shore. And he went on, muttering.

Two more passed. We waited in nervous silence for the next, not knowing how many had been sent to prowl around our camp. And as no more came, I whispered to the Sagamore:

"Let us go back. If more are to come, and if there be among them Butler or McDonald or any white man, he will never mistake me for any of his fellows after he hears me speak."

The Sagamore turned, the water swirling to his waist. I followed. We encountered nobody until the water began to shoal. Then, in mid-stream, a dark figure loomed out of the night, confronting us, and I heard him say in the Seneca language:

"Halt and turn. You travel the wrong way!"

"Go forward and mind your business!" I said in English.

The shadowy figure seemed astounded, remaining motionless there in the ford. Suddenly he bent forward as though to see my features, and at the same instant the Sagamore seized him and jerked his head under water.

But he could not hold him, for the fellow was oiled, and floundered up in the same instant. No doubt the water he had swallowed kept the yell safe in his throat, but his hatchet was out and high-swung as the Sagamore grasped his wrist, holding his arm in the air. Then, holding him so, the Mohican passed his knife through the man's heart, striking with swiftness incredible again and again; and as his victim collapsed, he eased him down into the water, turned him over, and took his shoulders between his knees.

"God!" I whispered. "Don't wait for that!"

But the Siwanois warrior was not to be denied; and in a second or two the wet scalp flapped at his belt.

Rolling over and over with the current, the limp body slipped down stream and disappeared into deeper shadows. We waded swiftly toward our own shore, crawled across the gravel, drew on our clothing, and stole up into the woods above.

"They'll know it by sunrise," I said. "How many did you count?"

"Thirteen in that war-party, Loskiel. And if Butler and McDonald be with them, that makes fifteen—and doubtless other renegades besides."

"Then we had best pull foot," said I. And I drew my knife and blazed the ford; and, as well as I might without seeing, wrote the depth of water on the scar.

I heard the Mohican's low laughter.

"The Senecas will see it and destroy it. But it will drive them frantic," he said.

"Whatever they do to this tree will but mark the ford more plainly," said I.

And the Mohican laughed and laughed and patted my shoulder, as we moved fast on our back trail. I think he was excited, veteran though he was, at his taking of a Seneca warrior's scalp. "Had you not jerked him under water when he leaned forward over your shoulder to see what manner of man was speaking English," said I, "doubtless he had awakened the forest with his warning yell in another moment."

"Let him yell at the fishes, now," said the Mohican, laughing. "No doubt the eels will understand him; they are no more slippery than he."

Save for the vague forms of the trees dimly discerned against the water, the darkness was impenetrable; and except for these guides, even an Indian could scarcely have moved at all. We followed the bank, keeping just within the shadows; and I was ever scanning the spots of starlit water for that same canoe which I had learned was to go upstream to watch us.

Presently the Siwanois checked me and whispered:

"Yonder squats your Wyandotte sentinel."

"Where? I can not see him."

"On that flat rock by the deep water, seeming a part of it."

"Are you certain?"

"Yes, Loskiel."

"You saw him move?"

"No. But a Siwanois of the Magic Clan makes nothing of darkness. He sees where he chooses to see.

"Mayaro," said I, "what do you make of this Wyandotte?"

"He has quitted his post without orders for a spot by the deep water. A canoe could come there, and he could speak to those within it."

"That might damn a white soldier, but an Indian is different."

"He is a Wyandotte—or says he is."

"Yes, but he came with credentials from Fortress Pitt."

"Once," said the Sagamore, "he wore his hair in a ridge."

"If the Eries learned that from the Nez Perces, why might not the Wyandottes also learn it?"

"He wears the Hawk."

"Yes, I know it."

"He saw the moccasin tracks in the sand at the other ford, Loskiel, and remained silent."

"I know it."

"And I believe, also, that he saw the canoe."

"Then," said I, "you mean that this Wyandotte is a traitor."

"If he be a Wyandotte at all."

"What?"

"He may be Huron; he may be a Seneca-Huron. But we Indians think differently, Loskiel."

"What do you think?"

"We do not know for certain. But"—and the Mohican's voice became quietly ferocious—"if a war-arrow ever struck this Wyandotte between the shoulders I think every tree-cat in the Long House would squall at the condoling council."

"You think this Wyandotte an Erie in disguise?" I asked incredulously.

"We Indians of different nations are asking that question of each other, Loskiel."

"What is the mind of the Grey-Feather concerning this?" I asked, horrified.

"Oneida and Stockbridge begin to believe as I believe."

"That this creature is a spy engaged to lead us to our deaths? Do they believe that this self-styled Wyandotte is an infamous Erie?"

"We so believe, Loskiel. We are not yet certain."

"But you who have taken Erie scalps should know——"

"We know an Erie by his paint and lock; by his arms and moccasins. But when an Erie wears none of these it is not easy to determine exactly what he might be. There is, in the Western nation, much impure blood, much mixing of captive and adopted prisoners with the Seneca conquerors. If an Erie wear cats' claws at the root of his scalp-lock, even a blind Quaker might know him. If one of their vile priests wear his hair in a ridge, then, unless he be a Nez Perce, there need be no doubt. But this man dresses and paints and conducts like no Erie I have ever seen. And yet I believe him one, and a Sachem at that!"

"Then, by God!" said I in a cold fury. "I will go down to the stream and put him under arrest until such time as his true colours may be properly determined!"

"Loskiel, if yonder Indian once saw in your eye that you meant to take him, he would slip between your hands like a spotted trout and be off down stream to his comrades. Go not toward him angry, or with anything in your manner and voice that he might distrust."

"I never learned to smile in the face of a traitor!"

"Learn now, then. Brother, you are young; and war is long. And of many aspects are they who take arms in their hands to slay. Strength is good; quickness and a true eye to the rifle-sight are good. But best of all in war are the calmness and patience of wisdom. A Sagamore has spoken."

"What would you have me do?"

"Nothing, yet."

"But we must make a night march of it, and I could not endure that infamous creature's company, even if it were safe for us to take him with us."

"My brother may remain tranquil. The Grey-Feather and I are watching him. The praying Indian and Tahoontowhee understand also. When we once are certain, the Erie dies."

"When you are certain," said I in a fury, "I will have him properly tried by military court and hung as high as Amherst hung two of his fellow devils. I wish to God he had executed the entire nation while he was about it. For once Sir William Johnson was wrong to interfere."

The Sagamore laughed and laid one hand on my shoulder:

"Is it a custom for an Ensign to pass judgment on a Major-General, O Loskiel, my dear but much younger brother?"

I blushed hot with annoyance and shame. Of all things on earth, self-control was the most necessary quality to any officer commanding Indians.

"The Sagamore is right," I said in a mortified voice.

"The Sagamore has lived longer than his younger brother," he rejoined gently.

"And is far wiser," said I.

"A little wiser in some few things concerning human life, Loskiel.... Does my brother desire that Mayaro shall bring in the Wyandotte?"

"Bring him," I said; and walked forward toward our camp.

Tahoontowhee stopped me with his challenge, then sprang forward at the sound of my voice.

"Men in the woods," he whispered, "creeping up from the South. They saw no fire and prowled no nearer than panthers prowl when they know a camp is awake."

"Senecas," I said briefly. "We make a night march of it. Remain on guard here. The Grey-Feather will bring your pack to you when we pick you up."

As I ascended the rocky pulpit, both the Grey-Feather and the Stockbridge were standing erect and wide awake, packs strapped and slung, rifles in hand.

"Senecas," I said. "Too many for us."

"Are we not to strike?" asked the Oneida wistfully, as the Mohican came swiftly up the rock followed by the Wyandotte, who seemed inclined to lag.

"Why did you quit your post?" I asked him bluntly.

"There was a better post and more to see on the rock," he said simply.

"You made a mistake. Your business is to obey your commanding officer. Do you understand?"

"The Black-Snake understands."

"Did you discover nothing from your rock?"

"Nothing. Deer moved in the woods."

"Red deer," I said coolly.

"A July deer is in the red coat always."

"The deer you heard are red the whole year round."

"Eho! The Black-Snake understands."

"Very well. Tie your pack, sling it, and shoulder your rifle. We march immediately."

He seemed to be willing enough, and tied his points with alacrity. Nor could I, watching him as well I might in so dark a spot, see anything suspicious in any movement he made.

"The Sagamore leads," I said; "the Black-Snake follows; I follow him; after me the Mole; and the Oneidas close the rear.... Attention!... Trail arms! File!"

And as we climbed out of our pulpit and descended over the moss to the soundless carpet of moist leaves:

"Silence," I said. "A sound may mean the death of us all. Cover your rifle-pans with your blankets. No matter what happens, no man is to fire without orders——"

I stopped abruptly and laid my hand on the Black-Snake's hatchet-sheath, feeling it all over with my finger-tips in the dark.

"Damnation!" I said. "There are tin points on the fringe! You might better wear a cow-bell! Where did you get it?"

"It was in my pack."

"You have not worn it before. Why do you wear it now?"

"It is looser in time of need."

"Very well. Stand still." I whipped out my knife and, bunching the faintly tinkling thrums in my fingers, severed the tin points and tossed them into the darkness.

"I can understand," said I, "a horse-riding Indian of the plains galloping into battle all over cow-bells, but never before have I heard of any forest Indian wearing such a fringe in time of war."

The rebuke seemed to stun the Wyandotte. He kept his face averted while I spoke, then at my brief word stepped forward into his place between myself and the Mohican.

"March!" I said in a low voice.

The Sagamore led us in a wide arc north, then west; and there was no hope of concealing or covering our trail, for in the darkness no man could see exactly where the man in front of him set foot, nor hope to avoid the wet sand of rivulets or the soft moss which took the imprint of every moccasin as warm wax yields to the seal.

That there was in the primeval woods no underbrush, save along streams or where the windfall had crashed earthward, made travelling in silence possible.

The forest giants branched high; no limbs threatened us; or, if there were any, the Sagamore truly had the sight of all night-creatures, for not once did a crested head brush the frailest twig; not once did a moccasined foot crash softly through dead and fallen wood.

The slope toward the river valley became steeper; we travelled along a heavily-wooded hillside at an angle that steadily increased. After an hour of this, we began to feel rock under foot, and our moccasins crushed patches of reindeer moss, dry as powder.

It was in such a place as this, or by wading through running water, that there could be any hope of hiding our trail; and as we began to traverse a vast, flat shoulder of naked rock, I saw that the Mohican meant to check and perplex any pursuit next morning.

What was my disgust, then, to observe that the Wyandotte's moccasins were soaking wet, and that he left at every step his mark for the morning sun to dry at leisure.

Stooping stealthily, I laid my hand flat in his wet tracks, and felt the grit of sand. Accidentally or otherwise, he had stepped into some spring brook which we had crossed in the darkness. Clearly the man was a fool, or something else.

And I was obliged to halt the file and wait until the Wyandotte had changed to spare moccasins; which I am bound to say he seemed to do willingly enough. And my belief in his crass stupidity grew, relieving me of fiercer sentiments which I had begun to harbour as I thought of all we knew or suspected concerning this man.

So it was forward once more across the naked, star-lit rock, where blueberry bushes grew from crevices, and here and there some tall evergreen, the roots of which were slowly sundering the rock into soil.

Rattlesnakes were unpleasantly numerous here—this country being notorious for them, especially where rocks abound. But so that they sprung their goblin rattles in the dark to warn us, we had less fear of them than of that slyer and no less deadly cousin of theirs, which moved abroad at night as they did, but was often too lazy or too vicious to warn us.

The Mohican sprang aside for one, and ere I could prevent him, the Wyandotte had crushed it. And how to rebuke him I scarcely knew, for what he had done seemed natural enough. Yet, though the Mohican seized the twisting thing and flung it far into the blueberry scrub, the marks of a bloody heel were now somewhere on the rocks for the rising sun to dry but not to obliterate. God alone knew whether such repeated evidence of stupidity meant anything worse. But now I was resolved to have done with this Indian at the first opportunity, and risk the chance of clearing myself of any charge concerning disobedience of orders as soon as I could report to General Sullivan with my command.

The travelling now, save for the dread of snakes, was pleasant and open. We had been gradually ascending during the last two hours, and now we found ourselves traversing the lengthening crest of a rocky and treeless ridge, with valleys on either side of us, choked with motionless lakes of mist, which seemed like vast snow fields under the splendour of the stars.

I think we all were weary enough to drop in our tracks and sleep as we fell. But I gave no order to halt, nor did I dream of interfering with the Sagamore, or even ask him a single question. It was promising to give me a ruder schooling than my regiment could offer me—this travelling with men who could outrun and outmarch the vast majority of white men.

Yet, I had been trained under Major Parr, and with such men in my command as Elerson, Mount, and Murphy; and I had run with Oneidas before and scouted far and wide with the best of them.

It was the rock-running that tired us, and I for one was grateful when we left the starlit obscurity of the ridge and began to swing downward, first through berry scrub and ground-hemlock, then through a thin belt of birches into the dense blackness of the towering forest.

Down, ever down we moved on a wide-slanting and easy circle, such as the high hawk swings when he is but a speck in the midsummer sky.

Presently the ground under our feet became level. A low, murmuring sound stole out of the darkness, pleasantly filling our ears as we advanced. A moment later, the Mohican halted; and we caught a faint gleam in the darkness.

"Sisquehanne," he said.

If, was the Susquehanna. Tired as I was I could not forbear a smile when this Mohican saluted the noble river by its Algonquin name in the presence of those haughty Iroquois who owned it. And it seemed to me as though I could hear the feathered crests stiffen on the two Oneida heads; for this was Oneida country, and they had been maliciously reminded that the Lenape had once named for them their river under circumstances in which no Iroquois took any pride. Little evidences of the subtle but ever-living friction between my Mohican and the two Oneidas were plenty, but never more maliciously playful than this. And presently I heard the Sagamore politely mention the Ouleout by its Iroquois name, Aulyoulet, which means "a voice that continues"; and while I sent the Night-Hawk down to the water to try for a crossing, Mohican and Oneida conversed very amiably, the topic being our enemies, and how it was that on the Ouleout and in Pennsylvania they had so often spared the people of that state and had directed their full fury toward New York.

The Oneida said it was because the Iroquois had no quarrel with Penn's people, who themselves disliked the intruding Yankee and New Yorker; but they were infuriated against us because we had driven the Iroquois from their New York lands and had punished them so dreadfully at Oriskany. And he further said that Cherry Valley would not have been made such a shambles except that Colonel Clyde and Colonel Campbell lived there, who had done them so much injury at Oriskany.

I myself thought that this was the truth, for no Iroquois ever forgave us Oriskany; and what we were now about to do to them must forever leave an implacable and unquenchable hatred between the Long House and the people of New York.

For on this river which we now followed, and between us and Tioga, where our main army lay, were the pretty Iroquois towns, Ingaren, Owaga, Chenang, and Owega, with their well-built and well-cellared houses, their tanneries, mills, fields of corn and potatoes, orchards, and pleasant gardens full of watermelons, muskmelons, peas, beans, squashes—in fact, everything growing that might ornament the estate of a proud man of my own colour. Thus had the Mohican described these towns to me. And now, as I sat weary, thinking, I knew that even before our army at Otsego joined the Tioga army, it would utterly destroy these towns on its way down; ruin the fields, and burn and girdle the orchards.

And this was not even the beginning of our destined march of destruction and death from one end of the Long House to the other!

Now our Oneida crept back to us, saying that the river was so low we could cross up to our arm-pits; and stood there naked, a slender and perfect statue, all adrip, and balancing pack and rifle on his head.

Wearily we picked our way down to the willows, stripped, hoisted rifles and packs, and went into the icy water. It seemed almost impossible for me to find courage and energy to dress, even after that chilling and invigorating plunge; but at last I was into my moccasins and shirt again. The Sagamore strode lightly to the lead; the Wyandotte started for the rear, but I shoved him next to the Mohican and in front of me, hating him suddenly, so abrupt and profound was my conviction that his stupidity was a studied treachery and not the consequences of a loutish mind.

"That is your place," I said sharply.

"You gave no orders."

"Nor did I rescind my last order, which was that you march behind the Sagamore."

"Is that to be the order of march?" he asked.

"What do you mean by questioning your officer?" I demanded.

"I am no soldier, but an Indian!" he said sullenly.

"You are employed and paid as a guide by General Sullivan, are you not? Very well. Then obey my orders to the letter, or I'll put you under arrest!"

That was not the way to talk to any Indian; but such a great loathing and contempt far this Wyandotte had seized me, so certain in my mind was I that he was disloyal and that every stupid act of his had been done a-purpose, that I could scarce control my desire to take him by that thick, bull-throat of his and kick him into the river.

For every stupid act or omission of his—or any single one of them—might yet send us all to our deaths. And their aggregate now incensed me; for I could not see how we were entirely to escape their consequences.

Again and again I was on the point of ordering a halt and having the fellow tried; but I dreaded the effect of such summary proceedings on the Oneidas and the Stockbridge, whose sense of justice was keen, and who might view with alarm such punishment meted out to mere stupidity.

It was very evident that neither they nor my Mohican had come to any definite conclusion concerning the Wyandotte. And until they did so, and until I had the unerring authority of my Indians' opinions, I did not care to go on record as either a brutal or a hasty officer. Indians entertain profound contempt for the man who arrives hastily and lightly at conclusions, without permitting himself leisure for deep and dignified reflection.

And I was well aware that with these Indians the success of any enterprise depended entirely upon their opinion of me, upon my personal influence with them.

Dawn was breaking before the Sagamore turned his head toward me. I gave the signal to halt.

"The Ouleout," whispered Tahoontowhee in my ear. "Here is its confluence with the Susquehanna."

The Mohican nodded, saying that we now stood on a peninsula.

I tried to make out the character of the hillock where we stood, but it was not yet light enough to see whether the place was capable of defence, although it would seem to be, having two streams to flank it.

"Sagamore," said I, "you and I will stand guard for the first two hours. Sleep, you others."

One after another unrolled his blanket and dropped where he stood. The Mohican came quietly toward me and sat down to watch the Susquehanna, his rifle across his knees. As for me, I dared not sit, much less lie flat, for fear sleep would overpower me. So I leaned against a rock, resting heavily on my rifle, and strained my sleepy eyes toward the invisible Ouleout. A level stream of mist, slowly whitening, marked its course; and "The Voice that Continues" sounded dreamily among the trees that bordered its shallow flood of crystal.

Toward sunrise I caught the first glimmer of water; in fact, so near was I that I could hear the feeding trout splashing along the reaches, and the deer, one by one, retreating from the shore.

Birds that haunt woodland edges were singing, spite of their moulting fever; and I heard the Scarlet Tanager, the sweet call of the Crimson Cardinal, the peeping of the Recollet chasing gnats above the water, the lovely, linked notes of the White-throat trailing to a minor infinitely prolonged.

Greyer, greyer grew the woods; louder sang the birds; suddenly a dazzling shaft of pink struck the forest; the first shred of mist curled, detached itself, and floated slowly upward. The sun had risen.

Against the blinding glory, looming gigantic in the mist, I saw the Sagamore, an awful apparition in his paint, turn to salute the rising sun. Then, the mysterious office of his priesthood done, he lifted his rifle, tossed the heavy piece lightly to his shoulder, and strode toward me.

I shook the sleeping Oneidas, and, as they sprang to their feet, I pointed out their posts to them, laid my rifle on my sack, and dropped where I stood like a lump of lead.

I was aroused toward nine by the Mohican, and sat up as wide awake as a disturbed tree-cat, instantly ready for trouble.

"An Oneida on the Ouleout," he said.

"Where?"

"Yonder—just across."

"Friendly?"

"He has made the sign."

"An ambassador?"

"A runner, not a belt-bearer."

"Bring him to me."

Strung along the banks of the Ouleout, each behind a tree, I saw my Indians crouching, rifles ready. Then, on the farther bank, at the water's shallow edge, I saw the strange Indian—a tall, spare young fellow, absolutely naked except clout, ankle moccasins, hatchet-girdle, and pouch; and wearing no paint except a white disc on his forehead the size of a shilling. A single ragged frond hung from his scalp lock.

Answering the signal of the Mohican, he sprang lightly into the stream and crossed the shallow water. My Oneidas seemed to know him, for they accosted him smilingly, and Tahoontowhee turned and accompanied him back toward the spot where I was standing, naively exhibiting to the stranger his first scalp. Which seemed to please the dusty and brier-torn runner, for he was all smiles and animation until he caught sight of me. Then instantly the mask of blankness smoothed his features, so that when I confronted him he was utterly without expression.

I held out my hand, saying quietly:

"Welcome, brother."

"I thank my brother for his welcome," he said, taking my offered hand.

"My brother is hungry," I said. "He shall eat. He is weary because he has came a long distance. He shall rest unquestioned." I seated myself and motioned him to follow my example.

The tall, lank fellow looked earnestly at me; Tahoontowhee lighted a pipe, drew a deep, full inhalation from it, passed it to me. I drew twice, passed it to the runner. Then Tahoontowhee laid a square of bark on the stranger's knees; I poured on it from my sack a little parched corn, well salted, and laid beside it a bit of dry and twisted meat. Tahoontowhee did the same. Then, very gravely and in silence we ate our morning meal with this stranger, as though he had been a friend of many years.

"The birds sing sweetly," observed Tahoontowhee politely.

"The weather is fine," said I urbanely.

"The Master of Life pities the world He fashioned. All should give thanks to Him at sunrise," said the runner quietly.

The brief meal ended, Tahoontowhee laid his sack for a pillow; the strange Oneida stretched out on the ground, laid his dusty head on it, and closed his eyes. The next moment he opened them and rose to his feet. The ceremony and hospitality devolving upon me had been formally and perfectly accomplished.

As I rose, free now to question him without losing dignity in his eyes, he slipped the pouch he wore around in front, where his heavy knife and hatchet hung, and drew from it some letters.

Holding these unopened in my hand, I asked him who he was and from whom and whence he came.

"I am Red Wings, a Thaowethon Oneida of Ironderoga, runner for General Clinton—and my credentials are this wampum string, so that you shall know that I speak the truth!" And he whipped a string of red and black wampum from his pouch and handed it to me.

Holding the shining coil in my hands, I looked at him searchingly.

"By what path did you come?"

"By no path. I left Otsego as you left, crossed the river where you had crossed, recrossed where you did not recross, but where a canoe had landed."

"And then?"

"I saw the Mengwe," he said politely, as the Sagamore came up beside him.

Mayaro smiled his appreciation of the Algonquin term, then he spat, saying:

"The Mengwe were Sinako and Mowawak. One has joined the Eel Clan."

"The Red Wings saw him. The Cat-People of the Sinako sat in a circle around that scalpless thing and sang like catamounts over their dead!"

It is impossible to convey the scorn, contempt, insult, and loathing expressed by the Mohican and the Oneida, unless one truly understand the subtlety of the words they used in speaking of their common enemies.

"The Red Wings came by the Charlotte River?" I asked.

"By the Cherry, Quenevas, and Charlotte to the Ouleout. The Mengwe fired on me as I stood on a high cliff and mocked them."

"Did they follow you?"

"Can my brother Loskiel trail feathered wings through the high air paths? A little way I let them follow, then took wing, leaving them to whine and squall on the Susquehanna."

"And Butler and McDonald?" I demanded, smiling.

"I do not know. I saw white men's tracks on the Charlotte, not two hours old. They pointed toward the Delaware. The Minisink lies there."

I nodded. "Now let the Red Wings fold his feathers and go to rest," I said, "until I have read my letters and considered them."

The Oneida immediately threw himself on the ground and drew his pouch under his head. Before I could open my first letter, he was asleep and breathing quietly as a child. And, on his naked shoulder, I saw a smear of balsam plastered over with a hazel leaf, where a bullet had left its furrow. He had not even mentioned that he had been hit.

The first letter was from my General Clinton:

"Have a care," he wrote, "that your Indians prove faithful. The Wyandotte I assigned to your command made a poor impression among our Oneida guides. This I hear from Major Parr, who came to tell me so after you had left. Remember, too, that you and your Mohican are most necessary to General Sullivan. Interpreters trained by Guy Johnson are anything but plenty; and another Mohican who knows the truest route to Catharines-town is not to be had for whistling."

This letter decided me to rid myself of the Wyandotte. Here was sufficient authority; time enough had elapsed since he had joined us for me to come to a decision. Even my Indians could not consider my judgment hasty now.

I cast a cold glance at him, where he stood in the distance leaning against a huge walnut tree and apparently keeping watch across the Ouleout. The Grey-Feather was watching there, too, and I had no doubt that his wary eyes were fixed as often on the Wyandotte as on the wooded shore across the stream.

A second letter was from Major Parr, and said:

"An Oneida girl called Drooping Wings, of whom you bought some trumpery or other, came to the fort after you had left, and told me that among the party in their camp was an adopted Seneca who had seen and recognized your Wyandotte as a Seneca and not as a Huron.

"Not that this information necessarily means that the Indian called Black-Snake is a traitor. He brought proper credentials from the officer commanding at Pitt. But it is best that you know of this, and that you feel free to use your judgment accordingly."

"Yes," said I to myself, "I'll use it."

I took another long look at the suspect, then opened my third and last letter. It was from Lois; and my heart beat the "general" so violently that for a moment it stopped my breath:

"Euan Loskiel, my comrade, and my dear friend: Since you have gone, news has come that our General Wayne, with twelve hundred light infantry, stormed and took Stony Point on the Hudson on the 15th of this past month. All the stores, arms, ammunition, and guns are ours, with more than five hundred prisoners. The joy at this post is wonderful to behold; our soldiers are mad with delight and cheer all day long.

"Lieutenant Beatty tells me that we have taken fourteen pieces of good ordnance, seven hundred stand of arms, tents, rum, cheese, wine, and a number of other articles most agreeable to recount.

"On Wednesday morning last a sad affair; at Troop Beating three men were brought out to be shot, all found guilty of desertion, one from the 4th Pennsylvania, one from the 6th Massachusetts, and one from the 3rd New York. The troops were drawn up on the grand parade. Two of the men were reprieved by the General; the third was shot.... It meant more to me, kneeling in my room with both hands over my ears to shut out the volley, than it meant to those who witnessed the awful scene. Marching back, the fifes and drums played 'Soldiers' Joy.' I had forgotten to stop my ears, and heard them.

"On Tuesday rain fell. News came at noon that Indians had surprised and killed thirty-six haymakers near Fort Schuyler; and that other Indians had taken fifteen or seventeen of our men who were gathering blueberries at Sabbath Day Point. Whereupon Colonel Gansevoort immediately marched for Canajoharie with his regiment, which had but just arrived; and in consequence Betty Bleecker and Angelina are desolate.

"As you see from this letter, we have left Croghan's new house, and are living at Otsego in a fine Bush House, and near to the place where Croghan's old house stood before it was destroyed.

"Sunday, after an all night rain, clear skies; and all the officers were being schooled in saluting with the sword, the General looking on. In the afternoon the Chaplain, 'Parson' Gano, as the soldiers call him, gave us a sermon. I went with Betty and Angelina. Miss Helmer went on the lake in a batteau with Mr. Boyd. The Rifles tried their guns on the lake, shooting at marks. Murphy and Elerson made no misses.

"On Monday the officers had a punch, most respectable and gay. We ladies went with Major Parr, Lieutenant Boyd, and the Ensign you so detest, to view the hilarity, but not to join, it being a sociable occasion for officers only, the kegs of rum being offered by General Clinton—a gentleman not famed for his generosity in such matters.

"This, Euan, is all the general news I have to offer, save that the army expects its marching orders at any moment now.

"Euan, I am troubled in my heart. First, I must acquaint you that Lana Helmer and I have become friends. The night you left I was sitting in my room, thinking; and Lana came in and drew my head on her shoulder. We said nothing to each other all that night, but slept together in my room. And since then we have come to know each other very well in the way women understand each other. I love her dearly.

"Euan, she will not admit it, but she is mad about Lieutenant Boyd—and it is as though she had never before loved and knows not how to conduct. Which is strange, as she has been so courted and is deeply versed in experience, and has lived more free of restraint than most women I ever heard of. Yet, it has taken her like a pernicious fever; and I do neither like nor trust that man, for all his good looks, and his wit and manners, and the exceedingly great courage and military sagacity which none denies him.

"Yesterday Lana came to my little room in our Bush House, where I sleep on a bed of balsam, and we sat there, the others being out, and she told me about Clarissa, and wept in the telling. What folly will not a woman commit for love! And Sir John riding the wilderness with his murdering crew! May the Lord protect and aid all women from such birds o' passage and of prey! And I thought I had seen the pin-feathers of some such plumage on this man Boyd. But he may moult to a prettier colour. I hope so—but in my heart I dare not believe it. For he is of that tribe of men who would have their will of every pretty petticoat they notice. Some are less unscrupulous than others, that is the only difference. And he seems still to harbour a few scruples, judging from what I see of him and her, and what I know of her.

"Yet, if a man bear not his good intention plainly written on his face, and yet protests he dies unless you love him, what scruples he may entertain will wither to ashes in the fiercer flame. And how after all does he really differ from the others?

"Euan, I am sick of dread and worry, what with you out in the West with your painted scouts, and Mr. Boyd telling me that he has his doubts concerning the reliability of one o' them! And what with Lana so white and unhappy, and coming into my bed to cry against my breast at night——"

Here the letter ended abruptly, and underneath in hurried writing:

"Major Parr calls to say that an Oneida runner is ordered to try to find you with despatches from headquarters. I had expected to send this letter by some one in your own regiment when it marched. But now I shall intrust it to the runner.

"I know not how to close my letter—how to say farewell—how to let you know how truly my heart is yours. And becomes more so every hour. Nor can you understand how humbly I thank God for you—that you are what you are—and not like Sir John and—other men.

"Women are of a multitude of kinds—until they love. Then they are of but two kinds. Of one of these kinds shall I be when I love. Not that I doubt myself, yet, who can say what I shall be? Only three, Euan—God, the man who loves me, and myself."

"I sit here waiting for a rifleman to take my letter to the General who has promised to commit it to the runner.

"A regiment is trying its muskets at the lake. I hear the firing.

"I have a tallow dip and wax and sand, ready to close my letter instantly. No one comes."

"Lana comes, very tired and pale. Her eyes frighten me, they seem so tragic. I learn that the army marches on the 9th. Yet, you went earlier, and I do not think my eyes resembled hers."

"Soldiers passing, drums beating. A Pennsylvania regiment. Lana lies on my bed, her face to the wall, scarce breathing at all, as far as I can see. Conch-horns blowing—the strange and melancholy music of your regiment. It seems to fill my heart with dread unutterable."

"The runner is here! Euan—Euan! Come back to me!

"Lois de Contrecoeur."

My eyes fell from the letter to the sleeping runner stretched out at my feet, then shifted vaguely toward the river.

After a while I drew my tablets, quill, and ink-horn from my pouch, and setting it on my knees wrote to her with a heart on fire, yet perfectly controlled.

And after I had ended, I sealed the sheet with balsam, pricking the globule from the tree behind me, and setting over it a leaf of partridge-berry. Also I wrote letters to General Clinton and to Major Parr, sealed them as I had sealed the other, and set a tiny, shining leaf on each.

Then, very gently I bent forward and aroused the Oneida runner. He sat up, rubbed his eyes, then got to his feet smiling. And I consigned to him my letters.

The Mohican, on guard by the Susquehanna, was watching me; and as soon as the Red Wings had started on his return, and was well across the Ouleout, I signalled the Sagamore to come to me, leaving the Mole and Tahoontowhee by the Susquehanna.

"Blood-brother of mine," I said as he came up, "I ask counsel of a wiser head and a broader experience than my own. What is to be done with this Wyandotte?"

"Must that be decided now, Loskiel?"

"Now. Because the Unadilla lies below not far away, and beyond that the Tioga. And I am charged to get myself thither in company with you as soon us may be. Now, what is a Sagamore's opinion of this Wyandotte?"

"Erie," he said quietly.

"You believe it?"

"I know it, Loskiel."

"And the others—the Oneidas and the Stockbridge?"

"They are as certain as I am."

"Good God! Then why have you not told me this before, Mayaro?"

"Is there haste?"

"Haste? Have I not said that we march immediately? And you would have let me give my order and include that villain in it!"

"Why not? It is an easier and safer way to take a prisoner to Tioga Point than to drag him thither tied."

"But he may escape——"

The Sagamore gave me an ironic glance.

"Is it likely," he said softly, "when we are watching?"

"But he may manage to do us a harm. You saw how cunningly he has kept up communication with our enemies, to leave a trail for them to follow."

"He has done us what harm he is able," said the Sagamore coolly.

I hesitated, then asked him what he meant.

"Why," he said, "their scouts have followed us. There are two of them now across the Susquehanna."

Thunderstruck, I stared at the river, where its sunlit surface glittered level through the trees.

"Do the others know this?" I asked.

"Surely, Loskiel."

I looked at my Indians where they lay flat behind their trees, rifles poised, eyes intent on the territory in front of them.

"If my brother does not desire to bring the Wyandotte to General Sullivan, I will go to him now and kill him," said the Mohican carelessly.

"He ought to hang," I said between my teeth.

"Yes. It is the most dreadful death a Seneca can die. He would prefer the stake and two days' torture. Loskiel is right. The Erie has been a priest of Amochol. Let him die by the rope he dreads more than the stake. For all Indians fear the rope, Loskiel, which chokes them so that they can not sing their death-song. There is not one of us who has not courage to sing his death-song at the stake; but who can sing when he is being choked to death by a rope?"

I nodded, looking uneasily toward the river where the two Seneca spies lurked unseen as yet by me.

"Let the men sling their packs," I said.

"They have done so, Loskiel."

"Very well. Our order of march will be the same as yesterday. We keep the Wyandotte between us."

"That is wisdom."

"Is it to be a running fight, Mayaro?"

"Perhaps, if their main body comes up."

"Then we had best start across the Ouleout, unless you mean to ford the Susquehanna."

The Sagamore shook his head with a grimace, saying that it would be easier to swim the Susquehanna at Tioga than to ford it here.

Very quietly we drew in or picked up our pickets, including the ruffianly Wyandotte, or Erie, as he was now judged to be, and, filing as we had filed the night before we crossed the Ouleout and entered the forest.

Two hours later the Oneida in the rear, Tahoontowhee, reported that the Seneca scouts were on our heels, and asked permission to try for a scalp.

By noon he had taken his second scalp, and had received his first wound, a mere scratch from a half-ounce ball, below the knee. But he wore it and the scalp with a dignity unequalled by any monarch loaded with jewelled orders.

"Some day," said the Sagamore in my ear, "Tahoontowhee will accept the antlers and the quiver."

"He would be greater yet if he accepted Christ," said the Stockbridge quietly.

We had halted to breathe, and were resting on our rifles as the Mohican said this; and I was looking at the Stockbridge who so quietly had confessed his Master, when of a sudden the Wyandotte, who had been leaning against a tree, straightened up, turned his head over his shoulder, stared intently at something which we could not see, and then pointed in silence.

So naturally was it done that we all turned also. Then, like a thunder-bolt, his hatchet flew, shearing the raccoon's tail from my cap, and struck the Stockbridge Indian full between the eyes, dashing his soul into eternity.



CHAPTER XIII

THE HIDDEN CHILDREN

So silently, suddenly, and with such incredible swiftness had this happened, and so utterly unprepared were we for this devilish audacity, that the Erie had shoved his trade-rifle against my ribs and fired before anybody comprehended what he was about.

But he had driven the muzzle so violently against me that the blow knocked me breathless and flat on my face, and his rifle, slipping along with the running swivel of my pouch buckle, was discharged, blowing the pouch-flap to fragments, and setting fire to my thrums without even scorching my body.

As, partly stunned, I lay on the moss, choking in the powder smoke, my head still ringing with the crash of the old smooth-bore, man after man leaped over me like frantic deer, racing at full speed toward the river. And I swayed to my knees, to my feet, and staggered after them, beating out the fire on my smoking fringes as I ran.

The Erie took the bank at one bound, struck the river sand like a ball, and bounded on. Both Oneidas shot at him, and I tried to wing him in mid-stream, but my hands were unsteady from the shock, and he went under like a diver-duck, drifted to the surface under the willows far below, and was out and among them before we could fire again.

The sight of him tore a yell of fury from the Oneidas' throats; but the Mohican, rifle a-trail, was speeding low and swiftly, and we sprang forward in his tracks.

A few moments later the Sagamore gave tongue to the fierce, hysterical view-halloo of his Wolf Clan; the Oneidas answered till the forest rang with the dreadful tumult of the pack-cry. Then, as I ran up breathless to where they were crouching, a more terrible whoop burst from them. The quarry was at bay.

It was where the river turned south, making a vast and glassy bay. A smooth cliff hung over it, wet and shining with the water from hidden springs, and sheering down into profound and limpid depths.

High on the face of the cliff, squatted on a narrow shelf, and hidden by the rocky formation, our quarry had taken cover. The twisted strands of a wild grapevine, severed by his knife, hung dangling below his eyrie, betraying his mode of ascent. He had gone up hand over hand, aided by his powerful shoulder muscles and by his feet, which must have stuck like the feet of flies to the perpendicular wall of rock.

To follow him, even with the aid of the vine he had severed, had been hopeless in the face of his rifle fire. A thousand men could not have taken him that way, while his powder and lead held out, for they would have been obliged to ascend one by one in slow and painful file, and he had but to shove his gun-muzzle in their faces as they appeared.

The war-yelps of the Oneidas had subtly changed their timbre so that ever amid the shrill yelling I marked the guttural snarls of baffled rage. The Mohican lay on his belly behind a tree, silent, but his eyes were like coals in their red intensity.

Presently the Oneidas, lying prone at our side, ceased their tumult and became silent. And for a long while we lay waiting for a shot.

All this time the Erie had given no sign of life, and I had begun to hope that he had been hit and would ultimately perish there, as wild things perish in solitude and silence.

Then the Mohican said in my ear:

"Unless we can stir him to move and expose himself, we must lose him. For his fellows will surely track us to this place."

"Good God! By what unfortunate accident should such a hiding place exist so near!" I said miserably.

The Sagamore's stern visage slightly relaxed.

"It is no accident, Loskiel. Do you not suppose he knew it was here? Else he had never dared attempt what he did."

"The vile Witch-cat has been here many a time," said the Grey-Feather, his ferocious gaze fixed on the cliff.

"Is the Mole dead?" I asked.

"He is with his God—Tharon or Christ, whichever it may be, Loskiel."

"The Mole must not be scalped," said Tahoontowhee softly. "If the Senecas pass that way they will have at last one thing to boast of."

I said to the Mohican:

"Hold the Erie. The Night-Hawk and I will go back and bury our dead against Seneca profanation."

"Let the Grey-Feather go, Loskiel."

"No. The Mole was Christian. Does a Christian fail his own kind at the last?"

"Loskiel has spoken," said the Mohican gravely. "The Grey-Feather and I will hold the filthy cat."

So we went back together across the river, the young Oneida and I; and we hid the Mole deep in the bed of a rotting log, and laid his Testament on his breast over the painted cross, and his weapons beside him. Then, working cautiously, we rolled back the log, replaced the dead leaves, brushed up the deep green pile of the moss, and smoothed all as craftily us we might, so that no Seneca prowling might suspect that a grave was here, and disinter the dead to take his scalp.

Over the blood-wet leaves where he had fallen, we made a fire of dry twigs, letting it burn enough to deceive. Then we covered it as hunters cover their ashes; the Oneida took the Erie's hatchet; and we hastened back to the others.

They were still lying exactly where we left them. Neither the Erie nor they had stirred or spoken. And, as I settled down in my ambush beside the Mohican, I asked him again whether there was any possible way to provoke the Erie so that he might stir and expose some portion of his limbs or body.

The Night-Hawk, who carried strapped to his back the quiver of an Oneida adolescent containing a boy's short bow and a dozen game arrows, consulted with the Grey-Feather in a low voice.

Presently he wriggled off to where some sun-dried birch-bark fluttered in the river breeze, returned with it, shredded it with care, strung his bow, tipped an arrow with the bark, and held it out to me.

I struck flint to steel, lighted my tinder, and set the shred of bark afire.

Then the Night-Hawk knelt, bent his bow, and the blazing arrow soared whistling with flame, and fell behind the rock on the shelf.

Arrow after arrow followed, whizzing upward and dropping accurately; but the wet mosses of the cliff extinguished the flashes.

As the last arrow fell, flared a moment, then merely smoked, an insulting laugh came from aloft, and my Indians uttered fierce exclamations and cuddled their rifle-stocks close to their cheeks, fairly trembling for a shot.

"Dogs of Oneidas!" called the Erie. "Go howl for your dead pig of a Stockbridge slave."

"The Mole wears his scalp with Tharon!" retorted the Grey-Feather, choking with fury. "But Tahoontowhee's hatchet is still sticking in the Senecas' heads!"

"For which the Night-Hawk shall burn at the Seneca stake, sobbing his death-song!" shouted the Erie, so fiercely that for a moment we lay silent, hoping that by some ungovernable movement he might expose himself.

"Taunt him!" I whispered; and the Mohican said with a derisive laugh:

"Four scalp-tufts from the mangy Cats of Amochol trim my hatchet-sheath. When the young men ask me what this sparse and sickly fur may be, I shall strip it off and cast it at their feet, saying it is but Erie filth to spit upon."

"Liar of a conquered nation!" roared the Erie, "for every priest of Amochol who fell by Otsego under your cowardly butcher's knife, a Siwanois Sagamore shall burn three days, and yet live to die the fourth! The day that August dies, so shall the Sagamore die at the Festival of Dreams in Catharines-town!"

"I shall remember," said I in a low voice to the Sagamore, "that the Onon-hou-aroria is to be celebrated in Catharines-town on the last day of August."

He nodded, then:

"A Mohican Sagamore insults a dirty priest of Amochol! I do you honour by offering you battle, with knife, with hatchet, with rifle, with naked hands! Choose, spawn of Atensi—still-born kitten of Iuskeha, choose! Not one soul except myself will raise hand against you. By Tharon, I swear it! Choose! And the victor passes freely and whither he wills!"

The Erie mocked him from his high perch:

"Squirrels talk! Long since has your Tharon been hurled headlong into Biskoonah by Atensi and her flaming grandson!"

At this awful blasphemy, the Mohican fairly blanched so that under his paint his skin grew ashy for a moment.

The Grey-Feather shouted:

"Lying and degraded priest! Mowawak Cannibal of a Sinako Cat! It is Atensi herself who burns with Iuskeha in Biskoonah; and the sacrilegious fires lick your altars!"

The Erie laughed horribly:

"Where is your fool of a stripling called Loskiel? Is he there with you? Or did my hatchet fetch him such a clip that he died of fright and a bullet in his belly?"

"He is unharmed," replied the Mohican, tauntingly. "A squaw shoots better than a Cat!"

"A lie! I saw my rifle blow a hole in his body!"

"Hatchet and rifle failed. The Ensign, Loskiel, laughed, asking what forest-flies were buzzing at his ear. Loskiel spits on Cats, and brushes their flying hatchets from his ears as others brush mosquitos!"

"Let him speak, then, to prove it!" shouted the Erie, incredulously.

But I remained silent.

Then the Erie's ferocious laugh rang out from the cliff.

"Now, you Mohican slave and you Oneida dogs, you shall know the power of Amochol. For what was done to Loskiel and to the Praying Mole, will be done to you all on the last day of this month, when the Dream Feast is held at Catharines-town! You shall die. And others shall die—not as you, but on the red altar of the Great Sachem Amochol! Strangled, disemboweled, sacrificed to clothe Atensi!"

The Grey-Feather, unable any longer to retain his self-control, was getting to his feet, staring wildly up at the cliff; but the Mohican drew him back into his form and held him there with powerful grip.

"Listen," he hissed, "to what this warlock blabbs."

The Erie laughed, evidently awaiting a retort. None came, and he laughed again triumphantly.

"Amochol's arm is long, O you Oneida dogs who howl outside the Long House gates! Amochol's eyes are like the white-crested eagle's eyes, seeing everything, and his ears are like the red buck's ears, so that nothing stirs unheard by him.

"Phantoms arise and walk at night; Amochol sees. Under earth and water, demons are breathing; Amochol hears. Then we Eries listen, too, and make the altar fires burn hotter. For the ghosts of the night and the demons that stir must be fed."

He waited again, doubtless expecting some exclamation of protest against his monstrous profession. After a moment he went on:

"Spectres and demons must be fed—but not on the foul flesh of dogs like you! We cut your throats to feed the Flying Heads."

He paused; and as no reply was forthcoming, the sorcerer laughed scornfully.

"Your blood becomes water! You cringe at the power of Amochol. But the red altar is not for you. Listen, dogs! Had I not found it necessary to slay your stripling, Loskiel, he had been burned and strangled an that altar!... And there is another at Otsego who shall die strangled on the altar of Amochol—the maiden called Lois! Long have we followed her. Long is the arm of the Red Priest—when his White Sorceress dreams for him!

"And now you know, you Mohican mongrel, why Amochol was at Otsego. His arm reaches even into the barracks of Clinton! Because to Atensi the sacrifice of these two would be grateful—the maiden Lois and your Loskiel. Only the pure and guarded pleasure her. And these two are Hidden Children. One has died. The other shall not escape us. She shall die strangled by Amochol upon his own altar!"

I sat up, sick with horror and surprise, and stared at the Mohican for an explanation. He and the Oneidas were now looking at me very gravely and in silence. And after a moment my head dropped.

I knew well enough what the brutal Erie meant by "Hidden Children." But that I was one I never dreamed, nor had it occurred to me that Lois was one, in spite of her strange history. For among the Iroquois and their adopted captives there are both girls and boys who are spoken of as "Hidden Persons" or "Hidden Children." They are called Ta-neh-u-weh-too, which means, "hidden in the husks," like ears of corn.

And the reason is this: a mother, for one cause or another, or perhaps for none at all, decides to make of her unborn baby a Hidden Child. And so, when born, the child is instantly given to distant foster-parents, and by them hidden; and remains so concealed until adolescence. And, being considered from birth pure and unpolluted, a girl and a boy thus hidden are expected to marry, return to their people when informed by their foster-parents of the truth, and bring a fresh, innocent, and uncontaminated strain into their clan and tribe.

What the Erie said seemed to stun me. What did this foul creature know of me? What knowledge had this murdering beast of Lois? And Amochol—what in God's name did the Red Sorcerer know of us, or of our history?

Even the horrid threat against Lois seemed so fantastic, so unreal, so meaningless, that at the moment, it did not impress me even with its unspeakable wickedness.

The Sagamore touched my arm as though with awe and pity, and I lifted my head.

"Is this true, brother?" he asked gently.

"I do not know if it is," I said, dazed.

"Then—it is the truth."

"Why do you say that, Mayaro?"

"I know it, now. I suspected it when your eyes first fell on the Ghost-bear rearing on my breast. I thought I knew you, there at Major Lockwood's house in Poundridge. It was your name, Loskiel, and your knowledge of your red brothers, that stirred my suspicions. And when I learned that Guy Johnson had sheltered you, then I was surer still."

"Who, then, am I?" I asked, bewildered.

The three Indians were staring at me as though that murderer aloft on his eyrie did not exist. I, too, had forgotten him for the moment; and it was only the loud explosion of his smooth-bore that shocked us to the instant necessity of the situation.

The bullet screamed through the leaves above us; we clapped our rifles to our cheeks, striving to glimpse him. Nothing moved on the rocky shelf.

"He fired to signal his friends," whispered the Mohican. "He must believe them to be within hearing distance."

I set my teeth and stared savagely at the cliff.

"If that is so," said I, "we must leave him here and pull foot."

There was a tense silence, then, as we rose, an infuriated yell burst from the Oneidas, and in their impotence they fired blindly at the cliff, awaking a very hell of echo.

Through the clattering confusion of the double discharge, the demoniac laughter of the Erie rang, and my Oneidas, retreating, hurled back insult and anathema, promising to return and annihilate every living sorcerer in the Dark Empire, including Amochol himself.

"Ha-e!" he shouted after us, giving the evil spirits' cry. "Ha-e! Ha-ee!" From his shelf he cast a painted stick after us, which came hurtling down and landed in the water. And he screamed as he heard us threshing over the shallows: "Koue! Askennon eskatoniot!"

The thing he had cast after us was floating, slowly turning round and round in the water; and it seemed to be a stick something thicker than an arrow and as long, and painted in concentric rings of black, vermillion, and yellow.

Then, as we gave it wide berth, to our astonishment it suddenly crinkled up and was alive, and lifted a tiny, evil head from the water, running out at us a snake's tongue that flickered.

That this was magic my Indians never doubted. They gave the thing one horrified glance, turned, and fairly leaped through the water till the shallow flood roared as though a herd of deer were passing over.

As for me, I ran, too, and felt curiously weak and shaken; though I suspected that this wriggling thing now swimming back to shore was the poison snake of the Ksaurora, and no Antouhonoran witchcraft at all, as I had seen skins of the brilliant and oddly marked little serpent at Guy Park, whither some wandering Southern Tuscaroras had brought them.

But the bestial creature of the cliff had now so inspired us all with loathing that it was as though our very breath was poisoned; and in swift and silent file we pushed forward, as if the very region—land, water, the air itself—had become impure, and we must rid ourselves of the place itself to breathe.

No war-party burning to distinguish itself ever travelled more swiftly. Sooner than I expected, we crossed the small creek which joins the river from the east, opposite the Old England District, and saw the ruins of Unadilla across the water.

Here was a known ford; and we crossed to Old Unadilla, where that pretty river and the Butternut run south into the broadening Susquehanna.

At this place we halted to eat; and I was of two minds whether to go by the West Branch of the Delaware, by Owaga and Ingaren across the Stanwix Treaty Line to Wyalusing, and from thence up the river to the Chemung and Tioga Point; or to risk the Chenango country and travel southwest by Owego, and so cutting off that great southern loop that the Susquehanna makes through the country of the Esaurora.

But when I asked the opinion of my Indians, they were of one mind against my two, saying that to follow the river was the easiest, swiftest, and safest course to Tioga Point.

They knew better than did I. This side of Tioga the Oneidas knew the ground as well as the Siwanois; but beyond, toward Catharines-town, only my Siwanois knew. Indeed, if my Oneidas remained with me at all beyond Tioga I might deem myself lucky, in such dread and detestation did they hold that gloomy region where the Wyoming Witch brooded her deadly crew, and where the Toad Woman, her horrible sister, fed the secret and midnight fires of hell with the Red Priest, Amochol.

A grey hawk was circling above us mewing. Truly, our nerves had been somewhat shattered, for as we rose and resumed pack and sack, a distant partridge drumming on his log startled us all; and it was as though we had thought to hear the witch-drums rolling at the Onon-hou-aroria, and the hawk mewing seemed like the Sorcerers calling "Hiou! Hiou! Hiou!" And the Unadilla made a clatter over its stones like the False-Faces rattling their wooden masks.

"Eheu!" sighed the pines above us as we sped on; and ever I thought of Okwencha and the Dead Hunter. And the upward roar of a partridge covey bursting in thunder through the river willows was like the flight of the hideous Flying Heads.

On we went, every sound and movement of the forest seeming to spur us forward and add flight-feathers to our speeding feet. For in my Indians, ascendant now, was the dull horror of the supernatural; and as for me my hatred of the Sorcerers was tightening every nerve to the point of breaking.

As I travelled that trail through the strange, eternal twilight of the great trees, I vowed to myself that Amochol should die; that the Sagamore and I would guide a thousand rifles to his pagan altar and lay this foul priesthood prone upon it as the last sacrifice.

Then I recalled the Black-Snake's threat against Lois; and shuddered; then the astounding reason he had given for the Red Priest's design upon us both set me dully wondering again.

Fear that his emissaries might penetrate our lines stirred me; and I remembered the moccasins she had received, and the messages sewed within them. If a red messenger had found her every year and had left at her door, unseen, a pair of moccasins, why might not an invisible assassin find her, too? Already, within our very encampment, she had received another pair of moccasins and a message entirely different from the customary one.

Whoever had brought it had come and gone unseen.

Distressed, perplexed, half sick with fear for her, I plodded on behind the Mohican, striving to drive from me the sombre thoughts assailing me, trying to reassure myself with the knowledge that she was safe at Otsego with her new friends, and that very shortly now she would be still safer in Albany, and under the shrewd and kindly eye of Mr. Hake.

The sun had set; the pallid daylight lingering along the forest edges by the river grew sickly and died. And after a little the Mohican halted on a hillock, and we cart our packs from us and peered around.

The forms of rocks took dim shape all about us, huge slabs and benches of stone, from which great bushes of laurel and rhododendron spread, forming beyond us an entangled and impenetrable jungle.

And under these we crawled and lay, listening for snakes. But there seemed to be none there, though our rocky fastness was a very likely place. And after we had eaten and emptied our canteens, the two Oneidas went out on guard to the eastern limit of the rocks; and the Sagamore and I lay on our sides, facing each other in the dark. And for a while we lay there, neither of us speaking. Finally I said under my breath:

"Then I am one of the Hidden People."

"Yes, brother," he replied very gently.

"Tell me why you believe this to be true. Tell me all you know."

For a little while the Mohican lay there very silent, and I did not stir. And presently he said:

"It was in '57, Loskiel, when I first laid eyes on you."

"What!"

"I am more than twice your age. You were then three years old."

In my astonishment it occurred to me that instead of twenty-two I was now twenty-five years of age, if what the Mohican said were true.

"Listen, Loskiel, blood-brother of mine, for you shall hear the truth now—the truth which Guy Johnson never told you.

"It was in '57; Munro lay at Fort William Henry; Webb at Fort Edward; and Montcalm came down from the lakes with his white-coats and Hurons and shook his sword at Munro and spat upon Webb.

"Then came Sir William Johnson to Webb with half a thousand Iroquois. And because Sir William was the only white man we Delawares trusted, and in spite of his Iroquois, three Mohicans offered their services—the Great Serpent, young Uncas, and I, Mayaro, Sagamore of the Siwanois."

He paused, then with infinite contempt:

"Webb was a coward. Nor could Sir William kick him forward. He lay shivering behind the guns at Edward; and Fort William Henry fell. And the white-coats could do nothing with their Hurons; the prisoners fell under their knives and hatchets—soldiers, women, little children.

"When Montcalm had gone, Webb let us loose. And, following the trail of murder, in a thicket among the rocks we came upon a young woman with a child, very weak from privation. Guy Johnson and I discovered them—he a mere youth at that time.

"And the young woman told him how it had been with her—that her husband and herself had been taken by the St. Regis three years before—that they had slain her husband but had offered her no violence; that her child had been born a few weeks later and that the St. Regis chief who took her had permitted her to make of it a Hidden Person.

"For three years the fierce St. Regis chief wooed her, offering her the first place in his lodge. For three years she refused him, living in a bush-hut alone with her child, outside the St. Regis village, fed by them, and her solitude respected. Then Munro came and his soldiers scattered the St. Regis and took her and her baby to the fort. And the St. Regis chief sent word that he would kill her if she ever married."

So painfully intent was I on his every low-spoken word that I scarce dared breathe as the story of my mother slowly unfolded.

"Guy Johnson and I took the young woman and her child to Edward," he said. "Her name was Marie Loskiel, and she told us that she was the widow of a Scotch fur trader, one Ian Loskiel, of Saint Sacrament."

There was another silence, as though he were not willing to continue. Then in a quiet voice I bade him speak; and he spoke, very gravely:

"Your mother's religion and Guy Johnson's were different. If that were the reason she would not marry him I do not know. Only that when he went away, leaving her at Edward, they both wept. I was standing by his stirrup; I saw him—and her.

"And—he rode away, Loskiel.... Why she tried to follow him the next spring, I do not know.... Perhaps she found that love was stronger than religion.... And after all the only difference seemed to be that she prayed to the mother of the God he prayed to.... We spoke of it together, the Great Serpent, young Uncas, and I. And Uncas told us this. But the Serpent and I could make nothing of it.

"And while Guy Johnson was at Edward, only he and I and your mother ever saw or touched you.... And ever you were tracing with your baby fingers the great Ghost Bear rearing on my breast——"

"Ah!" I exclaimed sharply. "That is what I have struggled to remember!"

He drew a deep, unsteady breath:

"Do you better understand our blood-brotherhood now, Loskiel?"

"I understand—profoundly."

"That is well. That is as it should be, O my blood-brother, pure from birth, and at adolescence undefiled. Of such Hidden Ones were the White-Plumed Sagamores. Of such was Tamanund, the Silver-Plumed; and the great Uncas, with his snowy-winged and feathered head—Hidden People, Loskiel—without stain, without reproach.

"And as it was to be recorded on the eternal wampum, you were found at Guy Johnson's landing place asleep beside a stranded St. Regis canoe; and your dead mother lay beside you with a half ounce ball through her heart. The St. Regis chief had spoken."

"Why do you think he slew her?" I whispered.

"Strike flint. It is safe here."

I drew myself to my elbow, struck fire and blew the tinder to a glow.

"This is yours," he said. And laid in my hand a tiny, lacquered folder striped with the pattern of a Scotch tartan.

Wondering, I opened it. Within was a bit of wool in which still remained three rusted needles. And across the inside cover was written in faded ink:

"Marie Loskiel."

"How came you by this?" I stammered, the quick tears blinding me.

"I took it from the St. Regis hunter whom Tahoontowhee slew."

"Was he my mother's murderer!"

"Who knows?" said the Sagamore softly. "Yet, this needle-book is a poor thing for an Indian to treasure—and carry in a pouch around his neck for twenty years."

The glow-worm spark in my tinder grew dull and went out. For a long while I lay there, thinking, awed by the ways of God—so certain, so inscrutable. And understood how at the last all things must be revealed—even the momentary and lightest impulse, and every deepest and most secret thought.

Lying there, I asked of the Master of Life His compassion on us all, and said my tremulous and silent thanks to Him for the dear, sad secret that His mercy had revealed.

And, my lips resting on my mother's needle-book, I thought of Lois, and how like mine in a measure was her strange history, not yet fully revealed.

"Sagamore, my elder brother?" I said at last.

"Mayaro listens."

"How is it then with Lois de Contrecoeur that you already knew she was of the Hidden Children?"

"I knew it when I first laid eyes on her, Loskiel."

"By what sign?"

"The moccasins. She lay under a cow-shed asleep in her red cloak, her head on her arms. Beside her the kerchief tied around her bundle lay unknotted, revealing the moccasins that lay within. I saw, and knew. And for that reason have I been her friend."

"You told her this?"

"Why should I tell her?"

There was no answer to this. An Indian is an Indian.

I said after a moment:

"What mark is there on the moccasins that you knew them?"

"The wings, worked in white wampum. A mother makes a pair with wings each year for her Hidden One, so that they will bring her little child to her one day, swiftly and surely as the swallow that returns with spring."

"Has she told you of these moccasins—how every year a pair of them is left for her, no matter where she may be lodged?"

"She has told me. She has shown me the letter on bark which was found with her; the relics of her father; this last pair of moccasins, and the new message written within. And she asked me to guide her to Catharines-town. And I have refused.

"No, Loskiel, I have never doubted that she was of the Hidden People. And for that reason have I been patient and kind when she has beset me with her pleading that I show to her the trail to Catharines-town.

"But I will not. For although in rifle dress she might go with us—nay, nor do I even doubt that she might endure the war-path as well as any stripling eager for honour and his first scalp taken—I will not have her blood upon my hands.

"For if she stir thither—if she venture within the Great Shadow—the ghouls of Amochol will know it. And they will take her and slay her on their altar, spite of us all—spite of you and me and your generals and colonels, and all your troops and riflemen—spite of your whole army and its mighty armament, I say it—I, a Siwanois Mohican of the Enchanted Clan. A Sagamore has spoken."

Chill after chill crept over me so that I shook as I lay there in the darkness "Who is this maiden, Lois?" I asked.

"Do you not guess, Loskiel?"

"Vaguely."

"Then listen, brother. Her grandfather was the great Jean Coeur who married the white daughter of the Chevalier de Clauzun. Her mother was Mlle. Jeanne Coeur; her father the young Vicomte de Contrecoeur, of the Regiment de la Reine—not that stupid Captain Contrecoeur of the regiment of Languedoc, who, had it depended on him, would never have ventured to attack Braddock at all.

"This is true, because I knew them both—both of these Contrecoeur captains. And the picture she showed to me was that of the officer in the Regiment de la Reine.

"I saw that regiment die almost to a man. I saw Dieskau fall; I saw that gay young officer, de Contrecoeur, who had nicknamed himself Jean Coeur, laugh at our Iroquois as he stood almost alone—almost the last man living, among his fallen white-coats.

"And I saw him dead, Loskiel—the smile still on his dead lips, and his eyes still open and clear and seeming to laugh up at the white clouds sailing, which he could not see.

"That was the man she showed me painted on polished bone."

"And—her mother?" I asked.

"I can only guess, Loskiel, for I never saw her. But I believe she must have been with the army. Somehow, Sir William's Senecas got hold of her and took her to Catharines-town. And if the little Lois was born there or at Yndaia, or perhaps among the Lakes before the mother was made prisoner, I do not know. Only this I gather, that when the Cats of Amochol heard there was a child, they demanded it for a sacrifice. And there must have been some Seneca there—doubtless some adopted Seneca of a birth more civilized—who told the mother, and who was persuaded by her to make of it a Hidden One.

"How long it lay concealed, and in whose care, how can I know? But it is certain that Amochol learned that it had been hidden, and sent his Cat-People out to prowl and watch. Then, doubtless did the mother send it from her by the faithful one whose bark letter was found by the new foster-parents when they found the little Lois.

"And this is how it has happened, brother. And that the Cat-People now know she is alive, and who she is, does not amaze me. For they are sorcerers, and if one of them did not steal after the messenger when he left Yndaia with the poor mother's yearly gift of moccasins, then it was discovered by witchcraft."

"For Amochol never forgets. And whom the Red Priest chooses for his altar sooner or later will surely die there, unless the Sorcerer dies first and his Cat-People are slain and skinned, and the vile altar is destroyed among the ashes of its accursed fire!"

"Then, with the help of an outraged God, these righteous things shall come to pass!" I said between clenched teeth.

The Sagamore sat with his crested head bowed. And if he were in ghostly communication with the Mighty Dead I do not know, for I heard him breathe the name of Tamanund, and then remain silent as though listening for an answer.

I had been asleep but a few moments, it seemed to me, when the Grey-Feather awoke me for my turn at guard duty; and the Mohican and I rose from our blankets, reprimed our rifles, crept out from under the laurel and across the shadowy rock-strewn knoll to our posts.

The rocky slope below us was almost clear to the river, save for a bush or two.

Nothing stirred, no animals, not a leaf. And after a while the profound stillness began to affect me, partly because the day had been one to try my nerves, partly because the silence was uncanny, even to me. And I knew how dread of the supernatural had already tampered with the steadiness of my red comrades—men who were otherwise utterly fearless; and I dreaded the effect on the Mohican, whose mind now was surcharged with hideous and goblin superstitions.

In the night silence of a forest, always there are faint sounds to be heard which, if emphasizing the stillness, somehow soften it too. Leaves fall, unseen, whispering downward from high trees, and settling among their dead fellows with a faintly comfortable rustle. Small animals move in the dark, passing and repassing warily; one hears the high feathered ruffling and the plaint of sleepy birds; breezes play with the young leaves; water murmurs.

But here there was no single sound to mitigate the stillness; and, had I dared in my mossy nest behind the rocks, I would have contrived same slight stirring sound, merely to make the silence more endurable.

I could see the river, but could not hear it. From where I lay, close to the ground, the trees stood out in shadowy clusters against the vague and hazy mist that spread low over the water.

And, as I lay watching it, without the slightest warning, a head was lifted from behind a bush. It was the head of a wolf in silhouette against the water.

Curiously I watched it; and as I looked, from another bush another head was lifted—the round, flattened head and tasselled ears of the great grey lynx. And before I could realize the strangeness of their proximity to each other, these two heads were joined by a third—the snarling features of a wolverine.

Then a startling and incredible thing happened; the head of the big timber-wolf rose still higher, little by little, slowly, stealthily, above the bush. And I saw to my horror that it had the body of a man. And, already overstrained as I was, it was a mercy that I did not faint where I lay behind my rock, so ghastly did this monstrous vision seem to me.



CHAPTER XIV

NAI TIOGA!

How my proper senses resisted the swoon that threatened them I do not know; but when the lynx, too, lifted a menacing and flattened head on human shoulders; and when the wolverine also stood out in human-like shadow against the foggy water, I knew that these ghostly things that stirred my hair were no hobgoblins at all, but living men. And the clogged current of my blood flowed free again, and the sweat on my skin cooled.

The furry ears of the wolf-man, pricked up against the vaguely lustrous background of the river, fascinated me. For all the world those pointed ears seemed to be listening. But I knew they were dead and dried; that a man's eyes were gazing through the sightless sockets of the beast.

From somewhere in the darkness the Mohican came gliding on his belly over the velvet carpet of the moss.

"Andastes," he whispered scornfully; "they wear the heads of the beasts whose courage they lack. Fling a stone among them and they will scatter."

As I felt around me in the darkness for a fragment of loose rock, the Mohican arrested my arm.

"Wait, Loskiel. The Andastes hang on the heels of fiercer prowlers, smelling about dead bones like foxes after a battle. Real men can not be far away."

We lay watching the strange and grotesque creatures in the starlight; and truly they seemed to smell their way as beasts smell; and they were as light-footed and as noiseless, slinking from bush to bush, lurking motionless in shadows, nosing, listening, prowling on velvet pads to the very edges of our rock escarpment.

"They have the noses of wild things," whispered the Mohican uneasily. "Somewhere they have found something that belongs to one of us, and, having once smelled it, have followed."

I thought for a moment.

"Do you believe they found the charred fragments of my pouch-flap? Could they scent my scorched thrums from where I now lie? Only a hound could do that! It is not given to men to scent a trail as beasts scent it running perdu."

The Mohican said softly:

"Men of the settlement detect no odour where those of the open perceive a multitude of pungent smells."