CHAPTER XIII. A FOREST PAGE
When the survivors of the band of Wyoming fugitives that the five hadhelped were behind the walls of Fort Penn, securing the food and restthey needed so greatly, Henry Ware and his comrades felt themselvesrelieved of a great responsibility. They were also aware how much theyowed to Timmendiquas, because few of the Indians and renegades wouldhave been so forbearing. Thayendanegea seemed to them inferior tothe great Wyandot. Often when Brant could prevent the torture of theprisoners and the slaughter of women and children, he did not do it.The five could never forget these things in after life, when Brant wasglorified as a great warrior and leader. Their minds always turned toTimmendiquas as the highest and finest of Indian types.
While they were at Fort Penn two other parties came, in a fearful stateof exhaustion, and also having paid the usual toll of death on the way.Other groups reached the Moravian towns, where they were received withall kindness by the German settlers. The five were able to give somehelp to several of these parties, but the beautiful Wyoming Valley layutterly in ruins. The ruthless fury of the savages and of many of theTories, Canadians, and Englishmen, can scarcely be told. Everything wasslaughtered or burned. As a habitation of human beings or of anythingpertaining to human beings, the valley for a time ceased to be. Anentire population was either annihilated or driven out, and finallyButler's army, finding that nothing more was left to be destroyed,gathered in its war parties and marched northward with a vast storeof spoils, in which scalps were conspicuous. When they repassed TiogaPoint, Timmendiquas and his Wyandots were still with them. Thayendanegeawas also with them here, and so was Walter Butler, who was destinedshortly to make a reputation equaling that of his father, "Indian"Butler. Nor had the terrible Queen Esther ever left them. She marchedat the head of the army, singing, horrid chants of victory, and swingingthe great war tomahawk, which did not often leave her hand.
The whole force was re-embarked upon the Susquehanna, and it was stillfull of the impulse of savage triumph. Wild Indian songs floated alongthe stream or through the meadows, which were quiet now. They advancedat their ease, knowing that there was nobody to attack them, but theywere watched by five woodsmen, two of whom were boys. Meanwhile thestory of Wyoming, to an extent that neither Indians nor woodsmenthemselves suspected, was spreading from town to town in the East, toinvade thence the whole civilized world, and to stir up an indignationand horror that would make the name Wyoming long memorable. Wyominghad been a victory for the flag under which the invaders fought, but itsadly tarnished the cause of that flag, and the consequences were to beseen soon.
Henry Ware, Paul Cotter, Sol Hyde, Tom Ross, and Jim Hart were thinkinglittle of distant consequences, but they were eager for the presentpunishment of these men who had committed so much cruelty. From thebushes they could easily follow the canoes, and could recognize some oftheir occupants. In one of the rear boats sat Braxton Wyatt and a youngman whom they knew to be Walter Butler, a pallid young man, animated bythe most savage ferocity against the patriots. He and Wyatt seemed tobe on the best of terms, and faint echoes of their laughter came to thefive who were watching among the bushes on the river bank. CertainlyBraxton Wyatt and he were a pair well met.
"Henry," said Shif'less Sol longingly, "I think I could jest about reachBraxton Wyatt with a bullet from here. I ain't over fond o' shootin'from ambush, but I done got over all scruples so fur ez he's concerned.Jest one bullet, one little bullet, Henry, an' ef I miss I won't ask fura second chance."
"No, Sol, it won't do," said Henry. "They'd get off to hunt us. Thewhole fleet would be stopped, and we want 'em to go on as fast aspossible."
"I s'pose you're right, Henry," said the shiftless one sadly, "butI'd jest like to try it once. I'd give a month's good huntin' for thatsingle trial."
After watching the British-Indian fleet passing up the river, theyturned back to the site of the Wyoming fort and the houses near it. Hereeverything had been destroyed. It was about dusk when they approachedthe battlefield, and they heard a dreadful howling, chiefly that ofwolves.
"I think we'd better turn away," said Henry. "We couldn't do anythingwith so many."
They agreed with him, and, going back, followed the Indians up theSusquehanna. A light rain fell that night, but they slept under a littleshed, once attached to a house which had been destroyed by fire. In someway the shed had escaped the flames, and it now came into timely use.The five, cunning in forest practice, drew up brush on the sides, andhalf-burned timber also, and, spreading their blankets on ashes whichhad not long been cold, lay well sheltered from the drizzling rain,although they did not sleep for a long time.
It was the hottest period of the year in America, but the night had comeon cool, and the rain made it cooler. The five, profiting by experience,often carried with them two light blankets instead of one heavy one.With one blanket beneath the body they could keep warmer in case theweather was cold.
Now they lay in a row against the standing wall of the old outhouse,protected by a six- or seven-foot slant of board roof. They had eatenof a deer that they had shot in the morning, and they had a senseof comfort and rest that none of them had known before in many days.Henry's feelings were much like those that he had experienced when helay in the bushes in the little canoe, wrapped up from the storm andhidden from the Iroquois. But here there was an important increaseof pleasure, the pattering of the rain on the board roof, a pleasant,soothing sound to which millions of boys, many of them afterwards greatmen, have listened in America.
It grew very dark about them, and the pleasant patter, almost musicalin its rhythm, kept up. Not much wind was blowing, and it, too, wasmelodious. Henry lay with his head on a little heap of ashes, whichwas covered by his under blanket, and, for the first time since he hadbrought the warning to Wyoming, he was free from all feeling of danger.The picture itself of the battle, the defeat, the massacre, the torture,and of the savage Queen Esther cleaving the heads of the captives, wasat times as vivid as ever, and perhaps would always return now and thenin its original true colors, but the periods between, when youth, hope,and strength had their way, grew longer and longer.
Now Henry's eyelids sank lower and lower. Physical comfort and thepresence of his comrades caused a deep satisfaction that permeated hiswhole being. The light wind mingled pleasantly with the soft summerrain. The sound of the two grew strangely melodious, almost piercinglysweet, and then it seemed to be human. They sang together, the wind andrain, among the leaves, and the note that reached his heart, rather thanhis ear, thrilled him with courage and hope. Once more the invisiblevoice that had upborne him in the great valley of the Ohio told him,even here in the ruined valley of Wyoming, that what was lost would beregained. The chords ended, and the echoes, amazingly clear, floated faraway in the darkness and rain. Henry roused himself, and came from theimaginative borderland. He stirred a little, and said in a quiet voiceto Shif'less Sol:
"Did you hear anything, Sol?"
"Nothin' but the wind an' the rain."
Henry knew that such would be the answer.
"I guess you didn't hear anything either, Henry," continued theshiftless one, "'cause it looked to me that you wuz 'bout ez near sleepez a feller could be without bein' ackshooally so."
"I was drifting away," said Henry.
He was beginning to realize that he had a great power, or rather gift.Paul was the sensitive, imaginative boy, seeing everything in brilliantcolors, a great builder of castles, not all of air, but Henry's giftwent deeper. It was the power to evoke the actual living picture ofthe event that bad not yet occurred, something akin in its natureto prophecy, based perhaps upon the wonderful power of observation,inherited doubtless, from countless primitive ancestors. The finestproduct of the wilderness, he saw in that wilderness many things thatothers did not see, and unconsciously he drew his conclusions fromsuperior knowledge.
The song had ceased a full ten minutes, and then came another note, ahowl almost plaintive, but, nevertheless, weird and full of ferocity.All knew it at
once. They had heard the cry of wolves too often in theirlives, but this had an uncommon note like the yell of the Indian invictory. Again the cry arose, nearer, haunting, and powerful. The five,used to the darkness, could see one another's faces, and the look thatall gave was the same, full of understanding and repulsion.
"It has been a great day for the wolf in this valley," whispered Paul,"and striking our trail they think they are going to find what they havebeen finding in such plenty before."
"Yes," nodded Henry, "but do you remember that time when in the housewe took the place of the man, his wife and children, just before theIndians came?"
"Yes," said Paul.
"We'll treat them wolves the same way," said Shif'less Sol.
"I'm glad of the chance," said Long Jim.
"Me, too," said Tom Ross.
The five rose up to sitting positions against the board wall, andeveryone held across his knees a long, slender barreled rifle, with themuzzle pointing toward the forest. All accomplished marksmen, it wouldonly be a matter of a moment for the stock to leap to the shoulder, theeye to glance down the barrel, the finger to pull the trigger, and theunerring bullet to leap forth.
"Henry, you give the word as usual," said Shif'less Sol.
Henry nodded.
Presently in the darkness they heard the pattering of light feet, andthey saw many gleaming eyes draw near. There must have been at leastthirty of the wolves, and the five figures that they saw reclining,silent and motionless, against the unburned portion of the house mightwell have been those of the dead and scalped, whom they had found insuch numbers everywhere. They drew near in a semicircular group, itsconcave front extended toward the fire, the greatest wolves at thecenter. Despite many feastings, the wolves were hungry again. Nothinghad opposed them before, but caution was instinctive. The big grayleaders did not mind the night or the wind or the rain, which theyhad known all their lives, and which they counted as nothing, but theyalways had involuntary suspicion of human figures, whether living ornot, and they approached slowly, wrinkling back their noses and sniffingthe wind which blew from them instead of the five figures. But theirconfidence increased as they advanced. They had found many such burnedhouses as this, but they had found nothing among the ruins except whatthey wished.
The big leaders advanced more boldly, glaring straight at the humanfigures, a slight froth on their lips, the lips themselves curlingback farther from the strong white teeth. The outer ends of the concavesemicircle also drew in. The whole pack was about to spring upon itsunresisting prey, and it is, no doubt, true that many a wolfish pulsebeat a little higher in anticipation. With a suddenness as startling figures raised themselves, five long, dark tubes leaped to theirshoulders, and with a suddenness that was yet more terrifying, a gushof flame shot from five muzzles. Five of the wolves-and they were thebiggest and the boldest, the leaders-fell dead upon the ashes of thecharred timbers, and the others, howling their terror to the dark,skies, fled deep into the forest.
Henry strode over and pushed the body of the largest wolf with his foot.
"I suppose we only gratified a kind of sentiment in shooting thosewolves," he said, "but I for one am glad we did it."
"So am I," said Paul.
"Me, too," said the other three together.
They went back to their positions near the wall, and one by one fellasleep. No more wolves howled that night anywhere near them.
When the five awakened the next morning the rain had ceased, and asplendid sun was tinting a blue sky with gold. Jim Hart built a fireamong the blackened logs, and cooked venison. They had also brought fromFort Penn a little coffee, which Long Jim carried with a small coffeepot in his camp kit, and everyone had a small tin cup. He made coffeefor them, an uncommon wilderness luxury, in which they could rarelyindulge, and they were heartened and strengthened by it.
Then they went again up the valley, as beautiful as ever, with itssilver river in the center, and its green mountain walls on either side.But the beauty was for the eye only. It did not reach the hearts ofthose who had seen it before. All of the five loved the wilderness, butthey felt now how tragic silence and desolation could be where humanlife and all the daily ways of human life had been.
It was mid-summer, but the wilderness was already reclaiming its own.The game knew that man was gone, and it had come back into the valley.Deer ate what had grown in the fields and gardens, and the wolves wereeverywhere. The whole black tragedy was written for miles. They werenever out of sight of some trace of it, and their anger grew again asthey advanced in the blackened path of the victorious Indians.
It was their purpose now to hang on the Indian flank as scouts andskirmishers, until an American army was formed for a campaign againstthe Iroquois, which they were sure must be conducted sooner or later.Meanwhile they could be of great aid, gathering news of the Indianplans, and, when that army of which they dreamed should finally march,they could help it most of all by warning it of ambush, the Indian'sdeadliest weapon.
Everyone of the five had already perceived a fact which was manifest inall wars with the Indians along the whole border from North to South,as it steadily shifted farther West. The practical hunter and scout wasalways more than a match for the Indian, man for man, but, when the rawlevies of settlers were hastily gathered to stem invasion, they wereinvariably at a great disadvantage. They were likely to be caught inambush by overwhelming numbers, and to be cut down, as had just happenedat Wyoming. The same fate might attend an invasion of the Iroquoiscountry, even by a large army of regular troops, and Henry and hiscomrades resolved upon doing their utmost to prevent it. An army neededeyes, and it could have none better than those five pairs. So they wentswiftly up the valley and northward and eastward, into the country ofthe Iroquois. They had a plan of approaching the upper Mohawk villageof Canajoharie, where one account says that Thayendanegea was born,although another credits his birthplace to the upper banks of the Ohio.
They turned now from the valley to the deep woods. The trail showedthat the great Indian force, after disembarking again, split into largeparties, everyone loaded with spoil and bound for its home village. Thefive noted several of the trails, but one of them consumed the wholeattention of Silent Tom Ross.
He saw in the soft soil near a creek bank the footsteps of about eightIndians, and, mingled with them, other footsteps, which he took to bethose of a white woman and of several children, captives, as even atyro would infer. The soul of Tom, the good, honest, and inarticulatefrontiersman, stirred within him. A white woman and her children beingcarried off to savagery, to be lost forevermore to their kind! Tom,still inarticulate, felt his heart pierced with sadness at the tale thatthe tracks in the soft mud told so plainly. But despair was not the onlyemotion in his heart. The silent and brave man meant to act.
"Henry," he said, "see these tracks here in the soft spot by the creek."
The young leader read the forest page, and it told him exactly the sametale that it had told Tom Ross.
"About a day old, I think," he said.
"Just about," said Tom; "an' I reckon, Henry, you know what's in mymind."
"I think I do," said Henry, "and we ought to overtake them by to-morrownight. You tell the others, Tom."
Tom informed Shif'less Sol, Paul, and Long Jim in a few words, receivingfrom everyone a glad assent, and then the five followed fast on thetrail. They knew that the Indians could not go very fast, as their speedmust be that of the slowest, namely, that of the children, and it seemedlikely that Henry's prediction of overtaking them on the following nightwould come true.
It was an easy trail. Here and there were tiny fragments of cloth,caught by a bush from the dress of a captive. In one place they saw afragment of a child's shoe that had been dropped off and abandoned. Paulpicked up the worn piece of leather and examined it.
"I think it was worn by a girl," he said, "and, judging from its size,she could not have been more than eight years old. Think of a child likethat being made to walk five or six hundred miles through
these woods!"
"Younger ones still have had to do it," said Shif'less Sol gravely, "an'them that couldn't-well, the tomahawk."
The trail was leading them toward the Seneca country, and they had nodoubt that the Indians were Senecas, who had been more numerous thanany others of the Six Nations at the Wyoming battle. They came thatafternoon to a camp fire beside which the warriors and captives hadslept the night before.
"They ate bar meat an' wild turkey," said Long Jim, looking at somebones on the ground.
"An' here," said Tom Ross, "on this pile uv bushes is whar the women an'children slept, an' on the other side uv the fire is whar the warriorslay anywhars. You can still see how the bodies uv some uv 'cm crusheddown the grass an' little bushes."
"An' I'm thinkin'," said Shif'less Sol, as he looked at the trail thatled away from the camp fire, "that some o' them little ones wuz gittin'pow'ful tired. Look how these here little trails are wobblin' about."
"Hope we kin come up afore the Injuns begin to draw thar tomahawks,"said Tom Ross.
The others were silent, but they knew the dreadful significance of Tom'sremark, and Henry glanced at them all, one by one.
"It's the greatest danger to be feared," he said, "and we must overtakethem in the night when they are not suspecting. If we attack by day theywill tomahawk the captives the very first thing."
"Shorely,', said the shiftless one.
"Then," said Henry, "we don't need to hurry. We'll go on until aboutmidnight, and then sleep until sunrise."
They continued at a fair pace along a trail that frontiersmen far lessskillful than they could have followed. But a silent dread was in theheart of every one of them. As they saw the path of the small feetstaggering more and more they feared to behold some terrible objectbeside the path.
"The trail of the littlest child is gone," suddenly announced Paul.
"Yes," said Henry, "but the mother has picked it up and is carrying it.See how her trail has suddenly grown more uneven."
"Poor woman," said Paul. "Henry, we're just bound to overtake thatband."
"We'll do it," said Henry.
At the appointed time they sank down among the thickest bushes that theycould find, and slept until the first upshot of dawn. Then they resumedthe trail, haunted always by that fear of finding something terriblebeside it. But it was a trail that continually grew slower. The Indiansthemselves were tired, or, feeling safe from pursuit, saw no need ofhurry. By and by the trail of the smallest child reappeared.
"It feels a lot better now," said Tom Ross. "So do I."
They came to another camp fire, at which the ashes were not yet cold.Feathers were scattered about, indicating that the Indians had takentime for a little side hunt, and had shot some birds.
"They can't be more than two or three hours ahead," said Henry, "andwe'll have to go on now very cautiously."
They were in a country of high hills, well covered with forests, aregion suited to an ambush, which they feared but little on their ownaccount; but, for the sake of extreme caution, they now advanced slowly.The afternoon was long and warm, but an hour before sunset they lookedover a hill into a glade, and saw the warriors making camp for thenight.
The sight they beheld made the pulses of the five throb heavily. TheIndians had already built their fire, and two of them were cookingvenison upon it. Others were lying on the grass, apparently resting,but a little to one side sat a woman, still young and of large, strongfigure, though now apparently in the last stages of exhaustion, with herfeet showing through the fragments of shoes that she wore. Her head wasbare, and her dress was in strips. Four children lay beside her' theyoungest two with their heads in her lap. The other two, who might beeleven and thirteen each, had pillowed their heads on their arms, andlay in the dull apathy that comes from the finish of both strengthand hope. The woman's face was pitiful. She had more to fear than thechildren, and she knew it. She was so worn that the skin hung loosely onher face, and her eyes showed despair only. The sad spectacle was almostmore than Paul could stand.
"I don't like to shoot from ambush," he said, "but we could cut downhalf of those warriors at our firs fire and rush in on the rest."
"And those we didn't cut down at our first volley would tomahawk thewoman and children in an instant," replied Henry. "We agreed, you know,that it would be sure to happen. We can't do anything until night comes,and then we've got to be mighty cautious."
Paul could not dispute the truth of his words, and they withdrewcarefully to the crest of a hill, where they lay in the undergrowth,watching the Indians complete their fire and their preparations for thenight. It was evident to Henry that they considered themselves perfectlysafe. Certainly they had every reason for thinking so. It was not likelythat white enemies were within a hundred miles of them, and, if so, itcould only be a wandering hunter or two, who would flee from this fierceband of Senecas who bad taken revenge for the great losses that they'had suffered the year before at the Oriskany.
They kept very little watch and built only a small fire, just enoughfor broiling deer meat which they carried. They drank at a little springwhich ran from under a ledge near them, and gave portions of the meat tothe woman and children. After the woman had eaten, they bound her hands,and she lay back on the grass, about twenty feet from the camp fire. Twochildren lay on either side of her, and they were soon sound asleep. Thewarriors, as Indians will do when they are free from danger and care,talked a good deal, and showed all the signs of having what was to thema luxurious time. They ate plentifully, lolled on the grass, and lookedat some hideous trophies, the scalps that they carried at their belts.The woman could not keep from seeing these, too, but her face did notchange from its stony aspect of despair. Then the light of the fire wentout, the sun sank behind the mountains, and the five could no longer seethe little group of captives and captors.
They still waited, although eagerness and impatience were tugging at thehearts of every one of them. But they must give the Indians time tofall asleep if they would secure rescue, and not merely revenge. Theyremained in the bushes, saying but little and eating of venison thatthey carried in their knapsacks.
They let a full three hours pass, and the night remained dark, butwith a faint moon showing. Then they descended slowly into the valley,approaching by cautious degrees the spot where they knew the Indian camplay. This work required at least three quarters of an hour, and theyreached a point where they could see the embers of the fire and the darkfigures lying about it. The Indians, their suspicions lulled, had putout no sentinels, and all were asleep. But the five knew that, at thefirst shot, they would be as wide awake as if they had never slept, andas formidable as tigers. Their problem seemed as great as ever. So theylay in the bushes and held a whispered conference.
"It's this," said Henry. "We want to save the woman and the childrenfrom the tomahawks, and to do so we must get them out of range of theblade before the battle begins." "How?" said Tom Ross.
"I've got to slip up, release the woman, arm her, tell her to run forthe woods with the children, and then you four must do the most of therest."
"Do you think you can do it, Henry?" asked Shif'less Sol.
"I can, as I will soon show you. I'm going to steal forward to the woman,but the moment you four hear an alarm open with your rifles and pistols.You can come a little nearer without being heard."
All of them moved up close to the Indian camp, and lay hidden in thelast fringe of bushes except Henry. He lay almost flat upon the ground,carrying his rifle parallel with his side, and in his right hand. Hewas undertaking one of the severest and most dangerous tests known toa frontiersman. He meant to crawl into the very midst of a camp of theIroquois, composed of the most alert woodsmen in the world, men whowould spring up at the slightest crackle in the brush. Woodmen who,warned by some sixth sense, would awaken at the mere fact of a strangepresence.
The four who remained behind in the bushes could not keep their heartsfrom beating louder and faster. They knew the tremendous risk undertaken
by their comrade, but there was not one of them who would have shirkedit, had not all yielded it to the one whom they knew to be the bestfitted for the task.
Henry crept forward silently, bringing to his aid all the years of skillthat he had acquired in his life in the wilds. His body was like thatof a serpent, going forward, coil by coil. He was near enough now to seethe embers of the fire not yet quite dead, the dark figures scatteredabout it, sleeping upon the grass with the long ease of custom, and thenthe outline of the woman apart from the others with the children abouther. Henry now lay entirely flat, and his motions were genuinely thoseof a serpent. It was by a sort of contraction and relaxation of the bodythat he moved himself, and his progress was absolutely soundless.
The object of his advance was the woman. He saw by the faint light ofthe moon that she was not yet asleep. Her face, worn and weather beaten,was upturned to the skies, and the stony look of despair seemed to havesettled there forever. She lay upon some pine boughs, and her hands weretied behind her for the night with deerskin.
Henry contorted himself on, inch by inch, for all the world like a greatsnake. Now he passed the sleeping Senecas, hideous with war paint, andcame closer to the woman. She was not paying attention to anything abouther, but was merely looking up at the pale, cold stars, as if everythingin the world had ceased for her.
Henry crept a little nearer. He made a slight noise, as of a lizardrunning through the grass, but the woman took no notice. He creptcloser, and there he lay flat upon the grass within six feet of her,his figure merely a slightly darker blur against the dark blur of theearth. Then, trusting to the woman's courage and strength of mind, heemitted a hiss very soft and low, like the warning of a serpent, half infear and half in anger.
The woman moved a little, and looked toward the point from which thesound had come. It might have been the formidable hiss of a coilingrattlesnake that she heard, but she felt no fear. She was too muchstunned, too near exhaustion to be alarmed by anything, and she didnot look a second time. She merely settled back on the pine boughs, andagain looked dully up at the pale, cold stars that cared so little forher or hers.
Henry crept another yard nearer, and then he uttered that low noise,sibilant and warning, which the woman, the product of the border, knewto be made by a human being. She raised herself a little, although itwas difficult with her bound hands to sit upright, and saw a dark shadowapproaching her. That dark shadow she knew to be the figure of a man. AnIndian would not be approaching in such a manner, and she looked again,startled into a sudden acute attention, and into a belief that theincredible, the impossible, was about to happen. A voice came from thefigure, and its quality was that of the white voice, not the red.
"Do not move," said that incredible voice out of the unknown. "I havecome for your rescue, and others who have come for the same purpose arenear. Turn on one side, and I will cut the bonds that hold your arms."
The voice, the white voice, was like the touch of fire to Mary Newton.A sudden fierce desire for life and for the lives of her four childrenawoke within her just when hope had gone the call to life came. Shehad never heard before a voice so full of cheer and encouragement. Itpenetrated her whole being. Exhaustion and despair fled away.
"Turn a little on your side," said the voice.
She turned obediently, and then felt the sharp edge of cold steel as itswept between her wrists and cut the thongs that held them together. Herarms fell apart, and strength permeated every vein of her being.
"We shall attack in a few moments," said the voice, "but at the firstshots the Senecas will try to tomahawk you and your children. Hold outyour hands."
She held out both hands obediently. The handle of a tomahawk was pressedinto one, and the muzzle of a double-barreled pistol into the other.Strength flowed down each hand into her body.
"If the time comes, use them; you are strong, and you know how," saidthe voice. Then she saw the dark figure creeping away.