XIII
THE SIGN OF THE SERPENT
A Story of Louisiana in the Early Eighteenth Century
The two Vidals--the father Captain and second in command at FortRosalie,[B] and the son Jean, who wore the stripes of a sub-lieutenant,though his face had scarcely a sign of beard on it yet--paced theparapet of the fort in absorbed talk. Below them rolled the brown floodof the Mississippi, gilded into tawny gold by the setting sun. In thesplendor of that glow stood out in bold relief the galley which hadarrived from New Orleans that day. Young Jean, who had been absent inthe little Louisiana capital for two months, and had received during thevisit his commission from Governor Perier, had been a passenger, and wasnow eagerly listening to the news of the fort.
[B] Fort Rosalie, during the early years of the eighteenth century one of the advance-posts of the Louisiana colony, was built on the bluff where now stands the beautiful city of Natchez. This whole region for many miles up and down the river and inland was the seat of the Natchez nation, originally a Toltec race which had emigrated from Mexico shortly after the Spanish conquest.
"It is almost word for word as I tell thee," said the senior. "'Twas amonth since that Monsieur le Commandant sent for Big Serpent to tell himthe Governor's wish, but not, as Monsieur Perier would have chosen tomake it, the beginning of negotiation. For all feel that it is not wellthe Natchez should remain in power so near the fort. But Chopart's wordswere like the lash of the slave-whip.
"'Does not my white brother know,' answered the Great Sun of theNatchez, 'that my people have lived in the village of White Apple formore years than there are hairs in the plaited scalp-lock which hangsfrom the top of my head to my waist?'
"'Foolish savage!' said Chopart. 'What ties of friendship can there bebetween our races? Enough for you to know that you must obey yourmaster's orders, as I obey mine.'
"'We have other lands; take them, but leave the village of White Appleto the Natchez. There is our temple, there the bones of our forefathershave slept since we came to the banks of the Father of Waters,' pleadedBig Serpent.
"'Within the next moon comes the galley from the big village of theFrench. If White Apple is not then delivered to my soldiers, and yourpeople gone, the great chief of the Natchez will be sent down the river,bound hand and foot, to rot in prison. Go. I have spoken,' and Monsieurle Commandant waved Big Serpent out of his presence."
"And do the Natchez submit? Will Big Serpent give up their beautifulvillage? Mon Dieu! It's a shame! It might have been managed differentlyhadst thou been made commandant instead of Chopart, _mon pere_."
"Tut! tut!" said the father. "Chopart may carry his load, and welcome.'Twould have irked me much to have done the Governor's will, for, afterall, 'tis the sword, not the scabbard, which kills. Warning of treacheryand conspiracy has come from White Apple, for thou knowest the oldPrincess had a French husband and loves his race. Yet her son, thechief, would bleed out every French drop in his veins if he could. Ilike not the signs, though only five days ago Big Serpent came to FortRosalie, and when Monsieur le Commandant flung the report of foul playin his teeth, the chief smiled like a baby in the face of its mother,and answered: 'Let my brother believe what he sees. On the seventh dayhence my people will bring thee more than the tribute due for the time,thou hast granted, and will then give up White Apple to the French.' YetSergeant Beaujean, who has been at the village since, says there are nosigns of preparation for departure, and that warriors are pouring infrom all the outlying country. We shall know in two days more. In themean time, Chopart reviles at all advice to keep the garrison underarms, with closed gates and loaded cannon. The insolent calls doubterscowards and old women. My sword should answer that taunt," continued thegrizzled soldier, fiercely, "were it not for a bad example at this time.Big Serpent, though young in years, is as old in guile as the mostancient wiseacre of his tribe. So I fear to have thee go to visit Akbalnow, _mon fils_, for the chief's brother is sure to be deep in anymischief brewing."
"Better reason, then," answered Jean, "to make the venture. Time fliesswiftly, and I, surer than another, could go safely and might find aclew to hidden danger. Yet 'tis hard to break bread and play the spy."
Captain Vidal paced up and down, his features working in doubt, as thenew thought forced its way to acceptance. He looked wistfully at hisonly son. "And thou wouldst go there and pit thy young wits against theIndian's devilish cunning? Well, it may do! Akbal was ever thy swornbrother and hunting comrade." So it was arranged without further words,but the father's convulsive hand-clasp, when Jean, in hunter'sbuckskins, bade him good-bye at sunrise next morning, proved how loathhe was.
It was ten o'clock when Jean arrived in White Apple, which was aboutfifteen miles from Fort Rosalie. Eight miles lay through the black muckof a swamp where even the wariest foot and quickest eye found their waywith trouble. The foul morass into which the river highlands sloped downon the landward side gave the shortest road. But its profusion of deadlyreptile life wriggling and hissing at every turn encompassed the narrowpath across the little knolls and tussocks which give the onlyfoot-grip, with no slight peril to a blundering step. An easier routemeant nearly double the distance.
Almost the first greeting was that of Akbal, but his manner was distant.He knew of Jean's long absence, but he asked no questions with thetongue, though his eye was keenly curious.
"I come to chase the buck with my friend once more before the Natchezseek a new hunting-ground," said Jean.
"Akbal not hunt to-day," was the answer, in broken French; "must listento wisdom of great chiefs in council. They meet even now in the Templeof the Sun. Go; the woods are full of deer and turkeys; but first musteat, for Akbal's friend much hungry from his walk."
This hospitable dismissal discomfited Jean, for it seemed to close thegates to further knowledge. The breakfast of venison and sweet maize gotno seasoning of cheer in the gloomy looks of the boyish chief. Throughthe door of the lodge the young Frenchman saw the lines of Natchezwarriors stalking through the streets towards the temple, while not asound arose in the village. All moved as silently as if they were amarching troop of phantoms. Akbal sat patiently as a bronze statue,waiting his guest's motion to depart.
In the centre of the village stood the temple--a huge, round structurebuilt of logs, now wrinkled with years, and surmounted with acylindrical roof thatched with swamp-canes, leaves, and Spanish-moss inan impervious mat. It rose twenty feet higher than the tallest lodges,and from one side extended an arched thick-set hedge, embowering a longpassage to the adjacent forest, a quarter of a mile away. Here thepriests and medicine-men of the Sun were wont to seclude themselves fromthe rest of the tribe.
The way to accomplish his quest suddenly flashed on Jean's mind. Once heparted from Akbal, seemingly to plunge into the forest, he could makehis way to the exit of the long, bowery avenue, and thence come to theoutside of the temple. There, it might be, he could learn all he wished,though with great peril to his life. So when the young chief pressed hishand in a sad and silent adieu, Jean, after a brief push into thetangled brake, fetched a detour, and found himself at the mouth of thepassage. Through its dusky green light he moved cautiously forward to acoign of vantage. This he found in the shrinkage of two ill-fittinglogs, which gave a space for seeing and hearing.
In the centre of the temple, on a rude stone altar, smoked theunquenched fire which had never died since the natal spark had flamed ina Mexican temple two hundred years before. This half a dozen hideouslypainted priests fed with fragrant barks and gums. Around them fivehundred warriors squatted on the ground, and passed the council-pipe,while the priests mumbled and chanted, and a portion of the sacred banddrew forth soft and monotonous music from long reed instruments. Arattlesnake, coiled around the right arm of the chief priest, swayed itscrest with an undulating motion to the cadences of the music, and itsbright eyes seemed to watch every motion with malign intentness, as ifit were the guiding spirit of the council. The braves wore no war-paint,for their
expedition was not meant to blazon its own purpose; but theirfaces, so far as they could be seen through the smoke, were distortedwith such ferocity and lust of blood that they could dispense with thehelp of pigments. And so the priests chanted, and the players playedtheir soft melody, and the high-priest stroked his serpent's hideoushead as it curved and swayed to the rhythm of the tune, while thewatching Jean was maddened by the delay and the passage of time andopportunity. At last, perhaps mindful of some signal from thehigh-priest, the snake darted its full length and struck with open mouthas if at some enemy,[C] Big Serpent arose from the seated ranks.
[C] The rattlesnake was sacred to the Sun God of the Natchez, and was made to play an important part in their religious ceremonies, and the mummery which entered, too, into their war councils. Something similar exists in the rites of the Moqui Pueblos to-day--a race supposed also to have been of Toltec origin.
The Great Sun's oration to his warriors, spoken in the Indian tongue,was mostly jargon to the listener, but he construed enough of it tounravel the Natchez plot. Under the guise of paying their tribute, theywould surprise the fort the next morning.
Jean waited for nothing more, but withdrew swiftly, and dashed into theforest. To reach Fort Rosalie as quickly as possible he took his wayagain through the noisome swamp which formed so much of the short-cutto the French post. He had found his way well towards the heart of thatplace of gloom and reptilian life. Inspection of every tuft of grass andweed now made progress slow, and Jean looked forward to a few moments ofrest on the hummock twenty feet off which projected from the edge of acanebrake. How lucky, he thought, that he had escaped without detection!On top of this thought came the shock of a challenge, which made hisheart leap.
"_Halte, la!_" and the figure of Akbal pushed through the reeds. His gunlay in the hollow of one arm, and from the other hand dangled a silverclasp with which Jean's hunting-shirt had been fastened, and which hehad not missed till this moment. It had been found in the bowery lanenear the temple.
"Better Akbal than another Natchez bring this back to his Frenchbrother," he went on, with a note of mockery in his voice. "Jan Akbal'sprisoner; no hurt him; to-morrow set free."
Quick as a flash Jean's gun swung to his shoulder.
"Stand aside, Akbal, or I shoot you dead. It must be that or pledge offree passage."
The two stood like duellists with levelled weapons, waiting for theword, with stern faces and flashing eyes. This was not the time norplace to remember old comradeship and the rite of blood-brotherhoodwhich had once been solemnized between them. That rite swore them to anundying amity, as if born of the same mother and they had tasted the reddrops hot from each other's veins in testimony. But all this wasforgotten. To Jean, Akbal was the barrier to prevent his saving thegarrison. To Akbal, Jean was the agent bent on foiling his people'srevolt from French oppression. But though their fingers touchedtriggers, they did not press them. Perhaps this hesitation would havelasted but a second.
But now Jean heard a whirring noise that disturbed even his tense trainof thinking with a cold chill. He dashed his musket butt at something,but it flecked him like a giant whip-lash. A monstrous rattlesnake hadfastened its fangs deep in his thigh. Another duellist had stepped tothe fore. Akbal saw the snake spring, and was himself almost as swift inleaping the interval. He shook his head as he saw the enormous size ofthe serpent, which was in the deadliest season of its venom, wrigglingwith a broken back.
"Much bad bite, but try save Jean," said he, as he helped him across tothe larger hummock. Luckily Jean's canteen was full of brandy, and thishe gulped down eagerly, while the Indian cut away the buckskin from hisleg. Two needle-point punctures, to be sure, seemed scarcely worthbothering about, but with an apology, "Knife much hurt, but good," heplunged the keen-edged blade into the flesh, cutting out the envenomedparts, and followed it by applying his lips and sucking at the wound fora full five minutes.
"Fine weed sometimes cure snake-bite. Big bush over there," and hedanced across the bubbling marsh to a bog-oak with a thick mass of greenat its base. The swollen leg and the pain which gnawed through thedrowsiness of the working venom told Akbal that there was no time to belost. Flint and steel quickly struck fire, and steeping leaves and rootshe made hot tea and a poultice. So the Indian nurse fought the terriblepoison in the veins of the patient all that afternoon and all the nightlong in the firefly-lit darkness of that evil swamp.
The panther screams, which mingled harshly with the subtler horror ofthings hissing and splashing in the fetid pools, passed into the dreamsof Jean. Copper-colored fiends with serpent heads storming the palisadesof Fort Rosalie and shrieking the Natchez war-whoop sank their longcurved fangs in the body after the knife had rifled the head. "_Monpere! mon pere! sauve mon pere!_" he cried, in his agonized nightmare,and then awoke, clutching Akbal's arm in a sweat of despair.
"Jan better now, stronger; no more bad dream," said Akbal, whorecognized signs of coming strength; and indeed when daylight struggledinto the swamp the color of the French boy's face had got back its lustyred.
"Come, come, we must hasten to the fort! I am myself once more," andJean stumbled to his feet to fall back again with the sore stiffness ofhis wounded thigh. Then he remembered the meaning of Akbal's presencewith a frown. The comrade-foe dragged the heart out of that look with aword:
"Go soon. Akbal no stop Jan now." He spoke with a proud sadness andsubmission in his tone. The serpent omen had come from the Sun God--noteven that deadly bite could stop the young Frenchman's return, and hehimself had been but the instrument of duty. So he carefully bound thesore leg, and they started across the boggy waste, Jean leaning on hisarm and limping with a determined step. It took long to traverse thatquaking and slippery road, and the sun climbed up the sky, and Jeanbecame half crazed with anxiety, for his leg would only do so much work,with all the help of a human crutch.
At last they emerged from the morass and began to climb the upland,toiling on with the fiercest energy of Jean's tortured spirit. Hark!that was the sound of cannon from the fort, and then they heard thefaint crackling of guns. "Too late!" half shrieked Jean Vidal, and hesank on the ground with the reaction, hopeless, helpless, and his facestreaming with tears of rage and grief. Akbal dragged him to a shelteredplace under a bank, and leaped like a deer up the hill. He believed inthe sign of the Sun God, for the rattlesnake was the totem of theNatchez nation. He did not reason, in his simple, superstitious loyalty,that he could have left Jean to die of the serpent's bite. He only knewthat he had been inspired to cure him. Now he believed that the furthermission of salvation had been passed from Jean to him, and the Frenchblood in his veins warmed to the dedication. The lives of the garrisonmight yet be kept from the tomahawk and the torture stake.
The fort was already in the hands of the Natchez when Akbal arrived onthe bloody scene. The murdering crew gathered to his assembly whoop,with Big Serpent at their head. He told the story of the supposedmiracle with fervent eloquence, and the lives of those who had notalready fallen in battle were spared, including Captain Vidal, for thesebloodthirsty warriors of the Natchez were pious in their way, andbelieved the sign of the serpent. Jean Vidal, too, remembered the strokeof that terrible fang with something like superstitious gratitude. Hadit not been for that he and Akbal would probably have slain each otherwhere they stood, and every Frenchman in the fort would have beenbutchered or reserved for a more fiendish death. As it was, Chopart wasthe only one to suffer execution, and he justly expiated the deeds of acold-blooded tyrant.