The Little Red Foot Part 87

And now, as I ran on, I understood that this accursed road had been made expressly to transport their siege artillery; that their guns were still in transit; that they had masked a cannon and manned it with Hessian cha.s.seurs to keep their gun-road safe against surprise from any party scouting out of Oriska.

Lord, what an ambuscade! And what an escape for us!

As I jogged on at the heels of my Indians, still dazed and shaken by the deadly surprise of it all, I saw Thiohero, who was some little distance in front of me, reel sideways as though out o' breath, and stand still near a beech tree, holding her scarlet blanket against her body.

When I came up to her she was leaning against the tree, clutching her blanket to her face and breast with both hands. But she heard me and lifted her head from the gaily coloured folds.

"Hahyion--Royaneh!" she panted, "_this_ was your battle.... And now--it is over ... and you shall live!..."

My Oneidas had halted and were looking back at us. And now they returned rapidly and cl.u.s.tered around us.

"Are you exhausted, little sister?" I demanded, drawing nearer. "Are you hurt----"

"Listen--my brother and--my Captain!" she burst out breathlessly.

"_This_ was the battle of my vision!--the strange uniforms--the cannon-cloud--the white shape!... I saw it near you where--where you stood in the cannon smoke!--a shape like mist at sunrise.... Haihee! It was the face and shape of the Caughnawaga girl!... It was Yellow Hair who floated there beside you in the cannon smoke!--covered to her eyes in white and flowers----"

The Little Maid of Askalege clutched her gay blanket closer to her breast and began to sway gently on her feet as though the thumping of a distant partridge were a witch-drum.

"Haihya Hahyion!" she whispered--"Thiohero Oyaneh salutes--her Captain.... I speak--as one dying.... Haiee! Haie--e! Yellow Hair is--is quite--a witch!----"

Her voice failed; down on her knees she sank. And, as I s.n.a.t.c.hed her from the ground and lifted her, she looked up into my face and smiled.

Then, in a long-drawn sigh, her soul escaped between my arms that could not stay its flight to Tharon.

Her face became as wax; her head fell forward on my breast; her eyes rolled upward. And, as I pressed her in my arms, all my body grew warm and wet with bright blood pouring from her softly parted lips.

CHAPTER XXIX

THE WOOD OF BRAKABEEN

It was the 12th day of August when we came again to the Wood of Brakabeen,--we four young warriors of the clan of the Little Red Foot.

We were ragged and bruised and weary, and starving; but the fierce rage burning in our b.r.e.a.s.t.s gave to each a strength and purpose that nerved our briar-torn and battered bodies to effort inexhaustible.

Under scattered and furtive shots from German muskets we had retreated through the forest with our dead prophetess, until night ended pursuit by the cha.s.seurs, and we ourselves had lost our direction.

All the next day we travelled southwest with our dead. On the tenth day we came out on Otsego Lake, near to Croghan's new house.

Where he had cleared the bush and where Indian gra.s.s was growing as tall as a man's head, we made a deep grave. And here we four clansmen buried the Little Maid of Askalege; and sodded the mound with wild gra.s.ses where strawberries grew, and blue asters and plumes of golden-rod.

A Canada whitethroat called sweetly, sadly, from the forest in the sunset glow. We made for the grave a white cross of silver birch. We placed parched corn and a cup of water at the foot of the cross; and her bow and scarlet arrows against her needs where deer, G.o.d willing, should be plenty. And near these we set her little moccasins lest in that unknown land her tender feet should suffer on the trail.

In the morning we made a fire of ozier, sweet-birch, cherry wood, and samphire.

When the aromatic smoke blew over us I rose and spoke. After I had finished, the others in turn rose and spoke their mind, saying very simply what was in their hearts concerning their little prophetess, who had died wearing a little red foot painted on her body.

So we left her at rest under the wild flowers and Indian gra.s.s, near to Croghan's empty house, with a vast wilderness around to guard the sanctuary, and the sad whitethroats to mourn her.

And now, fierce and starved and ragged, we came once more to the Wood of Brakabeen. And heard McDonald's guns in the valley and his pibroch on the hills.

The afternoon was still and hot, the deep blue sky cloudless. Over Vrooman's Land a brown smoke hung; more smoke was rising above Clyberg; more rolled up beyond the swampy ground near the Flockey.

From the edge of Brakabeen Wood, looking out over the valley, we could hear firing in the direction of Stone House, more musketry toward Fox Creek.

"McDonald is in Schoharie," I said to Tahioni. "There will be many dead here, women and children and the grey-haired. Are my brothers of the Little Red Foot too weary to strike?"

The young Oneida warrior laughed. I looked at my ragged comrades where they crouched in their frightful paint, listening excitedly to the distant firing, and I saw their lean cheeks twitching and their nostrils a-flare as they scented the distant fighting.

The wild screaming of the pibroch, too, seemed to madden them; and it enraged me, also, because I saw that Sir John's Highlanders were here with McDonald's fantastic crew and had come to slaughter us all with their dirks and broad-swords as they had threatened before Sir John fled North.

We turned to the left and I led my Oneidas in a file through the ferny glades of Brakabeen Wood, and amid still places where clear streams ran deep in greenest moss; where tall lilies nodded their yellow Chinese caps in the flowery swale; where, in the demi-light of forest aisles, nothing grew save the great trees bedded there since the dawn of time, which sprung their vast arches high above us to support their glowing tapestry of leaves.

It was mid-afternoon when, smelling hot smoke, we came near the woods by the river; and saw, close to us, a barn afire, and three men carrying guns, running hither and thither in a hay field and setting every stack aflame with their torches.

One o' the fellows was a drummer in the green uniform of Butler's Rangers, and his drum was slung on his back. And I knew him. He was Michael Reed of Fonda's Bush, and cousin to Nick Stoner.

And then, to my astonishment and rage, I saw Dries Bowman in his farmer's clothes; and the other man was a huge German--one of their cha.s.seurs, who wore a stiff pig-tail that was greased, and a black mustache, and waist-high spatter-dashes--a very barbarian in red and blue and green; and grunting and puffing as he ran about in the hot sunshine to set the hay-c.o.c.ks afire with his torch.

I remember giving no command; we sprang out of the woods, trailing our rifles in our left hands; and Bowman fired at me and, missing, started to run; but I got him by his collar and knocked him over with my gun-b.u.t.t.

The Hessian cha.s.seur instantly drew up and fired in our direction; and Tahioni shot him dead in his tracks, where he fell heavily on his back and lay in the gra.s.s with limbs outspread.

"You may take his scalp! I care not!" shouted I, watching my Oneidas, who had got at Micky Reed and were striving to take him alive as I had ordered.

But Reed had a big dragoon's pistol in his belt and would have used it had not Kwiyeh killed him swiftly with his hatchet.

But I would not permit them to take Reed's scalp, and bade them despoil the body quickly and bring the leather cross-belts and girdle to me.

Hanatoh ran up and caught Dries Bowman by the collar; and we jerked him to his feet and dragged and hustled him into the woods. And here despoiled him, pulling from his pockets a Royal Protection and a bundle of papers, which revealed him as a spy sent down to preach treason in Schoharie and carry what men he might corrupt as recruits to McDonald and Sir John.

"That's enough to hang him!" I said sharply to Tahioni. "Link me up those drummer's cross-belts!"

"What--what do you mean, John Drogue!" stammered the wretch. "Would you murder an old neighbour?"

"That same old neighbour would have murdered me at Howell's house. And now is come disguised in civilian clothing to Schoharie with a spy's commission, to raise the district in arms against us."

"My G.o.d!" he shrieked, as Tahioni flung the leather halter about his neck, "is it a crime if honest men stand by their King?"

"Not when they stand out in plain day and wear a red coat or a green,"

said I, flinging the leather halter over the oak tree's limb.

Hanatoh swiftly pinioned his arms and tied his wrists; I tossed the halter's end to Kwiyeh. Tahioni also took hold of it.