The Little Red Foot Part 88

"Hoist that spy!" I said coldly. And in a second more his feet were kicking some half dozen inches above the ground.

My Oneidas fastened the halter to a stout bush; I was shaking all over and felt sick and dizzy to hear him raling and choking in the leather noose which was too stiff for the ghastly business.

But at that instant Tahioni shouted a shrill warning; I looked over my shoulder and saw a great number of soldiers wearing red patches on their hats, running across the burning hayfield to surround us.

Yet it needed better men than McDonald's to take me and my Oneidas in Brakabeen Wood. We turned and plunged into the bush, leaving the wretched spy[40] hanging to the oak, his convulsed body now spinning dizzily round and round above the ground.

[Footnote 40: The historian, J. R. Simms, says that Benjamin De Luysnes and his party strung up Dries Bowman, and then cut him down and let him go with a warning. Simms also gives a different date to this affair. At all events, it seems that Bowman was cut down in time to save his life.

Simms, by the way, spells De Luysnes' name De Line. Campbell mentions Captain Stephen Watts as Major Stephen Watson. We all commit error.]

Looking back as I ran, I soon saw that the men who were chasing us had little stomach for a pursuit which must presently lead to bush-fighting.

They shouted and halooed, but lagged as they arrived at the denser woods; and they seemed to have no officers to encourage them, or if they indeed possessed any I saw none.

Tahioni came fiercely to me, where I had halted, to watch the red-patch soldiers, saying that we had now been out thirteen days and had taken but three scalps. He said that to hang a man was not a proper vengeance to atone the death of Thiohero; and wanted to know why my prisoners should not be delivered to him and his Oneida comrades, who knew how to punish their enemies.

Which speech so angered me that I had a mind to take him by the throat.

Only the sudden memory of our Red Foot clan-ship, and of Thiohero, deterred me. Also, that was no way to treat any Indian; and to lose my self-control was to lose the Oneidas' respect and my authority over them.

"My brother, Tahioni," said I coldly, "should not forget that he is my _younger_ brother.

"If Tahioni were older, and possessed of more wisdom and experience, he would know that unless a chief asks opinions none should be offered."

The youth's eyes flashed at me and he stiffened under a rebuke that is hard for any Iroquois to swallow.

"My younger brother," said I, "ought to know that I am not like an officer of Guy Johnson's Indian Department, who delivers prisoners to the Mohawks. I deliver no prisoner to any Indian. I obey my orders, and expect my Indians to obey mine. They are free always to take Indian scalps. The scalps of white men they take only if permitted by me."

Tahioni hung his head, the Screech-owl and the Water-snake nodded emphatic a.s.sent.

"Yonder," said I, "are the red-patch soldiers. They are Tory marauders and outlaws. If you can ambush and cut off any of them, do so. And I care not if you scalp them, either. But if any are taken I shall not deliver them to any Oneida fire. No prisoner of this flying scout shall burn."

The Water-snake twitched my sleeve timidly.

"Hahyion," he said, "we obey. But an Iroquois prefers the fire and torment to the noose. Because he can sing his death songs and laugh at his enemies through the flames. But what man can sing or boast when a rope chokes his speech in his throat?"

I scarcely heeded him, for I was watching the red-patch soldiers, who now were leaving the woods and crossing the hayfield, which still was smoking where the fire made velvet-black patches in the dry gra.s.s.

The barn had fallen in and was only a great heap of glowing coals, over which a pale flame played in the late afternoon sunshine.

Listening and looking after the red-patches, I heard very distinctly the sound of guns in the direction of Stone House.

Now, while it was none of my business to hang on McDonald's flanks for prisoners and scalps, it _was_ my business to observe him and what he might be about in Schoharie; and to carry this news to Saratoga by way of Johnstown, along with my budget concerning Stanwix and St. Leger.

Besides, Stone House lay on my way. So I signalled my Indians and started west. And it was not very long before we came upon two Schoharie militia-men whom I knew, Jacob Enders and George Warner, who took to a tree when they discovered my Oneidas in their paint, but came out when I called them by name, and gave an account that they were hunting a notorious Tory,--a renegade and late officer in the Schoharie Regiment,--a certain George Mann, a captain, who would have carried his entire company to McDonald, but was surprised in his villainy and had fled to the woods near Fox Creek.

I told them that we had not seen this fellow, and asked for news; and Warner showed me a scalp which he said he took an hour ago from Ogeyonda, after shooting that treacherous savage at the Flockey.

He gave it to Tahioni, which pleased the Oneida mightily and contented me; for I hate to see any white man take a scalp, though Tim Murphy and Dave Elerson took them as coolly as they took any other peltry.

Warner said that McDonald was up the valley, murdering and burning his way westward; that cavalry from Albany had just arrived, had raided Brick House and taken prisoner a lot of red-patch militia, forced them to tear up their Royal Protections, tied up the most obnoxious, and kicked out the remainder with a warning.

He said, further, that Adam Crysler and Joseph Brown, of Clyberg, were great villains and had joined McDonald with Billy Zimmer and others; and that McDonald had a motley army, full of kilted Highlanders, cha.s.seurs, red-patches, Indians, and painted Tories; and that the cavalry from Albany were marching to meet them, reinforced by Schoharie mounted-militia under Colonel Harper.

And now, even as Warner was still speaking, we heard the trumpet of the cavalry on the river road below; and, running out to the forest's edge, we saw the Albany Riders marching up the river,--two hundred hors.e.m.e.n in bright new helmets and uniforms, finely horsed, their naked sabers all glittering in the sun, and their trumpeter trotting ahead on a handsome white charger.

The horses, four abreast, were at a fast walk; flankers galloped ahead on either wing. And, as we hurried down to the road, an officer I knew, Lieutenant Wirt, came spurring forward to meet and question us, followed by two troopers,--one named Rose and the other was Jake Van Dyck, whom I also recognized.

"Jack Drogue, by all the G.o.ds of war!" cried the handsome lieutenant, as I saluted and spoke to him by name.

"Dave Wirt!" I exclaimed, offering my hand, which he grasped, leaning wide from his saddle.

He turned his mount toward the road again, and I and my Oneidas walked along beside him.

"Are those your tame panthers?" he demanded, pointing toward my Oneidas with his sword. "If they are, then we should have agreeable work for them and for you, Jack Drogue. For Vrooman and his men are in Stone House and the red-patches fire on them whenever they show a head; and our cavalry are like to strike McDonald at any moment now. We caught two of his d.a.m.ned spies----"

At that instant, far down the road I saw a woman; and even at that distance I recognized her.

"Yonder walks a bad citizen," said I sharply. "That is Madame Staats!"

We had now arrived beside the moving column of riders; and, as I spoke, a dozen cavalrymen shouted: "Here comes Rya's Pup!"

A captain of cavalry who spoke English with a French accent shouted to the Pup and beckoned her; but she turned and ran the other way.

Immediately two troopers spurred after her and caught her as she was fording the river; and each seized her by a hand, turned their horses, and trotted back to us with their prisoner, amid shouts of laughter.

Rya's Pup, breathless from her enforced run, fairly spat at us in her fury, cursing and threatening and holding her panting flanks in turn.

"You dirty rebel dogs!" she screamed, "wait till McDonald catches you!

Ah--there'll be blood enow for you all to wade in as I waded in the river yonder, when your filthy cavalry headed me!"

Wirt tried to question her, but she mocked us all, boasted that McDonald had a huge army at the Flockey, and that he was now on his way to Stone House to destroy us all.

"Turn that s.l.u.t loose!" said the Captain sharply.

So we let go the Pup, and she turned and legged it, yelling her scorn and fury as she ran; and we saw her go floundering and splashing across the river, doubtless to carry news of us to McDonald.

And it contented us that she so do, because now we came upon Stone House, where the small garrison under a Lieutenant Wallace had ventured out and were a-digging of a ditch and piling fence rails across the road to stop McDonald's riders in a charge.

Here, also, were Harper's mounted militia, sitting their saddles, poorly armed with militia fire-locks.

But we had a respectable force and were ashamed to await the outlaws behind ditch and rail; so we marched on through the gathering dusk to a house about two miles further, where a dozen strangely painted hors.e.m.e.n galloped away as we approached.

A yell of rage at sight of those blue-eyed Indians arose from our riders. Our trumpet sounded; the cavalry broke into a gallop.

It was now twilight.

I begged some mounted militia-men to take me and my Oneidas up behind them; and they were obliging enough to do so; and we jogged away into the rosy dusk of an August evening.

Almost immediately I saw the Flockey ahead, and Adam Crysler's house on the bank; and on the lawn in front of it I saw McDonald's grotesque legion drawn up in line of battle.