The Road to Frontenac Part 40

"Did the Great Mountain pursue them?"

"He has gone back to his stone house across the great lake, leaving the land black and smoking. The Senecas have come to the western villages of the Cayugas."

"There are none in this village?"

"No. But the chiefs have sent blankets to their brothers, and as much corn as a hundred braves could carry over the trail. They have taken from their own houses to give to the Senecas."

A few moments later two young men came with baskets of sagamity and smoked meat. Menard received it, and rising, knocked gently at the door.

"Yes, M'sieu,--I am not sleeping."

He hesitated, and she came to the door and opened it.

"Ah, you have food, M'sieu! I am glad. I have been so hungry."

"Come, Father," said the Captain, and they entered and sat on the long bench, eating the smoky, greasy meat as eagerly as if it had been cooked for the Governor's table. Their spirits rose as the baskets emptied, and they found that they could laugh and joke about their ravenous hunger.

The chiefs returned shortly after, and came stooping into the hut in the free Indian fas.h.i.+on. The old chief spoke:--

"The Big Buffalo has honoured the lodges of the Cayugas; he has made the village proud to offer him their corn and meat. It would make their hearts glad if he would linger about their fires, with the holy Father and the squaw, that they might tell their brothers of the great warrior who dwelt in their village. But the White Chief bears the word of the Long House. He goes to the stone house to tell his white brothers, who fight with the thunder, that the Cayugas and the Onondagas are friends of the white men, that they have given a pledge which binds them as close as could the stoutest ropes of deerskin. And so with sad hearts they come to say farewell to the Big Buffalo, and to wish that no dog may howl while he sleeps, that no wind may blow against his canoe, that no rains may fall until he rests with his brothers at the great stone house beyond the lake."

"The Big Buffalo thanks the mighty chiefs of the Cayugas," replied Menard. "He is glad that they are his friends. And when his mouth is close to the ear of the Great Mountain, he will tell him that his Cayuga sons are loyal to their Father."

The chief had lighted a long pipe. After two deliberate puffs, the first upward toward the roof of the hut, the second toward the ground, he handed it to Menard, who followed his example, and pa.s.sed it to the chief next in importance. As it went slowly from hand to hand about the circle, the Captain turned to the maid, who sat at his side.

"Do they mean it, M'sieu?" she whispered.

For an instant a twinkle came into his eye; she saw it, and smiled.

"Careful," he whispered.

Before she could check the smile, a bronze hand reached across to her with the pipe. She started back and looked down at it.

"You must smoke it," Menard whispered. "It is a great honour. They have admitted you to their council."

"Oh, M'sieu--I can't--" she took the pipe and held it awkwardly; then, with an effort, raised it to her mouth. It made her cough, and she gave it quickly to the Captain.

The Indians rose gravely and filed out of the hut.

"Come, Mademoiselle, we are to go."

The smoke had brought tears to her eyes, and she was hesitating, laughing in spite of herself.

"Oh, M'sieu, will--will it make me sick?"

He smiled, with a touch of the old light humour.

"I think not. We must go, or they will wonder."

They found the chiefs waiting before the hut, Father Claude and Teganouan among them. As soon as they had appeared, the whole party set out through the village and over a trail through the woods to the eastward. The ill-kept dogs played about them, and plunged, barking, through the brush on either side. Behind, at a little distance, came the children and hangers-on of the village, jostling one another to keep at the head where they could see the white strangers.

When they reached the bank of the lake, they found two canoes drawn up on the narrow strip of gravel, and a half-dozen well-armed braves waiting close at hand. The chief paused and pointed toward the canoes.

"The Cayugas are proud that the White Chief will sail in their canoes to the land of the white men. The bravest warriors of a mighty village will go with them to see that no Onondaga arrow flies into their camp by night."

He signalled to a brave, who brought forward a musket and laid it, with powder-horn and bullet-pouch, at the Captain's feet.

"This musket is to tell the Big Buffalo that no wild beast shall disturb his feast, and that meat in plenty shall hang from the smoking-pole in his lodge."

The canoes were carried into the water and they embarked,--Menard, the maid, and two braves in one, Father Claude and four braves in the other. They swung out into the lake, the wiry arms and shoulders of the canoemen knotting with each stroke of the paddles; and the crowd of Indians stood on the sh.o.r.e gazing after until they had pa.s.sed from view beyond a wooded point.

A few hours should take them to the head of the lake. They had reached perhaps half the distance, when Menard saw that two of his canoemen had exchanged glances and were looking toward the sh.o.r.e. He glanced along the fringe of trees and bushes, a few hundred yards distant, until his eyes rested on three empty canoes. He called to Father Claude's canoe, and both, at his order, headed for the sh.o.r.e. As they drew near, half a score of Indians came from the brush.

"Why," said the maid, "there are some of the men who brought us to the lake."

"Yes," replied Menard, "it is the Long Arrow's band."

He leaped out of the canoe before it touched the beach, and walked sternly up to the group of warriors. He knew why they were there. It was what he had expected. When they had discovered the death of the Long Arrow there had been rage and consternation. Disputes had followed, the band had divided, and a part had crossed the lake to hunt the trail of the Big Buffalo. He folded his arms and gave them a long, contemptuous look.

"Why do the Onondagas seek the trail of the Big Buffalo? Do they think to overtake him? Do they think that all their hands together are strong enough to hold him? Did they think that they could lie to the White Chief, could play the traitor, and go unpunished?"

Only one or two of the Onondagas had their muskets in their hands.

They all showed fright, and one was edging toward the wood. The Cayugas in the canoes, at a word from Father Claude, had raised their muskets. Menard saw the movement from the corner of his eye, and for the moment doubted the wisdom of the action. It was a question whether the Cayugas could actually be brought to fire on their Onondaga brothers. Still, this band had defied the law of the council, and might, in the eyes of the Indians, bring down another war upon the nation by their act. While he spoke, the Captain had been deciding on a course. He now walked boldly up to the man who was nearest the bushes, and s.n.a.t.c.hed away his musket. There was a stir and a murmur, but without heeding, he took also the only other musket in the party, and stepped between the Indians and the forest.

"Stand where you are, or I will kill you. One man"--he pointed to a youth--"will go into the forest and bring your muskets to the canoes."

They hesitated, but Menard held his piece ready to fire, and the Cayugas did the same. At last the youth went sullenly into the bushes and brought out an armful of muskets.

"Count them, Father," Menard called in French.

The priest did so, and then ran his eye over the party on the beach.

"There are two missing, M'sieu."

Menard turned to the youth, who, though he had not understood the words, caught their spirit and hurried back for the missing weapons.

Then the Captain walked coolly past them, and took his place in the canoe. For a long time, as they paddled up the lake, they could see the Onondagas moving about the beach, and could hear their angry voices.

CHAPTER XVIII.

THE ONLY WAY.

When at last the canoe slipped from the confines of river and hills and forest out upon the great Lake Ontario, where the green water stretched flat, east and north and west to the horizon, the Cayuga warriors said farewell and turned again to their own lands. It was at noon of a bright day. The water lay close to the white beach, with hardly a ripple to mar the long black scallops of weed and drift which the last storm had left on the sand. The sky was fair and the air sweet.

In the one canoe which the Cayugas had left to them, the little party headed to the east, now skimming close to the silent beach, now cutting a straight path across some bay from point to point, out over the depths where lay the sturgeon and the pickerel and trout and whitefish. The gulls swooped at them; then, frightened, soared away in wide, rus.h.i.+ng circles, dropping here and there for an overbold minnow.

The afternoon went by with hardly the pa.s.sing of a word. Each of them, the Captain, the maid, the priest, looked over the burnished water, now a fair green or blue sheet, now a s.p.a.ce of striped yellow and green and purple, newly marked by every phase of sun and cloud; and to each it meant that the journey was done. Here was solitude, with none of the stir of the forest to bring companions.h.i.+p; but as they looked out to the cloud-puffs that dipped behind the water at the world's end, they knew that far yonder were other men whose skins were white, for all of beard and tan, whose tongue was the tongue of Montreal, of Quebec, of Paris,--and neither tree nor rock nor mountain lay between.