Arrowmaker (Pennsylvania Frontier Series)

by Roy F. Chandler

  To fire the tiles and make them pottery hard, Rob lined his oven with carefully stacked tiles that had thoroughly dried in the sun. He lit a fire in the center of the oven and fed it until the oven was hot and the coals deep and glowing. He then sealed the entrance with earth and covered most of the smoke hole. The tiles baked in the enclosed heat for at least two days before the oven was re-opened. Slow cooling required an equal time before the tiles could be set aside, to wait until the house roof was ready.

  Rob dug his reddish-brown clay from a deposit within what would someday be his mill pond. The hollow he was creating could also be useful when it came to rock moving, but the labor of transporting fresh clay, which had to remain gummy while shaping, to the women’s patting-out spot was back-breaking. Rob created a man-sized travois similar to the one he had used to move Shikee to the Warm Springs. He mucked the gooey clay from the deposit using only his hands and hurried his trip to the patting ground. Sometimes, the women declared the clay too hard, and he had to provide water and help mix it into the clay until the squaws declared the material soft enough.

  Shikee would have none of it, but did allow himself to loll about commenting that Rob should have kept the pulling animals he had arrived with. Rob agreed, but it was too late for that. He attempted to claim victory by announcing that his strength was becoming so much greater than Shikee’s that he would soon find himself far the superior.

  Shikee’s answer had to do with buffalo and moose also being large, but neither was noted for its cunning or appearance. Rob gritted his teeth and struggled on.

  Building a stone house was more than an overnight effort, and Rob planned carefully to simplify the labor as much as possible. He drew many lines on the packed earth floor of Eshan’s lodge, checking and rechecking his floor plan before sketching on foolscap the house as he saw it.

  At the building site, he drove corner stakes and thought about them for a number of days. Once begun, there was no practical way to move a stone house or change its size.

  Rob sharpened David’s shovel and removed forest humus, the thin topsoil, and layers of yellowish clay until he struck the hard shale underlayment. He hacked at the shale with an adz until it was level and stood back to take stock of his progress.

  It had taken a week to prepare his building site, but Rob was pleased. He had created a square thirty-four feet to a side. Enclosed by walls, the area would form the bottom floor of his house.

  A ledge of rock lay exposed a few rods upstream from the home site. The hard stone was layered much as the flint had been at the arrowpoint quarry and pried free in foot thick slabs. By throwing a small dam across the creek and utilizing the flooded pit, his roof clay digging had developed, Rob was able to raft his stones close to his house. He rigged rope and pulleys to a sycamore to hoist larger stones. Smaller rocks he carried to the walls. The engineering saved rolling or skidding countless tons of rock, but it was immediately clear that the stone quarrying and fitting would be a monumental task. Rob expected to develop more muscle with which to impress Shikee.

  His mortar was clay with a bluish cast that the squaws had found good for pot making. Rob gouged gummy balls of the clay from near an abandoned beaver lodge and stored it handily in a shallow pool out of the current and close at hand.

  Rob’s building technique was simple. He laid down a bed of clay and fitted his bottom course of stone into it. He next raised the corners of the house, using a plumb line to keep them true and being careful that his stones fit solidly together. The clay provided only crack and hollow filling, and the wall could have stood without the mortar. A string drawn tight between corners kept his walls straight and in line.

  The work went slowly. At times the ledge resisted Rob’s efforts, and stones loosened reluctantly. He often became bored with the labor and dropped everything to go hunting or exploring with Shikee.

  The work left its mark. When he made roof tiles, his hands became stained a yellowish brown. His wall mortar re-stained them blue. Shikee liked that color and persuaded Fat to mix blue clay with grease for use as personal adornment.

  The strains of rock breaking and moving bulged Rob’s muscles as well as wearied them. His body lost its already thin layer of fat, and muscles, cords, and tendons stood out. Shikee poked him with stiffened fingers and commented that he would be dying soon. Fat and Flat filled his stomach with their best cooking but were pleased to be done with tile making and marveled openly at the foolishness of wishing to live within walls when a comfortable lodge required almost no effort.

  Shikee traveled often to the Indian village on Cisna Run. Occasionally, Rob went with him, but Shikee’s attention began to center on a particularly comely maiden, who managed to carry water from the stream with astonishing regularity. Rob suspected E’shan’s lodge would soon have a new squaw in residence—unless Shikee chose to leave the old arrowmaker and go his own way.

  Shikee showed no interest in the building, and he tapped his forehead in the universal sign of mental confusion whenever Rob raised the subject. If his friend requested help with an awkward stone, Shikee would assist, but punctuated his efforts with such agonized groans and gruntings that Rob kept his requests to a minimum.

  Although their paths separated increasingly often, their trust and confidence in each other were too deep to be shaken by different interests. Theirs had become a lifetime friendship that could weather absence without weakening, and each was sure that if truly needed, the other stood always ready.

  14

  1751 – Aughwick

  The hunting had turned poor in Sherman’s Valley, and fewer Indians appeared to trade for E’shan’s arrowpoints. The old man grew querulous as trade lessened. Rob and Shikee could no longer loaf on E’shan’s largess but found themselves hunting steadily to keep the lodge in meat. Bitter weather and long hunting dramatically reduced Rob’s building progress.

  When spring did not bring its normal busy trading, E’shan proclaimed a departure. He would leave his beloved meadows and move across the mountains to the village of Aughwick, a large community where George Croghan had recently opened a trading post.

  In E’shan’s view, the hills south of the Tuscarora were no longer Indian lands but a part of the white man’s world where guns broke the forest stillness and strident-voiced women ruled in lodges made of trees and rocks.

  The decision made, Rob accompanied Shikee and Flat to Aughwick where the new lodge would be constructed. Shikee chose a location similar to the one on the Little Buffalo, and Flat began building the lodge. As lodge building was squaw work, Shikee offered little help. Instead, he hunted and traded for hides and robes to equip the new home.

  E’shan’s move to Aughwick was looked upon with favor by the Delaware of that village. Not only was the arrowmaker an honored elder, his presence would bring added trade to the village.

  Rob enjoyed time spent with George Croghan who was taking his ease in a new cabin and letting the trade come to him. George, however, saw Indian trading nearly finished east of the Seven Mountains and doubted that Rob’s old plan to provide iron goods from a base on the Little Buffalo would any longer work. Times were changing too quickly, and there were now too few Indians in the valleys with fewer hunters seeking game there each season.

  Instead, Groghan thought that Rob should sell his goods to traders like himself who traveled far and traded close to the Indian villages. Rob saw his point and agreed to think on it.

  Working alone, Flat made slow progress with the lodge, so Rob helped her. Shikee cast scornful insults at his “female brother,” suggesting that he find a good man to hunt for him and noted that a squaw should not be seen so often with her breasts bared. Rob was glad when his friend went hunting.

  Under Flat’s direction, they sank limber hickory poles into the earth. They bowed them inward forming a rough half-circle nine feet high in the center. They raised the dirt floor a foot, pounded it smooth and hard, and dug a ditch outside the lodge to drain away dampness.

  The roof bo
ws were joined by rows of saplings lashed horizontally in place and designed to secure bark or hide lodge coverings. With sap running in the trees, Rob girdled and stripped away smooth bark in large slabs. The bark was immediately sewed onto the lodge sides where it would harden in place.

  When the new lodge neared completion, Rob and Shikee hired three of Croghan’s pack animals and made the one day trip back to the Little Buffalo. Fat and E’shan were prepared and waiting impatiently. The following dawn saw them heavily burdened and underway. The entrance flap to the lodge of many seasons was closed with expectation that what remained would not be disturbed.

  Their pace was slow, and the move showed to all E’shan’s advancing age. His legs, bowed from a lifetime of sitting at his work, proved weak and unsteady. Mildly shocked, Rob recalled the vigor the arrowmaker had shown only a few years earlier when they had returned from the flint quarry.

  Shikee was also concerned. They camped for the night in the Waterford Gap of Tuscarora Mountain having covered barely half the distance to Aughwick. They sat aside as E’shan nodded at the fire. Thoughtfully, Shikee said, “Our grandfather grows old, Quehana.”

  “You are right, Brother. I had not noticed until this journey.”

  “This will be his last march, Quehana. His bones will lie at Aughwick instead of on the Little Buffalo where they should be.”

  “When the time comes, we will move him to lie on the hill where I will place my other grandfather, Shikee. They can rest together and insult all that we do.”

  Shikee chuckled grimly. “All that you do perhaps, my brother, but I cannot live on the Little Buffalo. E’shan is right, it will soon be a white man’s land.”

  “Where I live, you may live, Shikee.” Rob took Shikee’s hand in the Indian manner.

  For a moment Shikee seemed lost in thought. “It is time I took a woman, Quehana. I will claim Red Bird, who has cast many eyes upon me. I will hunt for E’shan’s lodge as we have done together, and I will care for our grandfather until his days end.”

  “It is good, Shikee. My place is on the Little Buffalo. I will build my house of stone and raise corn in the meadow. I will visit my brother in Aughwick, and you will come often to my lodge.

  “The summer has ended for us, Shikee. Our seasons have been good, and we will see them again in a thousand campfires. Now our paths fork, and we go separate ways. I go with good heart and love for my brother Shikee.” They spoke little more and with the dawn continued their slow march to Aughwick.

  With E’shan settled into his new home, Rob bid hasty goodbyes, and anxious to return to the Little Buffalo, he headed south at his steady lope.

  The old lodge lay untouched in the familiar meadow. Indians, notorious for thievery among white men, had never pilfered E’shan’s lodge or Rob’s old wagon behind it. Now the valley seemed empty, and without E’shan’s protecting presence, Rob felt exposed and vulnerable. After a few nights alone in the lodge, he decided to move closer to his work.

  By rigging ropes and pulleys to convenient stumps and trees, Rob dragged the creaking wagon the necessary half mile. He hauled the wagon beneath the protecting boughs of giant sycamores that shaded the beginnings of his house. His canvas wagon cover was rotted and had split badly during the short journey. Rob tore hides from the old lodge to make a new cover, but the hides too had stiffened and cracked, and the passing of seasons bore on him. Rob concentrated on his work, ignoring the loneliness that plucked at him.

  He missed Shikee’s company more than the comforts of E’shan’s lodge. The years of roaming together were not easily put aside, and Rob was elated when an afternoon stillness was broken by the familiar owl hoot from the nearby woods.

  Throwing back his head, Rob answered with a panther’s throaty snarl of warning. Dropping his tools he hurdled the stream and raced up the ridge to find Shikee stuffing a long pipe, his back resting against a fallen log. Joyously, Rob leaped upon his friend sending pipe, tobacco, and Shikee’s dignity flying. They pummeled each other enthusiastically, rolling in the autumn leaves until Rob’s exuberance cooled.

  They slumped panting against the log, and for the first time, Rob noticed Red Bird bearing Shikee’s pack quietly collecting the scattered pipe and tobacco. It was Rob’s turn to make the clever owl call and poke a complimentary elbow into his friend’s ribs.

  With Shikee and his new squaw beside it, Rob’s fire was contented. Red Bird prepared their meal, and after suffering Shikee’s critical examination and inevitable insults of his walls, they laughed and marveled over the good times they had shared. Even Shikee’s retelling of the panther attack seemed good to Rob, although a thousand tellings had so twisted the tale that it was barely recognizable.

  E’shan continued to fail. Rob should come soon to see his grandfather. Croghan had gone from Aughwick. Some said he was with the white fathers in Philadelphia, Yes, Red Bird would make a good wife, although she had much to learn. Rob envied the looks shared by the pair, and he knew Shikee was in good hands.

  Alone on the creek, Rob had taken to sleeping on the hillside nestled within the security of sweeping hemlock boughs, but the evenings were lonesome. It was comforting to relax, sprawled by a warming fire, enjoying the presence of a strong and faithful friend.

  In the morning they breakfasted on a shad Red Bird had caught before the men rose from their blankets. As Red Bird assembled their few possessions for the return to Aughwick, Shikee insisted that their pemmican and double-handful of corn be left with Rob, who, he said, looked skinnier than a milk snake.

  Rob agreed to winter with them at Aughwick. He would come when the ground froze, and he could no longer work. But, lumber should be made when the sap was out of the tree. The wood weathered better and lasted longer. So, he would have to return to the Little Buffalo during February to drop the trees he had marked for his house.

  They left Rob’s camp, Shikee striding ahead and Red Bird bowed beneath their pack. Rob wished that Shikee could have stayed, but understood his reluctance to be long from the ailing E’shan.

  A short time after the pair had left his view, Rob hiked to the hilltop from where he could look west toward Castle knob. He glimpsed their figures moving steadily along and laughed as he saw the haughty Shikee bearing the pack with Red Bird tripping lightly behind. So much, thought Rob, for his friend’s masculine pretensions.

  15

  1751 – The Moose

  With the advent of cold weather, Rob’s building effort became miserable. His bed under the trees was cold and lonesome. The chill building stone was awkward to handle, and the creek water was biting to the touch. His hands and wrists chapped, and the skin split and smarted in the wet clay mortar.

  As the days shortened, he lost working time, and the poor hunting made even his small food demands a continuous effort.

  Having long grown out of his clothes, Rob wore tube-like Indian pants, each leg of which was separate and fastened to his belt by a thong. His moccasins were stuffed with meadow grass to keep out the cold. An old coat from David’s chest had burst at the seams but covered his chapped behind and hung halfway to his thighs. He wrapped an old cloth over his head and tied it under his chin to protect his ears and clapped a ragged hat on top of it all. He had fashioned clumsy mittens from rabbit skin to protect his sore hands and knew he would present a strange sight—if there had been anyone to see.

  An early freeze turned the creek solid, and Rob planned to give up for the winter. The ground was frozen, and he could dig no clay or loosen more stone. He had stones waiting to be rafted to the building site, and it dawned on him that he could save himself hours by skidding his stones downstream on slick, winter ice.

  He skidded stone after stone along the ice beaching them where they would be handy in the spring. He spent two days pushing rocks until all of the stone he had broken loose was moved downstream.

  Rob stomped around his foundation, studying the waist-high walls and decided that he was sick of all of it. He felt physically worn down and dirty beyond t
olerance. He was falling out of his clothing, his trade goods were all but used up, and he was living poorer than anybody he had ever known. He would head out for Aughwick, get Fat and Flat to make him some decent buckskins, see George Croghan about setting up some trading, eat heavy, and soak in a sweat lodge until he got to again feeling human.

  Making many trips, he emptied the old wagon, hiding everything it contained in a hollow within the hemlocks. It felt good to handle the familiar smithing tools, but he was anxious to be away.

  Since Shikee had gone, Rob had taken to hunting with David’s old Jaeger rifle. The Jaeger was short and handy, but it threw a huge lead ball and used a fistful of expensive powder. It was slow to load, and Rob thought it ironic that he, a gunsmith, had to use such an ill-suited weapon. The rifle’s range was superior to his bow, however, and saved him many hours of difficult stalking.

  Clad in his scarecrow garments and carrying the rifle, Rob left the Little Buffalo, crossed Tuscarora at Ickes Gap, and struck the great Tuscarora traveling path. A few miles short of Aughwick village, he began hunting. It would be prime to arrive at E’shan’s lodge bearing a gift of meat. It might offset some of his embarrassment at being so obviously out at the heels.

  He traveled silently along the base of the ridges, moving slowly, conscious of wind direction, trying to see before being seen. The wisdom of hunting close to a village the size of Aughwick was doubtful at best. Villagers ranged far providing meat for their lodges, and surviving game animals would be wily and alert.

  The woods lay cold and silent before Rob’s careful advance. No rabbits broke from the brush along the meadows, deer sign was old, and he found no fresh beds. Turkey sign was nonexistent. He crossed a ridge moving further from the trail into heavier timber, and deer sign was thicker. Game trails usually paralleled the ridges, but except for a few squirrels, nothing moved in the forest. Rob judged his chances as dismal.