Works of Robert W Chambers

by Robert W. Chambers

After ten minutes’ silent and swift advance, Thiohero came lightly to my side on the trail.

  “Brother,” she whispered, “was it well considered to let loose that Tree-eating rover in our rear?”

  “Would the Oneida take such a wretched trophy as that poor hunter’s tangled scalp?”

  “Neah. Yet, I ask again, was it wisdom to let him loose, who, for a mouthful of parched corn, might betray us to the Mengwe?”

  “Poor devil, he means no harm to anybody.”

  “Then why does he skulk after us?”

  Startled, I turned and caught a glimpse of something slinking on the ridge between our flankers; but was instantly reassured because no living thing could dog us without discovery from the rear. And presently I did see the Screech-owl run forward and hurl a clod of moss into the thicket; and the Saguenay broke cover like a scared dog, running perdue so that he came close to Hanatoh, who flung a stick at him.

  That was too much for me; and, as the Tree-eater bolted past me, I seized him.

  “Come,” said I, dragging him along, “what the devil do you want of us? Did I not bid you go in peace?”

  Thiohero caught him by the other arm, and he panted some jargon at her.

  “Koué!” she exclaimed, and her long, sweet whistle of the Canada sparrow instantly halted us in our tracks, flankers, rearguard, and all.

  Thiohero, still holding the Saguenay by his lean, muscular arm, spoke sharply to him in his jargon; then, at his reply, looked up at me with the flaming eyes of a lynx.

  “Brother,” said she, “this Montagnais hunter has given an account that the Maquas have prepared an ambuscade, knowing we are on the Great Trail.”

  I said, coolly: “What reason does the Saguenay give for returning to us with such a tale?”

  “He says,” she replied, “that we only, of all Iroquois or white men he has ever encountered, have treated him like a man and not as an unclean beast.

  “He says that my white brother has told him he is a man, and that if this is true he will act as real men act.

  “He says he desires to be painted upon the breast with a little red foot, and wishes to go into battle with us. And,” she added naïvely, “to an Oneida this seems very strange that a Saguenay can be a real man!”

  “Paint him,” said I, smiling at the Saguenay.

  But no Oneida would touch him. So, while he stripped to the clout and began to oil himself from the flask of gun-oil I offered, I got from him, through Thiohero, all he had noticed of the ambuscade prepared for us, and into which he himself had run headlong in his flight from the stones and insults of the Mohawks at the Big Eddy.

  While he was thus oiling himself, Luysnes shaved his head with his hunting blade, leaving a lock to be braided. Then, very quickly, I took blue paint from Thiohero and made on the fellow’s chest a hawk. And, with red paint, under this I made a little red foot, then painted his fierce, thin features as the girl directed, moving a dainty finger hither and thither but never touching the Saguenay.

  To me she said disdainfully, in English: “My brother John, this is a wild wolf you take hunting with you, and not a hound. The Saguenays are real wolves and not to be tamed by white men or Iroquois. And like a lone wolf he will run away in battle. You shall see, brother John.”

  “I hope not, little sister.”

  “You shall see,” she repeated, her pretty lip curling as Luysnes began to braid the man’s scalp-lock. “You think him a warrior, now, because he is oiled and wears war paint and lock. But I tell you he is only a wild Montagnais hunter. Warriors are not made with a word.”

  “Sometimes men are,” said I pleasantly.

  The girl came closer to me, looked up into my face with unfeigned curiosity.

  “What manner of white man are you, John?” she asked. “For you speak like a preacher, yet you wear no skirt and cross, as do the priests of the Praying Indians.”

  “Little sister,” said I, taking both her hands, “I am only a young man going into battle for the first time; and I have yet to fire my first shot in anger. If my white and red brothers — and if you, little sister — do full duty this day, then we shall be happy, living or dead. For only those who do their best can look the Holder of Heaven in the face.”

  She gave me a strange glance; our hands parted. I gave the Canada-sparrow call in the minor key — as often the bird whistles — and, at the signal, all my scouts came creeping in.

  “We cross West River here,” said I, “and go by the left bank in the same order of march, crossing the shoulder of the mountain by the Big Eddy, then fording the river once more, so as to take their ambuscade from the north and in the rear.”

  They seemed to understand. The Montagnais, in his new paint, came around behind me like some savage dog that trusts only his owner. And I saw my Oneidas eyeing him as though of two minds whether to ignore him or sink a hatchet into his narrow skull.

  “Who first sights a Mohawk,” said I, “shall not fire or try to take a scalp to satisfy his own vanity and his desire for glory. No. He shall return to me and report what he sees. For it is my business to order the conduct of this battle.... March!”

  We had forded West River, crept over the mountain’s shoulder, recrossed the river roaring between its rounded and giant bowlders, and now were creeping southward toward the Big Eddy.

  Already I saw ahead of me the brook that dashes into that great crystal-green pool, where, in happier days, I have angled for those huge trout that always lurk there.

  And now I caught a glimpse of the pool itself, spreading out between forested shores. But the place was still as death; not a living thing nor any sign of one was to be seen there — not a trace of a fire, nor of any camp filth, nor a canoe, nor even a broken fern.

  Moment after moment, I studied the place, shore and slope and hollow.

  Tahioni, flat on his belly in the Great Trail, lay listening and looking up the slope, where our Saguenay had warned us Death lay waiting.

  The Water-snake slowly shook his head and cast a glance of fierce suspicion at the Montagnais, who lay beside me, grasping his sorry trade-rifle, his slitted gaze of a snake fixed on the forest depths ahead.

  Suddenly, Nick caught my arm in a nervous grasp, and “My God!” says he, “what is that in the tree — in the great hemlock yonder?”

  And now we began to see their sharpshooters as we crawled forward, standing upright on limbs amid the foliage of great evergreens, to scan the trail ahead and the forest aisles below — these Mohawk panthers that would slay from above.

  Under them, hidden close to the ground, lay their comrades on either side of the little ravine, through which the trail ran. We could not see them, but we never doubted they were there.

  Four of their tree-cat scouts were visible: I made the sign; our rifles crashed out. And, thump! slap! thud! crash! down came their dead a-sprawling and bouncing on the dead leaves. And up rose their astounded comrades from every hollow, bush and windfall, only to drop flat at our rifles’ crack, and no knowing if we had hit any among them.

  A veil of smoke lay low among the ferns in front of us. There was a terrible silence in the forest, then screech on screech rent the air, as the panther slogan rang out from our unseen foes; and, like a dreadful echo, my Oneidas hurled their war cry back at them; and we all sprang to our feet and moved swiftly forward, crouching low in our own rifle smoke.

  There came a shot, and a cloud spread among the boughs of a tall hemlock; but the fellow left his tree and slid down on t’other side, like a squirrel, and my wild Saguenay was after him in a flash.

  I saw the Oneidas looking on as though stupefied; saw the Saguenay, shoulder deep in witch-hopple, seize something, heard the mad struggle, and ran forward with Tahioni, only to hear the yelping scalp-cry of the Montagnais, and see him in the tangle of witch-hopple, both knees on his victim’s shoulders, ripping off the scalp, his arms and body spattered with blood.

  The stupefaction of the Oneidas lasted but a second, then their battle yell burst out i
n jealous fury indescribable.

  I saw Tahioni chasing a strange Indian through a little hollow full of ferns; saw Godfrey Shew raise his rifle and kill the fugitive as coolly as though he were a running buck.

  Nick, his shoulder against a beech tree, stood firing with great deliberation at something I could not see.

  The three Frenchmen, de Golyer, Luysnes, and Johnny, had gone around, as though deer driving, and were converging upon a little wooded knoll, from which a hard-wood hogback ran east.

  Over this distant ridge, like shadows, I could see somebody’s light feet running, checkered against the sunshine beyond, and I fired, judging a man’s height, if stooping. And saw something dark fall and roll down into a gully full o’ last year’s damp and rotting leaves.

  Re-charging my rifle, I strove to realize that I had slain, but could not, so fierce the flame in me was burning at the thought of the children’s scalps these Iroquois had taken.

  “Is he down, Johnny Silver?” I bawled.

  “Fairly paunched!” shouted Luysnes. “Tell your Oneidas they can take his hair, for I shan’t touch it.”

  But Johnny Silver, in no wise averse, did that office very cheerfully.

  “Nom de Dieu!” he panted, tugging at the oiled lock and wrenching free the scalp; “I have one veree fine jou-jou, sacré garce! I take two; mek for me one fine wallet!”

  Down by the river the rifles were cracking fast and a smoke mist filled the woods. Ranging widely eastward we had turned their left flank — now their right — and were forcing them to a choice between the Sacandaga trail southward or the bee-line back to Canada by the left bank of West River.

  How many there were of them I never have truly learned; but that scarcely matters to the bravest Indian, when ambuscaded and taken so completely by surprise from the rear.

  No Indians can stand that, and but few white men are able to rally under such circumstances.

  The Screech-owl, locked in a death struggle with a young Mohawk, broke his arm, stabbed him, and took his scalp before I could run to his aid.

  And there on the ground lay four other scalps, two of white children, with the Little Red Foot painted on all.

  I looked down at the dead murderer. He was a handsome boy, not twenty, and wore a white mask of war paint and two bars of scarlet on his chin, I thought — then realized that they were two thick streaks of running blood.

  “May his clan bewail him!” shouted the burly Screech-owl. “Let the Mohawk women mourn their dead who died this day at West River! The Oneida mock them! Koué!” And his terrific scalp-yell pierced the racket of the rifles.

  I heard a gruffling sound and thick breathing from behind a pine, where the Water-snake was scalping one of the tree-cat scouts — grunting and panting as he tugged at the tough and shaven skin, which he had grasped in his teeth, plying his knife at the same time because the circular incision had not been continuous.

  Suddenly I felt sick, and leaned against a tree, fighting nausea and a great dizziness. And was aware of an arm around my shoulder.

  Whereupon I straightened up and saw the little maid of Askalege beside me, looking at me very strangely.

  At the same instant I heard a great roaring and cursing and a crash among the river-side willows, and was horrified to see Nick down on his back a-clawing and tearing and cuffing a Mohawk warrior, who was clinging to him and striving to use his hatchet.

  We made but a dozen leaps of it, Thiohero and I, and were in a wasp-nest of Mohawks ere we knew it.

  I heard Nick roar again with pain and fury, but had my hands too full to succor him, for a wild beast painted yellow was choking me and wrestling me off my feet, and little Thiohero was fighting like a demon with her knife, on the water’s edge.

  The naked warrior I clutched was so vilely oiled that my fingers slipped over him as though it were an eel I plucked at, and his foul and stinking breath in my face was like a full fed bear’s.

  Then, as he strangled me, out of darkening eyes I saw his arm lifted — glimpsed the hatchet’s sparkle — saw an arm seize his, saw a broad knife pass into his belly as though it had been butter — pass thrice, slowly, ripping upward so that he stood there, already gralloched, yet still breathing horribly and no bowels in him.... His falling hatchet clinked among the stones. Then he sank like a stricken bull, bellowed, and died.

  And, as he fell, I heard my Saguenay gabbling, “Brother! brother!” in my ears, and felt his hand timidly seeking mine.

  Breath came back, and eyesight, too, in time to see Nick and his Mohawk enemy on their feet again, and the Indian strike my comrade with clubbed rifle, turn, and dart into the willows.

  My God, what a crack! And down went Nick, like a felled pine in the thicket.

  But now in my ears rang a distressful crying, like a gentle wild thing wounded to the death; and I saw two Mohawks had got the little maid of Askalege between them, and were drowning her in the Big Eddy.

  I ran out into the water, but Tahioni, her brother, came in a flying leap from the bank above me, and all four went down under water as I reached them.

  They came up blinded, staggering, one by one, and I got Thiohero by the hair, where she lay in shallow water, and dragged her ashore behind me.

  Then I saw her brother clear his eyes of water and swing his hatchet like swift lightning, and heard the smashing skull stroke.

  The other Mohawk dived like an otter between us, and I strove to spear him with my knife, but only slashed him and saw the long, thin string of blood follow where he swam under water.

  My powder-pan was wet and flashed when I tried to shoot him, where I stood shoulder deep in the Big Eddy.

  Then came a thrashing, splashing roar like a deer herd crossing a marshy creek, and, below us, I saw a dozen Mohawks leap into the water and thrash their way over. And not a rifle among us that was dry enough to take a toll of our enemies crossing the West River plain in sight!

  Lord, what a day! And not fought as I had pictured battles. No! For it was blind combat, and neither managed as planned nor in any kind of order or discipline. Nor did we ever, as I have said, discover how many enemies were opposed to us. And I am certain they believed that a full regiment had struck their rear; otherwise, I think it had proven a very bloody business for me and my people. Because the Mohawks are brave warriors, and only the volley at their backs and the stupefying down-crash of their tree-scouts demoralized them and left them capable only of fighting like cornered wild things in a maddened effort to get away.

  Lord, Lord! What a battle! For all were filthy with blood, and there were brains and hair and guts sticking to knives and hatchets, and bodies and limbs all smeared. Good God! Was this war? And the green flies already whirling around us in the sunshine, and settling on the faces of the dead! —

  The little maid of Askalege, leaning on her brother’s shoulder, was coughing up water she had swallowed.

  Nick, with a bloody sconce, but no worse damage, sat upon a rock and washed out his clotted hair.

  “Hell!” quoth he, when he beheld me. “Here be I with a broken poll, and yonder goes the Indian who gave it me.”

  “Sit still, idiot!” said I, and set the ranger’s whistle to my lips.

  White and red, my men came running from their ferocious hunting. Not a man was missing, which was another lesson in war to me, for I thought always that death dealt hard with both sides, and I could not understand how so many guns could be fired with no corpse to mourn among us.

  We had taken ten scalps; and, as only Johnny Silver among my white people fancied such trophies, my Oneidas skinned the noddles of our quarry, and, like all Indians, counted any scalp a glory, no matter whose knife or bullet dropped the game.

  We all bore scratches, and some among us were stiff, so that the scratch might, perhaps, be called a wound. A bullet had barked de Golyer, another had burned Tahioni; Silver proudly wore a knife wound; the Screech-owl had been beaten and somewhat badly bitten. As for Nick, his head was cracked, and the little maid of Askaleg
e still spewed water.

  As for me, my throat was so swollen and bruised I could scarce speak or swallow.

  However, there was work still to be done, so I took Godfrey and Luysnes, the Screech-owl, and the Water-snake; motioned Yellow Leaf, the Montagnais to follow, and set off across West River, determined to drive our enemies so deep into the wilderness that they would never forget the Big Eddy as long as they survived on earth.

  CHAPTER XVI

  A TROUBLED MIND

  That was a wild brant chase indeed! And although there were good trackers among us, the fleeing Canienga took to the mountain streams and travelled so, wading northward mile after mile, which very perfectly covered their tracks, and finally left us travelling in circles near Silver Lake.

  I now think St. Sacrament must have mirrored their canoes — God and they alone know the truth! — for I never heard of any other Mohawks, or any Englishmen at all, or Frenchmen for that matter, who ever have heard of this Mohawk war party coming south to meet and rescue Sir John. Nor do our own records, except generally, mention our measures taken to stop the Sacandaga trail, or speak of the fight at the Big Eddy as a separate and distinct combat.

  It may be that this fight at the Big Eddy remained unnoticed because we sustained no losses. Also, we were losing our people all along the wilderness, from the ashes of Falmouth to the Ohio. I do not know. But my chiefest concern, then and later, was that the survivors among these Caniengas got clean away, which misfortune troubled my mind, although my Oneidas had a Dutch dozen of their scalps, all hooped and curing, when we limped into the Drowned Lands from our wild brant chase above.

  Now, my orders being to stop the Sacandaga Trail, there seemed no better way than to cut this same trail with a ditch and plant in it a chevaux-de-frise; and then so dispose my men that even a scout might remain in touch by signal and be prepared to fall back behind this barrier if Sir John crept upon our settlements by stealth.

  Fish House could provision us, or the Point, if necessary; and any scout of ours in the Drowned Lands ought to see smoke by day or fire by night from Maxon’s nose to Mayfield.