In the scouting of that morning Truman Flagg took an active part, and he alone of all who were out discovered the trail of the fleeing Ottawas. Following it far enough to assure himself that no unfriendly forest ranger had run across it, he turned his steps in the direction of the Seneca village. Here, although he was received with a certain coolness, arising from his participation in the incident of the previous evening, no affront was offered him, and he had no difficulty in acquiring the information he desired. Thus he was able to report to Major Hester, on his return to Tawtry House, that Mahng not only lived, but was in a fair way to recover from his injury, and that by means of swift runners the grievance of the Indians had already been laid before Sir William Johnson.
This report was confirmed on the following day, by the appearance of a delegation of Seneca chiefs, who brought a note from the governor, and demanded that Major Hester deliver to them the Ottawa captive. Sir William's note, though extremely courteous, was very firm, and contained an unmistakable order for restoration to the Senecas of their lawful prisoner. It also chided the major for interfering between Indians, at a risk of disturbing the friendly relations between the English and their Iroquois neighbors.
With the reading of this note an angry flush mantled the soldier's bronzed cheeks, and he seemed on the point of expressing his feelings in forcible language. Controlling himself with a visible effort, and bidding Truman Flagg interpret his words, he replied to the chiefs as follows:—
"Brothers: I have listened to your demand and find it a just one. The talking-paper of the white chief bids me deliver to you a prisoner known as Songa the Ottawa. The orders of the white chief must be obeyed, as I would obey this one were it possible to do so, but it is not. Listen. As I walked before my lodge, a stranger, whom I had never seen, ran from the forest and fell at my feet. He was bleeding from many wounds, and exhausted from long running. An enemy followed, and sought to kill him; when my son, a little child, threw himself across the stranger's neck and saved his life. Was not that a sign from the Great Spirit that he wished the stranger to live? Could I do less than was done by that little child? You know I could not. You know that no Seneca warrior would allow a man to be killed who sought his protection in such a manner. So I lifted this stranger and took him to my lodge. At the same time I told his enemy that I would keep him until an order could be brought from the great white chief for him to be delivered up. Now you have brought that order, and, were the stranger still in my lodge, I would deliver him to you; but he is not. He left me that same night. How, I know not. He was sore wounded, and was lodged in a secure place, but in the morning he was gone. I am told that he is a medicine man of the Metai. May he not have been removed by the magic of his circle? No matter. He was here and is gone. You look to me for him, and I cannot produce him. That is all. I have spoken."
A dignified old Seneca chief arose to reply, and said; "We have heard the words of my white brother, and we believe them to be true, for his tongue is not crooked. He alone of all white men has never lied to us. He says the prisoner is gone, and it must be so. But it is not well. Our hearts are heavy at the escape of so brave a captive. What, then, will my brother give us in his place, that the heaviness of our hearts may be lifted?"
"I will give you," replied Major Hester, "two guns, and ten red blankets, twenty pounds of powder and fifty pounds of lead, one piece of blue cloth, one piece of red cloth, and five pounds of tobacco. Is it enough?"
"It is enough," answered the chief, while the eyes of his companions glistened at the prospect of this munificent present. "But," he continued, "there was a woman. What will my brother give for her?"
"Nothing," answered the white brother, promptly, "for she was not your prisoner."
"Ugh!" grunted the Indians.
"There is also Mahng," continued the savage diplomat, whose rule of action was that of his white colleagues in the same service; namely, to give as little and get as much as possible. "What will my brother give him to help the healing of his wounds?"
"I will give Mahng a handsome present whenever he shall come to receive it, that there may be no bad blood between us," was the answer; and with these concessions the Indians expressed themselves as well content.
The proprietor of Tawtry House kept his word in regard to the presents; but Mahng never came to claim those set apart for him. Instead of so doing, he sent word to Major Hester that no gift, save that of his life's blood, would ever atone for the insult of that kick, nor wipe out the enmity between them.
"So be it, then, if he will have it so," replied the soldier, with a light laugh, when this was reported to him; but his wife turned pale and trembled as she recalled the undying hate expressed by Mahng's scowling face. Nor was the Ojibwa's threat an entirely idle one, as the settlers discovered to their sorrow, when several of their cattle were killed, an outbuilding was burned, and finally the major himself had a narrow escape with his life, from a shot fired by an unseen foe. Finally, these things became so annoying that Sir William Johnson notified the Senecas to drive Mahng from their country, or hand him over to the whites for punishment, unless they wished to forfeit the valuable annual present, sent to them by their great Father of England, an instalment of which was then due.
As the Diver was by no means popular in his adopted tribe, he was promptly carried across the Niagara river, and forbidden ever to set foot on its eastern shore again, under penalty of death. Having performed this virtuous act, the Senecas moved eastward to the long council-house of the Six Nations, which was located in the country of the Onondagas, where they were to receive their presents and share in the deliberations of their confederacy.
It was two months after the incidents above described, and several weeks had passed without an Indian having been seen in the vicinity of Tawtry House. So absolutely peaceful were its surroundings that the vigilance of its inmates was relaxed, and during the daytime, at least, they came and went at will, without a thought of insecurity.
This peace was rudely broken one morning by shrill cries from the Scotch nurse maid who, an hour before, had strolled with her infant charge toward the lake. She now ran to the house in an agony of terror, and uttering unintelligible screams. It was at first believed that the child was drowned, but finally the distracted parents gleaned from the girl's half-coherent words that she had left him in safety at some distance from the shore, for a single minute, while she stepped to the water's edge for a drink. When she returned he had disappeared, nor was there any answer to her calling.
For two days search parties scoured the surrounding forest, but without avail. There was not an experienced trailer among them, Truman Flagg being with Sir William Johnson at the Onondaga council-house. Toward the close of the second day, while Major Hester and most of his men were still engaged in their fruitless search, the heartbroken mother walked listlessly to the place where her child had last been seen. She had already been there many times, unconsciously, but irresistibly attracted to the spot.
On this occasion, as she was about to turn back, there came to her ear the cry of an infant. Like a tigress robbed of her young, and with blazing eyes, the bereaved woman sprang in the direction of the sound, and in another instant her child, alive and well, was clasped to her bosom. He had been hidden beneath the low-spreading branches of a small cedar, and she snatched him from a bark cradle, exquisitely made and lined with costly furs.
Like one pursued by a great terror, she fled to the house with her precious burden, nor would she permit one to take it from her until her husband's return.
When they examined the child they found him without scratch or blemish, save for a curious and inflamed disfiguration on his left arm, just below the shoulder. Though this soon healed, it was long before its mystery was explained; but when Truman Flagg saw it, he pronounced it to be the tattooed mark of an Indian totem.
In a new country the changes effected during sixteen years are apt to be greater than those of a lifetime in long-established communities. Certainly this was the case in North America during the sixteen years immediately preceding that of 1763. The bitter fighting between England and France for the supremacy of the new world that began with the signal defeat of the English army under Braddock, in 1755, was ended four years later by Wolfe's decisive victory on the Plains of Abraham. A year later France retired from the conflict and surrendered Canada, with all its dependencies, to the English. These dependencies included a long chain of tiny forts, about some of which were clustered thrifty French settlements that extended entirely around the Great Lakes and south of them into the valley of the Ohio. Among these were Niagara at the mouth of the river of that name, Presque Isle on the site of the present city of Erie, Sandusky, Detroit, Mackinac, Fort Howard on Green Bay, and Fort St. Joseph near the southern end of Lake Michigan. While from its commanding position the most important of these forts was the first named; the largest, and the one surrounded by the most thriving settlement was at Detroit. Here the fort itself was a palisaded village of one hundred compactly built houses standing on the western bank of the Detroit river. Beyond it, on both sides for nearly eight miles, stretched the prosperous settlement of French peasants, whose long, narrow farms reached far back from the river, though in every case the tidy white houses and outbuildings stood close to the water's edge.
The English settlements at the close of the war with France had not crossed the Alleghanies, and in the province of New York the western bank of the Hudson was an almost unbroken wilderness. Through the country of the Six Nations, and by their especial permission, a military route, guarded by a line of forts, had been established, though it was clearly understood by the Indians that all these should be abandoned as soon as the war was ended. This route began at the frontier town of Albany. Here the traveller left the clumsy but comfortable sloop on board which he had perhaps spent a week or more on the voyage from New York, and embarked in a canoe or flat-boat, which was laboriously poled against the swift current of the Mohawk river. Thus he passed the old Dutch town of Schenectady, Johnson Hall and Johnson Castle, Forts Hunter and Herkimer, and at length reached the head of river navigation at Fort Stanwix. From here a short portage through the forest led him to the waters of Wood creek, where he might again embark and float with the sluggish current to the Royal Blockhouse on the shore of Oneida lake. Crossing this, and passing under the walls of Port Brewerton at the source of the Oswego river, he would descend the swift waters of that stream to Fort Oswego on the shore of Lake Ontario. From here his course in any direction lay over the superb waterways of the great inland lakes whose open navigation was only interrupted by a toilsome portage around the great cataract of the Niagara river.
Beyond these few isolated dots of white settlements and the slender lines of communication between them, the whole vast interior country was buried in the shade of an unbroken forest that swept like a billowy sea of verdure over plains, hills, valleys, and mountains, screening the sunlight from innumerable broad rivers and rushing streams, and spreading its leafy protection over uncounted millions of beasts, birds, and fishes. Here dwelt the Indian, and before the coming of the white man the forest supplied all his simple needs. Its gloomy mazes were threaded in every direction by his trails, deep-trodden by the feet of many generations, and forming a network of communication between all villages and places of importance. So carefully did these narrow highways follow lines of shortest distance and easiest grade, that when the white man began to lay out his own roads he could do no better than adopt their suggestions.
With the coming of the whites, the life of the Indian was subjected to sudden and radical changes. Having learned of the existence and use of guns, knives, kettles, blankets, and innumerable other things that appealed to his savage notions of comfort and utility, he must now have them, and for them would trade furs. So the fur traders became important features of the forest life, and their business grew to be so immensely profitable that its control was one of the prime objects for which England and France fought in America. The little forts that the French scattered over the country were only trading-posts, and at them, so long as their builders ruled, the Indians were treated with a fairness and courtesy that won their firm friendship and made them stanch allies in times of war. But when the French power was broken, and the Indians, without at all understanding why, found that they must hereafter deal only with English fur traders, all this was changed.
There was no longer a war on hand nor a rival power in the land, therefore the necessity for conciliating the Indian and gaining his friendship no longer existed. The newcomers did not care so much for furs as they did for land. For this they were willing to trade rum, but not guns, knives, powder, or bullets. These must be kept from the Indian, lest he do mischief. He no longer found in the white man a friend, but a master, and a very cruel one at that.
It was now considered good economy to withhold the presents that in war time had been so lavishly bestowed on the Indians, and the one problem that the English sought to solve was how to get rid of the undesirable red man as cheaply and quickly as possible. The little trading-posts, in which he had been made a welcome guest, were now filled with red-coated soldiers, who called him a dog and treated him as such. He became ragged and hungry, was driven from the homes of his fathers, and finally began to perceive that even the privilege of living was not to be granted him much longer. He grew desperate, and his hatred against those who had driven away his kind French friends and brought about all his present misery became very bitter. He saw plainly that if he did not drive these redcoats back to the sea whence they came, they would soon sweep his race from the face of the earth. There seemed to be only a few white men and many Indians; but while the former were united under one great leader, the latter were divided into many tribes with many little leaders. If they, too, would only find some great chief, under whom all the tribes could unite, how quickly would they wipe out the hated redcoats and teach the English to respect their rights. Perhaps as soon as they began to fight for themselves the white-coated soldiers of France would come again to help them. At any rate, certain white men told them this would happen, and they were believed. If only they could find a leader!
Gradually, but with convincing proof, it dawned upon the unhappy Indians that a great leader had arisen among them, and was ready to deal the decisive blow that should set them free. To tribe after tribe and to village after village came messengers bearing broad belts of wampum and the crimson hatchet of war. They came in the name of Pontiac, war chief of the fierce Ottawas, head medicine man of the powerful Metai, friend of Montcalm, stanch ally of the French during the recent war, and leader of his people at the battle of the Monongahela, where stubborn Braddock was slain with his redcoats, and even the dreaded "long-knives" from Virginia were forced to fly.
Far and wide travelled the messengers of this mighty chieftain, and everywhere was his war hatchet eagerly accepted. Far and wide went Pontiac himself, and wherever his burning words were heard the children of the forest became crazed with the fever of war. Finally, the fierce plan was perfected. The blow was to be struck at every British post west of Niagara on the same day. With the fall of these, the triumphant forest hordes were to rush against the settlements and visit upon them the same cruel destruction that had overtaken their own villages whenever the white man had seen fit to wipe them from his patch.
While this movement had gained ground until the fatal storm was just ready to burst, it had been conducted with such secrecy that only one white man even suspected its existence, and his name was Graham Hester.
On the breaking out of the French war, Major Hester accepted his friend's invitation to remove his family to Johnson Hall, and make that his home during the troublous times that would render Tawtry House an unsafe place of residence. This he did the more readily on account of his wife's health, which was so precarious that, while the major was confident he could defend his forest fortress against any ordinary attack, he feared lest the excitement of such an affair might prove too much for the frail woman who was dearer to him than life.
Alas for his precautions! During the wearisome eastward journey, the travellers were drenched by a fierce storm of rain and hail that was followed by a chilling wind. So furious was the tempest that it was impossible to wholly protect the invalid from it, and in less than a week thereafter the noisy bustle of Johnson Hall was silenced for an hour by her funeral. So deeply did the rugged soldier feel his loss, that he vowed he would never again set foot in the house that had been hers, and that, as soon as he could make provision for his children, he would seek in battle for the king, that reunion with his loved one that death alone could grant.
The children thus deprived of a mother's tender care were Donald, now a sturdy lad of twelve years, and Edith, a dainty little maiden two years younger. The former was wise beyond his years in forest lore, which he had eagerly imbibed from the tuition of that master of woodcraft, Truman Flagg. At the same time he was sadly deficient in a knowledge of books and many other things that go to make up the education of a gentleman. Him, therefore, the major decided to send to New York to be fitted for the college then known as "King's," but afterwards famous under the name of "Columbia."
Against this decision the lad raised strenuous objections, declaring that his sole ambition was to become a soldier, and that such a one could learn to fight without the aid of books.
"True, my son, so he can, after a fashion," replied the major, gravely. "But, in the art of war, as in every other art, all our teachings come from those who have preceded us, and the most important of these are recorded in the books they have left for our consideration. Again, as the soldier of to-day is the modern representative of the chivalrous knight of olden time, he must needs be a gentleman, and an uneducated gentleman would be as sorry a spectacle as an unarmed soldier in battle. So, my dear boy, accept thy fate kindly and make a soldier's fight against the enemy named ignorance. Upon the day of thy graduation from King's College, if my influence can compass it, which I doubt not it can, a commission in one of His Majesty's American regiments shall await thy acceptance. I shall send our little lass with thee, and both she and thyself will be entertained in the household of Madam Rothsay, the widow of a dear friend of mine, who has agreed to receive you and fulfil, so far as may be, a mother's duty toward my motherless children."
The major escorted his children as far as Albany, where he embarked them, together with the Scotch nurse who had cared for both of them from their birth, on board a packet-sloop that should carry them to their new house. Having thus made provision for the welfare of his dear ones, the lonely man proceeded to fulfil the destiny he had planned by joining as a volunteer aid the army which, under General Johnson, was charged with the capture of Crown Point on Lake Champlain. In this campaign it was largely owing to Major Hester's soldierly knowledge and tactical skill that the French army, under Baron Dieskau, which had advanced as far as the southern end of Lake George, was defeated. For this victory Sir William Johnson was raised to a baronetcy and presented with a purse of five thousand pounds.
Through the war Major Hester fought with one army or another, always in the forefront of battle, as he was a leader in council; but never finding the boon of death which he craved. At length he stood with Wolfe on the lofty Plain of Abraham, and in the fall of Quebec witnessed the fatal blow to French power in America. In all this time he had never returned to the forest house that he had last looked upon in company with his beloved wife. Whether his resolution not to visit it would have lived to the end can never be known, for in the second year of the war a marauding party from an army, which, under Montcalm, had just captured and destroyed Oswego, reached Tawtry House and burned it to the ground.
After the surrender of Canada, Major Hester visited his children in New York City. Here he found his boy, grown almost beyond recognition, domiciled in the new King's College building, then just completed, and doing well in his studies, but keenly regretting that the war was ended without his participation. The white-haired soldier also found his daughter, Edith, now fifteen years of age, budding into a beautiful womanhood, and bearing so strong a resemblance to her mother that he gazed at her with mixed emotions of pain and delight.
During his stay in the city, the major was frequently consulted upon military affairs by the English commander-in-chief, Sir Jeffry Amherst, who finally begged him to accompany the expedition which he was about to send into the far west, under the redoubtable Colonel Rogers, of ranger fame, to receive the surrender of the more distant French posts.
"Rogers is impetuous, and needs a man of your experience to serve as a balance-wheel," said Sir Jeffry. "Besides, I want some one of your ability and knowledge of Indian affairs to take command of Detroit, the principal settlement and most important trading-post in the west. So, Hester, if you will accept this duty, you will not only be serving the king, but doing me a great personal favor as well."
Willing to continue for a while longer in active service, and having no other plan, Major Hester accepted Sir Jeffry's offer, and set forth on his long journey, joining Rogers at Fort Niagara, where, with the aid of cranes and ox-teams, the rangers were laboriously transporting their heavy whale-boats over the steep portage around the great cataract.
At length the little flotilla was again launched, and as it skirted the southern shore of Lake Erie, its every movement was watched by the keen eyes of Indian scouts, concealed in dense forest coverts, and reported in detail to the chief of that country; for never before had a body of British troops ventured so far into the interior. Finally, in one of their camps the rangers were visited by an imposing array of Indian sachems, headed by the great chief himself, who demanded the reason of their presence in his country.
When Rogers, in reply, had stated the nature of his business, the chief began a speech, in which he forbade the further advance of the English. Suddenly his eye rested upon Major Hester, who had just left his tent to attend the council. The speech of the Indian came to an abrupt pause, and gazing fixedly at the white-haired officer, he inquired if he were not the chief who dwelt in the great house of the two trees in the land of the Senecas.
"I did dwell there," replied the major, greatly surprised at the question.
"Does my brother of the two-tree house wish to journey through the country of the Ottawas?" demanded the chieftain.
"Certainly, I do," was the reply.
"For peace or for war?" queried the savage, laconically.
"For peace," answered Major Hester. "The war is ended, and we do but journey to take peaceable possession of those forts which the French have given over to the English."
"Ugh! It is good! Let my white brother travel in peace, for Pontiac knows that his tongue is straight, and that what he says must be true words."
With this the haughty chieftain, followed by his savage retinue, left the camp, and not another Indian was seen until Detroit was reached, though, as was afterwards learned, a strong body of Pontiac's warriors had awaited them at the mouth of the Detroit river, and were only restrained from attacking the flotilla by their leader's express command.
Neither Major Hester nor Colonel Rogers knew what to make of this curious behavior on the part of the powerful Indian who had evidently been determined to oppose their progress. The former could not recall ever having seen him or held intercourse with him, though, after he assumed command of Fort Detroit, Pontiac paid him frequent visits, and always evinced a strong friendship for the honest soldier, who invariably treated him and his people with consideration and fairness. Frequently, too, Pontiac complained to the major of the outrages perpetrated by other English commanders, their brutal soldiers, and the horde of reckless traders who swarmed through the country. He declared that if they were continued, the Indians would rise against their oppressors and sweep them from the face of the earth.
Fully appreciating the state of affairs, but powerless to alter it for the better, save in his own jurisdiction, Major Hester appealed to Sir William Johnson, begging him to visit the western country and use his powerful influence to quiet the growing discontent. This Sir William did with great pomp and ceremony in 1761, finding himself just in time to quell, by lavish presents and still more lavish promises, a general uprising of the Algonquin tribes. The peaceful relations thus established lasted but a short time, however, and within a year the aggressions of the whites had become more pronounced, and the situation of the Indians more desperate than ever. Pontiac had disappeared from the vicinity of Detroit, and for many months Major Hester had not seen him. At the same time he was well informed of the cruelties practised upon the natives, and foresaw that they could not much longer be restrained from retaliating in their own bloody fashion. Being unwilling to fight on the side of injustice and oppression, he at length prayed Sir Jeffry Amherst to relieve him from his command. This request was granted, and late in 1762 he was succeeded by Major Gladwyn, an officer with a brave record as a fighter and unhampered by any troublesome consideration of the rights or wrongs of Indians. Although thus relieved of his command, certain duties arose to detain Major Hester for several months at Detroit; and the momentous spring of 1763 found him still an inmate of that frontier post.
No rising sun ever witnessed a fairer scene than that presented by the little wilderness settlement of Detroit on the sixth of May, 1763. All nature was rejoicing in the advent of spring and donning its livery of green. The broad river, flowing southward with a mighty volume of water from four inland seas of which it formed the sole outlet, was lined as far as the eye could reach with the white houses and fertile fields of French farmers. From these, spirals of blue smoke curled peacefully, and the voices of cattle answered each other in morning greetings. A darker mass of buildings on the western bank denoted the palisaded village in which dwelt the British garrison, their wives and children, and some fifty fur traders, with their Canadian employees. The houses within the palisades, about one hundred in number, were mostly low, wooden structures, roofed with bark or thatch. The village was square in form, and while one side opened on the river, the other three were enclosed by wooden walls, twenty-five feet in height, with log bastions at the corners, and a blockhouse over each of the three gateways. Several pieces of light artillery were mounted on the bastions, and anchored in the river lay the armed schoonersBeaverandGladwyn. At some distance from the fort, both up and down the river, rose the smoke of populous Indian villages, for all the natives of that section were in from their winter hunting, and gathered at this point for trade. Over the placid waters light canoes occasionally darted from bank to bank. A boat brigade, bound for the far north, was just starting from the fort, and the Canadian voyageurs, gay with fringes, beads, and crimson sashes, caused the morning air to ring with a tuneful chorus as boat after boat shot away and stemmed the current with lusty oars.
Not far from the point of this noisy embarkation was another, though much less ostentatious scene of departure and leave-taking. In the stern of a birch canoe, paddle in hand and evidently impatient to be off, sat one of Rogers' buckskin-clad rangers, who was about to revisit his distant New Hampshire home, for the first time in three years. Near by, on the strand, stood two men, both tall and possessed of a military bearing. One, who wore the undress uniform of an officer, was elderly and white-haired, while the other, slender, and clad much as was the ranger in the canoe, was in the first flush of splendid young manhood. As these two stood hand in hand, the younger said: "Can I not persuade you, father, even at this last moment, to change your mind and accompany us? Poor Edith will be so dreadfully disappointed."
"I fear she will, Donald," returned Major Hester, with a sad smile, "but as this life is mainly composed of disappointments, the sooner she learns to bear them with composure, the better. I had indeed looked forward to taking this journey with you, to clasping my dear girl in my arms once more, and ere the year was ended to rebuilding Tawtry House, in which to establish her as mistress. With the war ended, I fondly hoped that a certain degree of happiness were still possible to me, and looked forward to securing it by some such means as I have just outlined."
"And is it not, father?" broke in the youth, eagerly. "Surely you have done far more than your duty here, and—"
"No man has done that, Donald, so long as there remains an unperformed task for which he is fitted," interrupted Major Hester, gravely. "So long as I believe a crisis in Indian affairs to be imminent, and that by remaining here I may be able to avert it, at least until the reinforcements which it is now yours to hasten can arrive, it is clearly my duty to stay. So off with you, lad. Don't run any risks that can just as well be avoided, and don't try to avoid any that, if successfully taken, will serve to speed your errand. Farewell, my son. May God bless you and keep you and bring your enterprise to a happy termination."
After the canoe had departed, Major Hester ascended one of the water bastions, where he watched it until it became a tiny speck, and finally vanished behind the projecting land then known as Montreal point.
Donald Hester had striven so manfully with his studies that he was finally graduated from King's College, well toward the head of his class, during the previous summer. Thereupon he had been rewarded with his heart's desire, an ensign's commission in the Royal Americans. To the new and fascinating duties of his chosen profession he at once devoted himself with such ardor as to draw favorable comment from his superiors. After serving at several posts he had, to his great delight, been transferred to Detroit, where the soldier father and soldier son, each more than proud of the other, were joyfully reunited after their years of separation. Here, too, he renewed his boyhood's intimacy with forest life, and eagerly resumed his long-neglected studies in wilderness lore, and woodcraft.
Although Donald was generally liked by his brother officers, he had no taste for the dissipations with which they sought to relieve the monotony of their lives. In place of these, he chose to take gun or fishing-rod and go off on long excursions in his canoe. On one of these occasions, when far down the river and in vigorous pursuit of a wounded duck, he had the misfortune to break his only paddle short off. In a moment he was helplessly drifting with the powerful current toward the open waters of Lake Erie. In this dilemma, his only resource was to paddle with his hands, and attempt by this tedious method to force his craft to the nearest shore. While he was thus awkwardly engaged, there came it ripple of laughter from close beside him, and he started up just in time to gaze squarely into the laughing face of an Indian girl, who instantly impressed him as the most graceful creature he had ever seen. She occupied, with a girl companion, a beautifully painted and ornamented canoe, which had slipped up to him with the lightness of a thistle-down. As the young soldier caught sight of her she was in the very act of tossing a paddle into his own helpless craft.
Then the strange canoe darted away like an arrow, while the only answer to the young man's fervently expressed thanks was a merry peal of laughter, coupled with an exclamation, of which he caught but the single word "ah-mo." These were wafted back to him as the flying canoe disappeared behind the point of a small island. With a desire to learn something more of the bewitching forest maiden, who had come so opportunely to his aid, Donald urged his own craft vigorously in that direction, but when he rounded the point there was no trace to be seen of those whom he sought.
So deep an impression had the olive-tinted face, the laughing eyes, and the jetty tresses of the girl who tossed the paddle to him made upon the young ensign, that they haunted both his sleeping and his wakeful hours; but, plan as he might, he could not succeed in seeing her again, nor did his cautiously worded inquiries serve to elicit the slightest information concerning her.
Perhaps it was well for the efficiency of the service that about this time Major Gladwyn selected Donald to be the bearer of certain despatches to Sir William Johnson, concerning the reinforcements and supplies that he expected to receive by the spring brigade of boats from Niagara. Major Hester, who had intended to return East about this time, suddenly decided to remain at Detroit a while longer. He therefore intrusted a number of private despatches to the young courier, both for Sir William and General Amherst. Besides its more important despatches, Donald's canoe was freighted with a large packet of letters from members of the garrison to distant friends and loved ones. Thus it set forth on its long and perilous voyage followed by fond hopes and best wishes from every member of the band of exiles left behind.
When Major Hester slowly and thoughtfully returned to his quarters after witnessing the departure of his son, he found sitting on the doorstep, and patiently awaiting his coming, a Canadian woman. Beside her stood her stolid-looking husband, whom the major recognized as a well-to-do farmer of the settlement, to whom he had granted some trifling favors while in command of the post.
"Good-morning, madame. Good-morning, St. Aubin. To what am I indebted for the honor of this early call? What can I do for you?" asked the old soldier, in answer to the humble salutations with which they greeted his approach.
"Ah! monsieur, we have come," began the woman.
"Certainment, we have come," echoed her husband.
"Jean!"
"Pardon, Marie."
"We have come with despair on account of the previous abounding kindness of monsieur, to divulge him—"
"A secret! A secret terrible!" exploded the old man, who was nervously standing first on one foot and then on the other.
"Jean!"
"Oui, Marie."
"If you have an important secret to confide, had we not better enter the house?" suggested the major, who saw from the excited earnestness of the worthy couple that something very unusual had occurred to agitate them.
They accepted this invitation, and the major finally gleaned from their combined and interjectory statements that on the previous day Madame St. Aubin, visiting the Ottawa village, had surprised a number of warriors in the act of cutting off the long barrels of their guns, until the entire length of each weapon was not more than a yard. Moreover, she had overheard an Indian who was somewhat under the influence of liquor boast that ere many days he would have English scalps with which to fringe his leggings.
"Has any one else seen these things or noted symptoms of uneasiness among the Indians?" demanded the major.
"Yes. Basil, the blacksmith, has been troubled for days by Indians begging for loans of files and saws, for what purpose they would not state."
"But why do you not carry this matter to Major Gladwyn, who is in command, instead of to me, who now possess no authority?"
"Because, monsieur, the commandant makes of us a jest and cares not to listen. Aussi, because we care not for him; but to you, monsieur, who have formerly turned many of our sorrows into joys, we wish not that harm should come. For ourselves, we have no fear. The savages will not harm the French. But for the English, whom they love not—well, there it is different."
"You think, then, that the fort is in danger?"
"Of an attack, monsieur. Yes."
"How soon?"
"Who can tell? Perhaps in one week. Perhaps even to-morrow."
"Will you come again this evening, before the gates are closed, and bring any further information you may gain during the day?"
"We dare not, monsieur. All the French are now too closely watched. This morning we sell eggs. In the evening it would be known that we had no business."
"If I leave the post an hour after sunset and walk just beyond the church, will you meet me there and deliver to me your information?"
"If it is possible, we will; for the thing that monsieur demands must be granted on account of his, ofttimes of the heart, kindness."
After the departure of these people, Major Hester thoughtfully made his way to the quarters of the commanding officer, whom he found at breakfast.
Gladwyn, though a brave man and a thorough soldier, was a high liver, inclined to dissipation, impatient of advice, and held an undisguised contempt for all Indians. To crown all, he was extremely jealous of the ascendancy over the native tribes gained by his predecessor in command, whom he cordially disliked and wished out of the way. On the present occasion he greeted him in courteous terms, but coldly and without rising.
"This is indeed an early call, major. I suppose I am indebted for the pleasure to the fact that Ensign Hester took an early departure, according to instructions, and your paternal instinct led you to speed his journey. I must confess my surprise that you did not accompany him. I suppose you are waiting for the opportunity of a more comfortable passage by schooner. For my part, I prefer the excitement of a canoe voyage; but I suppose as one grows old—"
"A soldier never grows so old as to forget his duty, Major Gladwyn," answered the elder officer, stiffly. "And I can assure you that only a strong sense of duty causes me to linger in a place where my presence is so evidently undesirable. But I have not interrupted your breakfast for the purpose of discussing personalities. I desire to lay before you a bit of information that has just come to my knowledge, regarding certain suspicious movements among the Indians, who, as you must be aware, are gathered about the post in unusual numbers. They are cutting off their gun-barrels to such a length that the weapons may be concealed beneath their blankets. I have this direct from St. Aubin, whose wife, visiting the Ottawa village yesterday, discovered its inmates to be thus engaged."
"It must have been an interesting sight," replied Gladwyn, carelessly, "but I fail to perceive what possible interest it can have for me. I suppose the rascals have learned that they can shoot just as effectively, or rather as ineffectively, with short gun-barrels as with long, and so have wisely decided to do away with useless weight. By Jove, Hester, I have laughed more than once at the shrewdness of our traders who sell cheap flint-lock muskets to the redskins for as many otter or beaver skins as can be piled between stock and muzzle, and have these trade guns built with an increased length each year. Rather clever, is it not?"
"It is a bit of infamous cheating that will sooner or later recoil on our own heads," replied the other, hotly. "But that is neither here nor there. The question is, whether or not the Indians mean to attack this post, and whether it is prepared for an attack in case they do?"
"If they only would, my dear sir, I for one should welcome it as a cheerful break in the deadly monotony of our lives in this forsaken place. As for preparations, you should be among the last to question that the troops of His Most Gracious Majesty of England are always prepared to meet any number of naked savages under any circumstances."
"That was Braddock's opinion," remarked Major Hester, grimly, "and he paid for it with his life. But granting that we are able to withstand an attack, are we prepared for a siege?"
"Oh come, major!" exclaimed Gladwyn, rather testily, "that question is rather a severe test of one's credulity. As if it were possible for a parcel of howling redskins to conduct a siege! No one knows better than you that their only method of fighting is a surprise, a yell, a volley, and then a retreat. They are absolutely incapable of sustained effort."
"Are you acquainted with Pontiac, the present war chief of the united tribes?" inquired Major Hester, coldly.
"Certainly I am, and a more conceited, ignorant, boastful, treacherous, cowardly, and utterly worthless bit of red humanity than he I have yet to meet. I have already warned him away from this section of country, and if he persists in remaining where he is so little wanted, I shall be obliged to teach him a lesson."
"Very well, major, if these are your unalterable opinions regarding the present state of affairs, I have nothing more to say, save to wish you a very good morning," replied the elder officer, as he turned to leave. "However," he added, "I shall still consider it my duty to report any further bits of information that may come to me."
"While thanking you, I beg you not to inconvenience yourself to do so," remarked Gladwyn, frigidly, and with this the interview ended.
That evening, while a dull glow still lingered in the western sky, though the shadows of dusk were fallen on the fort and its surroundings, Major Hester passed the sentry at one of the gates and walked slowly, as though for an aimless stroll, as far as the little French-Canadian church. On reaching it he detected a dim figure in its shadow and asked in a low tone, "Is that you, St. Aubin?"
"No, monsieur," was the answer, in a girl's voice, "but I am his daughter, and am come in his place, as he is detained by company. He bade me deliver a message to you alone and then hasten back." With this the girl almost whispered in the ear of the old soldier a few words that caused his teeth to clench and his heartstrings to tighten. She had hardly concluded, when an approaching step from the direction of the fort caused her to spring aside and fly with the swiftness of a deer.
"Who goes there?" challenged Major Hester.
"Pardon me, major," answered the well-known voice of the commandant. "I had no idea I was interrupting a tête-à-tête. In fact, I did not associate you with trysts of this kind."
"That will do, Major Gladwyn," interrupted the other, sternly. "I have but this minute learned that on the morrow Pontiac, with sixty of his warriors, all having guns concealed beneath their blankets, will demand to hold a council with you. The leader will make a speech, at the conclusion of which he will present a belt of wampum. Your taking of that belt will be the signal for a general massacre of every English soul within the limits of Fort Detroit, save only the one to whom the chief has presented his calumet."
"Do you believe this cock-and-bull story, Hester?" demanded the startled commander.
"Even now is the war dance in progress," was the reply. "Listen!"
At that moment a waft of night air bore to their ears the sullen booming of distant war drums and the wild chorus of quavering yells with which the frenzied savages across the river greeted Pontiac's declaration of war against the hated English.
"By Heaven, Hester! I believe you are right," cried Gladwyn, as he listened to these ominous sounds. "At any rate, I will accept your warning, and make such preparations as will show those devils that we are not to be caught napping."