XIXIN FORT DUQUESNE AGAIN
This was tough. There was a lot of whooping and shouting when from the edge of the clearing over which floated the white flag of France above the log walls old Shingis uttered his prisoner yell; and there was a lot of joking and laughing—and disappointment, too—when he marched his prisoner in and they all saw that it was nobody but a boy.
But hold! What boy? Why, the boy who had run away last fall! Wah! Ugh! Hurons and Pontiac’s Ottawas recognized this boy; and Pontiac himself strode, scowling, to demand the prisoner of old Shingis.
Shingis and Pontiac had an argument about the matter. Then that seemed settled. Pontiac called, the Indians ran about grabbing things, and formed a long, double line, of men and women facing inward equipped with clubs and switches. The double line extended like a living lane to the fort gates.
The Hunter was to be punished by running the gantlet. He had to run through that lane while everybody took a whack at him as he passed; but when he came to the other end he was safe. Unless he was smart he would be well beaten.
Old Shingis plucked knife and hatchet from him, and shoved him forward to the entrance to the lane. Pontiac was watching.
“Now we see how fast a little bear runs,” said King Shingis. “Go in Mingo; come out Delaware,get hurt no more. Run!” And with another shove would have started him off.
But the Hunter had not waited to be shoved. In a great bound he had torn free and had ducked past the first two or three double files, who missed him entirely with their switches. On he sped, ducking, dodging, diving—stung with switches and battered at by hasty clubs, amid wild shouts and laughter.
He was more than half way when he dimly saw his chance. Just ahead an old Indian was waiting straddled and bent over, to land a good blow upon him. The Hunter suddenly ducked lower; right under between the old Indian’s legs he dived—up rose the Indian, down he came, but the Hunter was beyond, and outside the gantlet and scudding like a deer for those gates.
The lane scattered. A few of the Indians ran to head him off and hit him. These he dodged; they and the other Indians were not much in earnest now, anyway; he tore through a little knot of men at the gate and was inside. He had gained sanctuary, but when he stopped for breath he felt that he had been given a sound thrashing just the same, and had twisted his ankle. Maybe Pontiac would be satisfied with all that.
French officers were saying: “Smart little boy! Brave leetle fellow,” in French and English. Then he heard another voice in English:
“Hurt you?”
He looked. This was a white boy, about his size but maybe somewhat older, rather battered up and limping with a stick.
“No,” Robert answered.
“Come along with me. I’ll fix you,” the white boy bade.
He took the Hunter (hobbling proudly) to a house where there were medicines and a French doctor. The house was called a hospital. Here the few cuts from the clubs and switches were greased, but the cuts did not amount to much. He said nothing about his ankle.
The white boy’s name was James Smith. He too had been captured—had been captured in the woods of Pennsylvania and brought here; had had to run the gantlet, but had not got off so easily as Robert.
Now for a second time Robert found himself in Fort Duquesne of the French, and wondering how he was to get out. Nobody appeared to pay much attention to him, but the whole place was much excited, as if not knowing what to do. The army of English and Long Knives was coming.
The French and the Indians of course knew this. Spies were keeping watch; Indians were constantly passing in through the gates, with word of the English, and French parties hastened out to scout the trails. For the Hunter to get back to Gist and Scarouady and Washington might be difficult.
He saw Guyasuta, but Guyasuta pretended not to notice him and he put in most of the daytime with James Smith. James had been here for a week and more and had picked up much information.
The French officers were not the same as last fall. Contrecoeur who had driven Ward away was still commander; his captains were now men named Beaujeu, Dumas, and Ligneris. Langlade, the half-Ottawa, was here too; while inside and outside thefort there were the Indians—more kinds than the Hunter had ever seen together before.
A great many from the Big Lakes of the north—French Iroquois, the Hurons, Potawatomis, Ojibwas and Ottawas; besides Wyandots and Delawares and Shawnees and Mingos from the Ohio Country; all in their best costumes of bright blankets, fringed leggins, and beaded or quilled moccasins, and red, yellow and blue paint, with strips of black also.
Black Hoof of the Shawnees was here; Shingis, Beaver and Killbuck of the Delawares; Pontiac, the war chief of the Ottawas, and old Nissowaquet, head chief of all the Ottawas, whose sister was Langlade’s wife; Anastase, head chief of the Hurons; oh, a score of famous chiefs, all helping the French.
Outside there were games and feasting and much loafing about; inside, the French soldiers drilled and stood guard and loafed, as though the English army was not feared. Nevertheless it was feared.
“These French know they can’t fight off Braddock’s men and cannon,” said James Smith. “I’ve guessed that. They’re layin’ low and foxin’ so the Injuns won’t run away. The Injuns are scared, you bet.”
He was glad to learn from Robert that the army was indeed very strong.
This evening there was a council of the French and the Indians, to talk things over. On his way to the council Shingis passed the Hunter and James. He grinned, and he said:
“Ugh! Pretty soon English come. March like fools, all togedder. Easy see ’um. French an’ Injun shoot ’um all down like one pigeon. What white boy an’ leetle Delaware think of that; huh?”
That did not sound good. But in the morning it looked as if the council had not agreed, for the French did not march out, and neither did the Indians. They still waited, and the French officers acted rather glum. Captain Beaujeu (who was a handsome young man, slim and pink-cheeked) spent considerable time among the chiefs. He appeared to be arguing with them, and talking with Langlade.
This afternoon, when James Smith was sleeping and Robert was sitting alone, trying to figure upon getting away, Guyasuta came at last and sat beside him.
“Too bad you here,” said Guyasuta in the Seneca. “Maybe you want to go.”
“You fight the English, Guyasuta?” the Hunter asked.
“I fight the English,” said Guyasuta. “That big red-coat general does not know how to treat Indians. He sends for us, then he sends us away. He treats us like children, and so do his red-coat soldiers. I will not march around by his orders. But I do not fight Washington and Scarouady. They are my brothers. You can tell them so.”
“That is good, but how can I tell them?” answered Robert—with excellent reason.
“Yes,” said Guyasuta; “you ran off from here once and the Ottawa are mad. Now Shingis would make you his son. You are Delaware. You will have hard work to run off again. Wait and we will see.”
“I will wait till the English and the Long Knives come to take the fort; and that won’t be long,” replied Robert. “Then the French and their Indians will run, themselves.”
“Wah!” said Guyasuta. “Maybe. It is a great army, with big guns. I know, because I saw it; everybody knows. The council hasn’t decided what to do. There is another council tonight. The French are too few yet. The Indians ask the French captain how he expects their eight hundred men to whip four thousand with great guns. You must not try to run off. You had better wait. And I ask you not to tell that white boy that you have seen me. If I am known to be your friend then you will be shut up.”
“He goes with me,” said Robert, at once.
“Then you would be caught sure,” replied Guyasuta. “He is white, and he is too lame to run. Besides, he will be well treated. The Delaware keep him to adopt him, for they like him.”
Another council was held this night. The English army had been sighted nearer, and the excitement in the fort had increased. From the council room there sounded loud speeches, by the French and by the chiefs.
“What do you make of it, Rob?” Jim asked. “Is that war? You’re part Injun—you ought to know.”
“I don’t think so,” Robert answered. “Sounds like two minds, one yes, one no. Injuns are scared.”
When the council had quit there still were no signs of getting ready to fight: no running about inside; no war dances outside in the Indian camp.
After sunrise still another council was held, this time upon the ground not far from the very gates. Beaujeu the Canadian Ranger was there; and Langlade, Pontiac, Black Hoof, Killbuck, Beaver, Shingis and Anastase who had been chosen head chiefof all. The warriors crowded forward, to listen; words rose high. Beaujeu and Langlade pleaded, but the Ottawas, the Hurons, the Delawares, the Iroquois, even the Shawnees, held back.
Anastase finally stood, and dropped his blanket again.
“No,” he cried to Beaujeu. “We have told you that Onontio ought not to ask his children to die for him. Does my young father wish to die? It is not the part of wise men to fight four thousand with a few hundred. We know that the Mingos do not want this fort here, so why should we uselessly try to hold it for the French? We shall not march to certain death. The French should have brought more men.”
“Ugh! Look!”
A runner was pelting down from the woods for the fort. He came on across the cleared ground—he came with news and he arrived sweaty and panting.
The English army had forded a bend of the Monongahela below the old Fraser trading house! They were marching through the bend, to ford again above, near Fraser’s, only ten miles from the fort. They would be here soon, with all their soldiers and their great guns.
The council broke into a tumult and a hurrying about. No one seemed to know what to do. Then up sprang Beaujeu—and a gallant young figure he was, too, his head bare, his yellow hair floating, his eyes very blue and his face flushed.
“Listen!” he shouted. “Are you women? Do I see you afraid? The English are at the river. Nowis the time. Let us meet them on our own ground, where one man can stop twenty. Listen! I am resolved to meet them. It shames me to stay here. What! Will you let your father go alone against the enemy? Come, for he is certain of success.”
Those were the right words at the right moment. Who could resist the brave Beaujeu? A great yell answered him. Chief after chief shook his hand.
“Only wait. We will follow our father.”
Beaujeu ran inside. Soldiers hurried out, rolling barrels of powder and casks of bullets, and knocked the heads in, before the gates. Chiefs and warriors were painting; they paused only long enough to cluster around the barrels and casks and to scoop their powder flasks and bullet pouches full. Inside, orders were being shouted, and soldiers were lining up. It was to be war in the woods.
With James Smith, Robert the Hunter had been looking down upon this scene from the top of the palisade wall near the gates. Here they two clung; and in the excitement he had forgotten Jim, but now he heard him.
“They’re going to attack!”
“Yes. Surprise.”
“Where, you think?”
“Maybe at second ford. Good place, where army crosses second time, to get on this side.”
“How far?”
“Maybe ten mile, by trail to Fraser place.”
“You know?”
Robert nodded.
“Then you run, Rob. Tell ’em.”
“Leave you, Jim?”
“Yes. I’ve got to stay. I’m lame. Couldn’t get away anyhow. But you can look like an Injun.”
Just then Robert heard a hiss. Guyasuta had passed along under him. And he saw that Jim was very white, and weak, and had hard work even to hang to the palings. Washington must be warned! Guyasuta had signalled; so the Hunter only said “goodbye” and he dropped down and followed Guyasuta.