Little Oskaloo Part 13

He did not quail before the uncertain fate that stared him in the face; but resolved to meet it, dread as it might be, like a man.

The boat was drawn upon the bank, and lifted into the boughs of a huge tree, which told that it was not to kiss the waves again that night.

The Shawnee deposited it there while the young Seneca guarded the settler. But such vigilance was useless, for Oscar had resolved to attempt no escape that did not offer the best signs of success.

Having deposited the boat in the tree so well that none but the keenest of eyes could have found it, the eldest savage gave his companion a look, and the next moment a knife flashed in his hand.

Oscar thought that his doom was near at hand, for Parquatoc stepped forward, his scarlet fingers encircling the buckhorn handle of the keen blade. But though the youth's eyes flashed and his well-knit figure quivered, there was no gleam of murder in his eyes.

The Shawnee looked on without a sign of interference.

"The pale face has said that he does not hate the Indian!" the youth said.

"Why should I? He has never done me harm."

"But he kills the whites, and now the Blacksnakes come among his wigwams with rifle and torch."

"True; but the Blacksnake, as you call our great soldier, would not be marching into this country if the bad whites had not stirred up the tribes by lies and rum."

The young settler spoke with great boldness, looking straight into the eyes of the pair.

"The pale face hates the king's men and the renegades?"

"He does."

There was a moment's silence.

"Does he hate the White Whirlwind?"

"He hates Jim Girty with all his heart!"

The Shawnee nodded to Parquatoc with manifest satisfaction.

"Then let the pale man bare his breast."

For the first time since the landing, a pallor swept over Oscar Parton's face.

If the savages were friends to the Girtys, and there were few Indians who would not have followed them to death, his replies had fated him to die, and the command to bare his breast seemed to settle the question of his life.

He hesitated, but not through fear.

"Is the white man afraid?" asked the boy-warrior with a sneer.

"No!" was the quick reply, and the next instant the settler's hands were lifted to obey the command; but the deer thongs that bound them prevented him.

Parquatoc smiled, and cut the bonds.

Then Oscar tore his jacket open, and exposed his flesh to the Indian's gaze.

"The white man hates the British and the white renegades. He must join our band."

Then while the last word still quivered the speaker's lips, the knife flashed across his breast and a spurt of blood told that it had left a horrid trail behind. The youth did not fall, but remained erect, while the Indians regarded the work of the blade with satisfaction.

"Listen," said Parquatoc, laying his hand on Oscar's shoulder and looking straight into his eyes. "You are one of us now and forever.

There was a council the other dark (night) in the long hollow. The White Whirlwind came and raised his voice for war. Many chiefs followed him; but there were many more who were afraid to lift their voices for peace.

The Indian can't fight the Blacksnake. He will sweep them from his path as the hurricane sweeps the leaves from the trees. Parquatin, our brother, rose and spoke for peace. He told the council that war meant starving squaws, desolated maize fields, and gameless hunting grounds to the Indian. He called White Whirlwind a bad man, who would desert the red man to trail a white girl through the forest. It was a talk that made the Whirlwind mad; and there in the council before the a.s.sembled braves of seven nations, he drove his tomahawk into our brother's brain.

We have raised our hands to the Manitou like the white men do when they want to make their words strong, and said that we hate the palefaces who have lied the Indian into the fight. We strike at the renegade; we trail the White Whirlwind; and he shall die for the blow which he struck at the council in the long hollow. White man, you are one of us now. You carry the sign of the brotherhood. Wherever you go you will find red brethren. No other paleface belongs to us. In danger, show the mark; our people are many, and after the next great battle, the cold white faces among the tribes will not be few. You are free; but if you go with us we will step upon the trail of the white rose stolen from you."

To the young warrior's speech, uttered in that eloquence which now and then adorns the pages of savage history, Oscar Parton listened with wonderment and strange emotions. It is true that Parquatoc's words, as he advanced, prepared him for the finale, but his transition from thoughts of doom to freedom was yet swift and startling. He found himself initiated into a cabal of Indians who had sworn to make war against certain white people--himself the sole white member of the organization.

There was a something about the young Parquatoc that made the settler admire him; and now that he knew that Jim Girty had basely slain his brother, he saw a motive for the boy-warrior's intense hatred.

He resolved to cultivate his friends.h.i.+p; but he did not know how soon the bonds sealed that night were to be broken.

"Come!" said Parquatoc, breaking in upon his thoughts. "The light is not very far away, and we must not be here when the white arrows fall upon the river."

"But white man no gun," said the Shawnee, speaking for the first time since the landing.

"Never mind; gun come soon enough," was the Seneca's reply.

A moment later the tree and concealed boat were left behind, and the trio hurried from the river.

Oscar Parton walked beside the boy, never dreaming of escape, though his freedom had been restored, for his new brethren had promised to aid him in his search for Kate.

He was thinking about his thrilling initiation, and wondering what would come of it.

CHAPTER XIII.

A LOVERS' MEETING.

The reader will recollect that we left Harvey Catlett, the young scout, searching for John Darknight's trail on the banks of the Maumee. We will now return to him.

For a long time the youth prosecuted his search with vigor, confident that he would soon be enabled to strike the trail and start in pursuit of the treacherous guide, whose hands had, he doubted not, taken Kate Merriweather from the camp. But the minutes pa.s.sed without bringing him success, and he at last began to fear that the abductor had not landed at any point opposite the bivouac.

With this idea gaining strength in his mind, he resolved to rejoin his companion and suggest new operations. But Oscar Parton did not respond to his oft-repeated signals, and the young scout sought him in turn until the gray streaks of light announced the dawn of another day. He did not hear the boat that drifted past him in the night, nor catch a sound of the struggle between the living and the dead which was taking place on board.

He was inclined to charge Oscar Parton with desertion, attributing it to the young man's zeal for Kate's welfare, for whom he--Oscar--preferred perhaps to hunt alone.

"Well, let him go!" Catlett said at last, standing on the sh.o.r.e with the daylight in his face. "If he does not like to trail with me, I am sure that I will not lift a hand against him. He might have been a stumbling block, any way, and on the whole I am not sorry that he has rid me of himself."

Speaking thus--as the reader knows, unjustly--of Oscar Parton, the young scout started up the river. A few steps brought him to a rifle which lay on the ground. A glance told him that it belonged to the man whom he had just charged with desertion; but now he regretted his words. The discovery of the weapon told him that Parton was in trouble.

His keen eyes, used to the woods and their trails, could not show him any signs of a struggle, for the tide had removed the stranding place of the canoe, and after a long and unsuccessful search, Catlett looked mystified. He looked at the rifle, but it told no story of its owner's mishaps; it lay in his hands dumb--provokingly so.

"It beats me!" were the only audible words that escaped him, after a long silence of study and conjecture.