Part 61 (2/2)
”The vile Witch-cat has been here many a time,” said the Grey-Feather, his ferocious gaze fixed on the cliff.
”Is the Mole dead?” I asked.
”He is with his G.o.d--Tharon or Christ, whichever it may be, Loskiel.”
”The Mole must not be scalped,” said Tahoontowhee softly. ”If the Senecas pa.s.s that way they will have at last one thing to boast of.”
I said to the Mohican:
”Hold the Erie. The Night-Hawk and I will go back and bury our dead against Seneca profanation.”
”Let the Grey-Feather go, Loskiel.”
”No. The Mole was Christian. Does a Christian fail his own kind at the last?”
”Loskiel has spoken,” said the Mohican gravely. ”The Grey-Feather and I will hold the filthy cat.”
So we went back together across the river, the young Oneida and I; and we hid the Mole deep in the bed of a rotting log, and laid his Testament on his breast over the painted cross, and his weapons beside him. Then, working cautiously, we rolled back the log, replaced the dead leaves, brushed up the deep green pile of the moss, and smoothed all as craftily us we might, so that no Seneca prowling might suspect that a grave was here, and disinter the dead to take his scalp.
Over the blood-wet leaves where he had fallen, we made a fire of dry twigs, letting it burn enough to deceive. Then we covered it as hunters cover their ashes; the Oneida took the Erie's hatchet; and we hastened back to the others.
They were still lying exactly where we left them. Neither the Erie nor they had stirred or spoken. And, as I settled down in my ambush beside the Mohican, I asked him again whether there was any possible way to provoke the Erie so that he might stir and expose some portion of his limbs or body.
The Night-Hawk, who carried strapped to his back the quiver of an Oneida adolescent containing a boy's short bow and a dozen game arrows, consulted with the Grey-Feather in a low voice.
Presently he wriggled off to where some sun-dried birch-bark fluttered in the river breeze, returned with it, shredded it with care, strung his bow, tipped an arrow with the bark, and held it out to me.
I struck flint to steel, lighted my tinder, and set the shred of bark afire.
Then the Night-Hawk knelt, bent his bow, and the blazing arrow soared whistling with flame, and fell behind the rock on the shelf.
Arrow after arrow followed, whizzing upward and dropping accurately; but the wet mosses of the cliff extinguished the flashes.
As the last arrow fell, flared a moment, then merely smoked, an insulting laugh came from aloft, and my Indians uttered fierce exclamations and cuddled their rifle-stocks close to their cheeks, fairly trembling for a shot.
”Dogs of Oneidas!” called the Erie. ”Go howl for your dead pig of a Stockbridge slave.”
”The Mole wears his scalp with Tharon!” retorted the Grey-Feather, choking with fury. ”But Tahoontowhee's hatchet is still sticking in the Senecas' heads!”
”For which the Night-Hawk shall burn at the Seneca stake, sobbing his death-song!” shouted the Erie, so fiercely that for a moment we lay silent, hoping that by some ungovernable movement he might expose himself.
”Taunt him!” I whispered; and the Mohican said with a derisive laugh:
”Four scalp-tufts from the mangy Cats of Amochol trim my hatchet-sheath. When the young men ask me what this spa.r.s.e and sickly fur may be, I shall strip it off and cast it at their feet, saying it is but Erie filth to spit upon.”
”Liar of a conquered nation!” roared the Erie, ”for every priest of Amochol who fell by Otsego under your cowardly butcher's knife, a Siwanois Sagamore shall burn three days, and yet live to die the fourth! The day that August dies, so shall the Sagamore die at the Festival of Dreams in Catharines-town!”
”I shall remember,” said I in a low voice to the Sagamore, ”that the Onon-hou-aroria is to be celebrated in Catharines-town on the last day of August.”
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