The brushwood which the Indians heaped against the door of Oliver Blount’s home, had been gathered on the edge of the clearing and was quite dry. The bark films were soon ignited by the flints, and in less time than we can record a single sentence, the little boughs were cracking in the ruddy blaze.
Segowatha, who, on account of his wound, lay at the foot of a tree some distance from the cottage, commanded his braves to draw back from the scene, and with a single exception they obeyed. That exception was Jules Bardue, the Yellow Chief, as he had been termed for several years. He had suddenly disappeared, though Segowatha made no inquiries regarding his absence, nor manifested any uneasiness about it.
The creole was a privileged character among the north-western Indians. He had not always dwelt among the tribes of the Illinois country. He had been an attache to Sir William Johnson’s estate in New York, and amid its beauties he first encountered the girl he now sought—Catherine Blount. Then she was a pretty little blonde of fifteen, and he a manly-looking fellow of one and twenty. He threw himself before Miss Kate whenever an opportunity presented, and when he discovered that the beauty did not love him—when, in indignant tones, she bade him remain from her side, he obeyed the instincts of a bad heart and grossly insulted her.
As young as she was—a mere child in years—Kate Blount had imbibed to no little degree her father’s resentful nature, and it was with great difficulty that the creole wrenched from her the pistol which had flashed from her bosom to avenge the insult he had offered.
To what violence his passion might have led we can only guess, for from among the shadows of the forest trees a veritable giant sprung upon him; strong arms encircled him, and, before he could think with calmness, he found himself stripped and bound to a tree. Kate Blount had suddenly disappeared, and before him stood her irate father, armed with a bundle of switches. Jules Bardue did not beg for mercy; he was not that kind of a man. On the contrary he gritted his teeth until sixty terrible blows had stripped the flesh from his back, and he was unbound and hurled almost senseless to the ground.
The next morning the creole, or Frenchman as he was called by many, did not make his appearance at Sir William’s lodge; nor was he ever seen near it again. He feared the wrath of Oliver Blount, and had left the country for his own and the country’s good.
He fled to the new Illinois; lived at Cahokia awhile, then joined the Pottawatomies, and became their Yellow Chief. He knew that Oliver Blount intended to emigrate to the Illinois country sometime, and the Yellow Chief’s frequent incursions into that Paradise told that he watched and waited for father and daughter—for his revenge.
Fully thirty paces from trader Blount’s cottage the Indians watched the progress of their devilish work, and when they beheld the flames licking up the door with their forked tongues, they exchanged “ughs” of supreme satisfaction. The besieged would not permit themselves to be roasted to death, and every minute the dusky demons expected to hear the submissive cry. A cordon of braves encircled the cottage thus cutting off the retreat of the doomed ones.
But while this was transpiring, a merciful Providence was interposing a saving hand, for a suddenly-gathered storm-cloud burst over the cottage; the gates of the upper deep opened, and threatened to deluge every thing.
The superstitious Indians, surprised and alarmed at this sudden burst of lightning and rain, left their stations and gathered around the wounded chief.
Despite his wounds, Segowatha sprung to his feet.
“Back to your places, braves!” he yelled, facing the shrinking savages with drawn tomahawk. “The Manitou merely waters the earth, and he will smile soon.”
Sullenly the warriors returned to their posts, and again the cottage was encircled by the tomahawk and scalping-knife.
The drenching rain, driven in upon the porch by the wind, effectually extinguished the flames; and when the storm at last had subsided, an Indian approached the house, to discover a door so charred that it must yield to a slight assault.
Not a sound proceeded from the cottage, and the Indians, who now crept forward like snakes to the attack, wondered at the silence. When they reached the foot of the porch they rose in a body and threw themselves against the door.
It made no resistance, and the savages, with horrible yells, rushed pell-mell into the cottage. Beyond the portal they met a determined resistance, but it was from a dog. With an almost human yell, Pontiac darted at the foremost Indian’s throat, and dragged the torn wretch to the floor. The entire band sprung upon the dog, and a minute later he was literally hacked to pieces with their knives.
Where were Kate Blount and the hunted Peoria?
The savages rushed into the second chamber; but it was tenantless. The ladder which was wont to invite ingress to the attic was missing, and with some difficulty the red demons gained the upper story. A moment later a yell of mingled rage and disappointment pealed from their throats, and while it echoed throughout the gloomy recesses of the drenched forest, they congregated beneath an opening in the roof, and gazed bewildered at the stars which seem to laugh at their defeat.
The birds had flown!
Segowatha greeted this announcement with a groan of rage, and in angry tones he summoned the rear guards into his presence. Tremblingly they approached, and told him that while they guarded the house, the twain had not escaped.
“But while you acted like squaws they crept from the lodge,” cried the War Wolf with terrific mien. “I will have no such braves with me!”
As he spoke he buried his hatchet in the brain of the foremost guard, and turned with murderous intention upon the second. But, his strength failed him; the weapon dropped from his hand, and a sub-chief supported him with his arms.
“Shall we throw ourselves upon the snake’s trail?”
“No, no!” said Segowatha, his face suddenly growing pale, and a convulsive shudder passing over his giant frame. “The War Wolf must go to his people; the Peoria’s bullet struck deep. Segowatha is near the dark river. But give the snake’s den to the fire, and call the Yellow Chief back.”
With the bare thought of their war-chief’s approaching end, the savages gave themselves over to a rage which knew no bounds, and defies description.
They flew to the work of destruction; they ripped the weather boarding from the cottage, and split it with their hatchets, piling it in the lower rooms. Presently the flints were applied again, and soon Oliver Blount’s home was wrapped in flames. While the tongues of fire licked up the toil of years, a chief repeated the shrill cry of the night-hawk three times in rapid succession. Then they waited anxiously for the coming of some one, but, whoever that one was, he did not come.
The demons danced about the trader’s burning home; they tore down the neat fence that surrounded it, and cast it into the fire; they applied their hatchets to the beautiful silver maples which afforded delicious shade, and gave them to the devouring element. In short, they spared nothing, even tearing up the broad stones which led to the well, and hurling them with terrible yells after the trees.
At last the cottage was destroyed, and, ready for more hellish work, the Indians turned to Segowatha for orders. The dying chief, for it was plain that he was approaching the river of death, smiled upon their work and inquired regarding the creole.
“He comes not,” answered a young chief—the Lone Wolf, “like a cowardly dog he has deserted us. We will whip him with canes when he sneaks back to our lodges.”
“The Yellow Chief went to watch the spot where the fur-trader keeps his boat,” said Segowatha. “But Segowatha can not dream why he comes not. He must have heard the hawk cry.”
“He may have filled his ears with leaves,” said Lone Wolf, who, though a Pottawatomie, bore no good thoughts for Jules Bardue. “He watches yet, perhaps. We will hunt the dog.”
Touching a warrior’s arm lightly, the young Indian bounded toward Cahokia Creek, followed by the red-skin whom his touch had summoned.
A path led from the cottage to the creek, which almost encircled it, and the two Indians were not long in reaching the stream. Suddenly Lone Wolf’s companion uttered an “ugh” expressive of horror, and dropped before a dark object which lay near the water.
“The Yellow Chief!” exclaimed Lone Wolf.
A brief examination proved the creole to be still living, and just recovering from the deathly swoon into which a terrible blow had hurled him.
A glance about the star-lit spot showed evidences of a fierce struggle, and the missing boat told the result of the combat.
The Indians lifted the Yellow Chief and bore him to Segowatha.
The War Wolf raised himself on his elbow, and for a long time looked down into the creole’s face without speaking.
“Segowatha leads the red-men of the big lake no more,” he said, at last, in the calmest of tones, which the Indian loves to assume when he stands upon the threshold of death. “The Manitou grips his hand now, and the War Wolf must go. Warriors—Pottawatomies, Ojibwas,” his eyes swept the circle of tawny faces, “who followed Segowatha hither, you must swear.”
In the momentary pause that followed, thirty hatchets flew aloft, and thirty hands covered the hearts of their respective owners.
“Swear!” cried the dying War Wolf—“swear to hunt to earth the Peoria skunk and the white house-snake who crawls after him. Swear to tear the hearts from all whom she loves—her bearded father, the Pale Giant, and the boy with long hair. Segowatha hates them all!”
“We swear!” cried Lone Wolf. “Warriors, by our chieftain’s blood we swear all this.”
With the last word the young brave dyed his hands in the warm blood that gushed afresh from Segowatha’s wounds, and the other red-skins followed his example.
“I swear, too!” unexpectedly cried a voice in French, and, raising himself with a mighty effort, the Yellow Chief thrust his hand into Segowatha’s blood. “Ha! ha! we will hunt them down—the fugitives of the Illinois! Oh, that they were here now!”
Exhaustion then again followed, and he dropped to the ground, and a moment later a terrific yell, uttered simultaneously by thirty pair of lips, told that the mighty War Wolf of the Pottawatomies had stepped into the impenetrable future.
Over Segowatha’s corpse an Ojibwa dropped with a groan, and two others staggered to their feet to fall to the earth, a second later, wounded to the death.
The uninjured red-skins griped their rifles; but not a foe was to be seen. Everywhere the silence of death reigned supreme!