The Hidden Children

And here, on a low, bushy ridge, we lay all day, seeing in the forest not one living thing, nor any movement in that dim solitude, save where the grey and wraith-like water tossed a flat crest against some fallen tree, or its dull and sullen surface gleamed like lead athwart the valley far ahead.

My Indians squatted, or sprawled prone along the ridge; Lois lay flat on her stomach beside me, her chin resting on her clasped hands. We talked of many things that afternoon—of life as we had found it, and what it promised us—of death, if we must find it here in these woods before I made her mine. And of how long was the spirit's trail to God—if truly it were but a swift, upward flight like to the rushing of an arrow already flashing out of sight ere the twanging buzz of the bow-string died on the air. Or if it were perhaps a long, slow, painful journey through thick night, toilsome, blindly groping, wings adroop trailing against bruised heels. Or if we two must pass by hell, within sight and hearing of the thunderous darkness, and feel the rushing wind of the pit hot on one's face.

Sometimes, like a very child, she prattled of happiness, which she had never experienced, but meant to savour, wedded or not—talked to me there of all she had never known and would now know and realize within her mother's tender arms.

"And sometimes, Euan, dreaming of her I scarce see how, within my heart, I can find room for you also. Yet, I know well there is room for both of you, and that one without the other would leave my happiness but half complete.... I wonder if I resemble her? Will she know me—and I her? How shall we meet, Euan—after more than a score of years? She will see my moccasins, and cry out! She will see my face and know me, calling me by name! Oh, happiness! Oh, miracle! Will the night never come!"

"Dear maid and tender! You should not build your hopes too high, so that they crush you utterly if they must fall to earth again."

"I know. Amochol may have slain her. We will learn all when you take Amochol—when God delivers him into your hands this night.... How will you do it, Euan?"

"Take him, you mean?"

"Aye."

"We lie south, just outside the fire-ring's edge. Boyd watches them from the north. His signal to us begins the business. We leap straight for the altar and take Amochol at its very foot, the while Boyd's heavy rifles deal death on every side, keeping the others busy while we are securing Amochol. Then we all start south for the army, God willing, and meet our own people on the high-ridge east of us."

"But Yndaia!"

"That we will scour the instant we have Amochol."

"You promise?"

"Dearest, I promise solemnly. Yet—I think—if your mother lives—she may be here in Catharines-town tonight. This is the Dream Feast, Lois. I and my Indians believe that she has bought her life of Amochol by dreaming for them. And if this be true, and she has indeed become their Prophetess and Interpreter of Dreams, then this night she will be surely here to read their dreams for them."

"Will we see her before you begin the attack?"

"Little Lois, how can I tell you such things? We are to creep up close to the central fire—as close as we dare."

"Will there be crowds of people there?"

"Many people."

"Warriors?"

"Not many. They are with Hiokatoo and Brant. There will be hunters and Sachems, and the Cat-People, and the Andastes pack, and many women. The False Faces will not be there, nor the Wyoming Witch, nor the Toad Woman, because all these are now with Hiokatoo and Walter Butler. For which I thank God and am very grateful."

"How shall I know her in this fire-lit throng?" murmured Lois, staring ahead of her where the evening dusk had now veiled the nearer trees with purple.

Before I could reply, the Sagamore rose from his place on my left, and we all sprang lightly to our feet, looked to our priming, covered our pans, and trailed arms.

"Now!" he muttered, passing in front of me and taking the lead; and we all filed after him through the open forest, moving rapidly, almost on a run, for half a mile, then swung sharply out to the right, where the trees grew slimmer and thinner, and plunged into a thicket of hazel and osier.

"I smell smoke," whispered Lois, keeping close to me.

I nodded. Presently we halted and stood in silence, minute after minute, while the purple dusk deepened swiftly around us, and overhead a few stars came out palely, as though frightened.

Then Mayaro dropped noiselessly to the ground and began to crawl forward over the velvet moss; and we followed his example, feeling our way with our right hands to avoid dry branches and rocks. From time to time we paused to regain our strength and breathe; and the last time we did so the aromatic smell of birch-smoke blew strong in our nostrils, and there came to our ears a subdued murmur like the stirring of pine-tops in a steady breeze. But there were no pines around us now, only osier, hazel, and grey-birch, and the deep moss under foot.

"A house!" whispered the Yellow Moth, pointing.

There it stood, dark and shadowy against the north. Another loomed dimly beyond it; a haystack rose to the left.

We were in Catharines-town.

And now, as we crawled forward, we could see open country on our left, and many unlighted houses and fields of corn, dim and level against the encircling forest. The murmur on our right had become a sustained and distinct sound, now swelling in the volume of many voices, now subsiding, then waxing to a dull tumult. And against the borders of the woods, like a shining crimson curtain shifting, we could see the red reflection of a fire sweeping across the solid foliage.

With infinite precautions, we moved through the thicket toward it, the glare growing yellower and more brilliant as we advanced. And now we remained motionless and very still.

Massed against the flare of light were crowded many people in a vast, uneven circle ringing a great central fire, except at the southern end. And here, where the ring was open so that we could see the huge fire itself, stood a great, stone slab on end, between two round mounds of earth. It was the altar of Amochol, and we knew it instantly, where it stood between the ancient mounds raised by the Alligewi.

The drums had not yet begun while we were still creeping up, but they began now, muttering like summer thunder, the painted drummers marching into the circle and around it twice before they took their places to the left of the altar, squatting there and ceaselessly beating their hollow sounding drums. Then, in file, the eight Sachems of the dishonoured Senecas filed into the fiery circle, chanting and timing their slow steps to the mournful measure of their chant. All wore the Sachem's crest painted white; their bodies were most barbarously striped with black and white, and their blankets were pure white, crossed by a single blood-red band.

What they chanted I could not make out, but that it was some blasphemy which silently enraged my Indians was plain enough; and I laid a quieting hand on the Sagamore's shaking arm, cautioning him; and he touched the Oneidas and the Stockbridge, one by one, in warning.

Opposite us, the ruddy firelight played over the massed savages, women, children, and old men mostly, gleaming on glistening eyes, sparkling on wampum and metal ornaments. To the right and left of us a few knives and hatchets caught the firelight, and many multi-coloured plumes and blankets glowed in its shifting brilliancy.

The eight Sachems stood, tall and motionless, behind the altar; the drumming never ceased, and from around the massed circle rose a low sing-song chant, keeping time to the hollow rhythm of the drums:

[22 - "Now again they decided and said: 'This shall be done!'"]"Onenh are oya
Egh-des-ho-ti-ya-do-re-don
Nene ronenh
'Ken-ki-ne ne-nya-wenne!"

Above this rumbling undertone sounded the distant howling of dogs in Catharines-town; and presently the great forest owls woke up, yelping like goblins across the misty intervale. Strangely enough, the dulled pandemonium, joined in by dog and owl and drum and chanting savages, made but a single wild and melancholy monotone seeming to suit the time and place as though it were the voice of this fierce wilderness itself.

Now into the circle, one by one, came those who had dreamed and must be answered—not as in the old-time and merry Feast of Dreams, where the rites were harmless and the mirth and jollity innocent, if rough—for Amochol had perverted the ancient and innocent ceremony, making of a fourteen-day feast a sinister rite which ended in a single night.

I understood this more clearly now, as I lay watching the proceedings, for I had seen this feast in company with Guy Johnson on the Kennyetto, and found in it nothing offensive and no revolting license or blasphemy, though others may say this is not true.

Yet, how can a rite which begins with three days religious services, including confession of sins on wampum, be otherwise than decent? As for the rest of the feast, the horse-play, skylarking, dancing, guessing contests—the little children's dance on the tenth day, the Dance for Four on the eleventh, the Dance for the Eight Thunders on the thirteenth—the noisy, violent, but innocent romping of the False Faces—all this I had seen in the East, and found no evil in it and no debauchery.

But what was now already going on I had never seen at any Iroquois feast or rite, and what Amochol had made of this festival I dared not conjecture as I gazed at the Dreamers now advancing into the circle with an abandon and an effrontery scarcely decent.

Six young girls came first, naked except for a breadth of fawn-skin falling from waist to instep. Their bodies were painted vermilion from brow to ankle; they carried in their hands red harvest apples, which they tossed one to another as they move lightly across the open space in a slow, springy, yet not ungraceful dance.

Behind them came a slim maid, wearing only a black fox-head, and the soft pelt dangling from her belt, and the tail behind. She was painted a ruddy yellow everywhere except a broad line of white in front, like a fox's belly; and, like a fox, too, her feet and hands were painted black.

Following her came eight girls plumed in spotless white and clothed only in white feathers—aping the Thunders, doubtless; but even to me, a white man and a Christian, it was a sinister and evil sight to see this mockery as they danced forward, arms entwined, and the snowy plumes floating out in the firelight, disclosing the white painted bodies which the firelight tinted with rose and amber lights.

Then came dancing other girls, dressed in most offensive mockery of the harmless and ancient rite—first the Fire Keeper, crowned with oak leaves instead of wild cherry, and wearing a sewed garment made of oak twigs and tufted leaves, from which the acorns hung. Followed two girls in cloaks of shimmering pine-needles, and wearing wooden masks, dragging after them the carcasses of two white dogs, to "Clothe the Moon Witch!" they cried to the burly Erie acolyte who followed them, his heavy knife shining in his hand.

Then the Erie disemboweled the strangled dogs, cast their entrails into the fire, and kicked aside the carcasses, shouting:

"Atensi stands naked upon the Moon! What shall she wear to cover her?"

"The soft hide of a Hidden Child!" answered a Sachem from behind the altar. "We have so dreamed it."

"It shall be done!" cried the Erie; and, lifting himself on tip toe, he threw back his brutal head and gave the Panther Cry so that his voice rang hideously through the night.