The Hidden Children

[* "My foot? I consent."]

"The other one also."

"The other one also."

* "Neah-wenh-a, O Loskiel. I shall presently slay you and go to sleep."

[* "I thank you."]

There fell a silence, then:

"Do you not know in your heart how it is with me?" I said unsteadily.

She lay down, facing me.

"In my heart I know, beloved above all men! But I am like a child with you--desiring to please, ardent, confused, unaccustomed. And everything you say delights me--and all you do--or refrain from doing--thrills me with content.... It was so true and sweet of you to leave my lips untouched. I adore you for it--but then I had adored you if you had kissed me, also. Always, your decision pleasures me."

After a long while I spoke cautiously. She lay asleep, her lips scarce parted; but in her sleep she seemed to hear my voice, for one arm stole out in the dark and closed around my neck.

And so we lay until the dark forms gliding from the forest summoned me to mount my guard, and Lois awoke with a little sigh, sat upright, then sprang to her feet to face the coming dawn alone with me.

CHAPTER XIX

AMOCHOL

By daybreak we had salted our parched corn, soaked, and eaten it, and my Indians were already freshening their paint. The Sagamore, stripped for battle, barring clout and sporran, stood tall and powerfully magnificent in his white and vermilion hue of war. On his broad chest the scarlet Ghost Bear reared; on his crest the scarlet feathers slanted low. The Yellow Moth was unbelievably hideous in the poisonous hue of a toad-stool; his crest and all his skin glistened yellow, s.h.i.+ning like the sulphurous belly of a snake. But the Grey-Feather was ghastly; his bony features were painted like a skull, spine, ribs, and limb-bones traced out heavily in yellowish white so that he seemed a stalking and articulated skeleton as he moved in the dim twilight of the trees. And I could see that he was very proud of the effect.

As for the young and ambitious Night Hawk, he had simply made one murderous symbol of himself--a single and terrific emblem of his entire body, for he was painted black from head to foot like an Iroquois executioner, and his skin glistened as the plumage of a sleek crow s.h.i.+nes in the sunlight of a field. Every scalp-lock was neatly braided and oiled; every crown shaven; every knife and war-axe and rifle-barrel glimmered silver bright under the industrious rubbing; flints had been renewed; with finest priming powder pans reprimed; and now all my Indians squatted amiably together in perfect accord, very loquacious in their guarded voices, Iroquois, Mohican, and Stockbridge, foregathering as though there had never been a feud in all the world.

Through the early dusk of morning, Lois had stolen away, having discovered a spring pool to bathe in, the creek water being dark and bitter; and I had freshened myself, too, when she returned, her soft cheeks abloom, and the crisp curls still wet with spray.

When we had eaten, the Sagamore rose and moved noiselessly down the height of land to the trail level,

Behind her trotted in order the Yellow Moth, Tohoontowhee, and lastly the Grey-Feather--"Like Father Death herding us all to destruction,"

whispered Lois in my ear, as I halted while the Sagamore surveyed the trail ahead with cautious eyes.

As we moved forward once more, I glanced around at Lois and thought I never had seen such fresh and splendid vigor in any woman. Nor had I ever seen her in such a bright and happy spirit, as though the nearness to the long sought goal was changing her every moment, under my very eyes, into a lovelier and more radiant being than ever had trod this war-scarred world.

While we had eaten our hasty morning meal, I had told her what I had learned of the Vale Yndaia; and this had excited her more than anything I ever saw to happen to her, so that her grey eyes sparkled with brilliant azure lights, and the soft colour flew from throat to brow, waxing and waning with every quick-drawn breath.

She wore also, and for the first time, the "moccasins for flying feet"--and ere she put them on she showed them to me with eager and tender pride, kissing each soft and beaded shoe before she drew it over her slender foot. Around her throat, lying against her heart, nestled her father's faded picture. And as we sped I could hear her murmuring to herself:

"Jean Coeur! Jean Coeur! Enfin! Me voici en chemin!"

North, always north we journeyed, moving swiftly on a level runway, or, at fault, checked until the Sagamore found the path, sometimes picking our dangerous ways over the glistening bog, from swale to log, now leaping for some solid root or bunch of weed, now swinging across quicksands, hanging to tested branches by our hands.

Duller grew the light as the foliage overhead became denser, until we could scarce see the warning glimmer of the bog. Closer, taller, more unkempt grew the hemlocks on every hand. In the ghostly twilight we could not distinguish their separate spectral trunks, so close they grew together. And it seemed like two solid walls through which wound a dusky corridor of mud and bitter tasting water.

Then, far ahead a level gleam caught my eye. Nearer it grew and brighter; and presently out of the grewsome darkness of the swamp we stepped into a lovely oval intervale of green ferns and gra.s.ses, set with oak trees, and a clear, sweet thread of water das.h.i.+ng through it, and spraying the tall ferns along its banks so that they quivered and glistened with the sparkling drops. And here we saw a little bird flitting--the first we had seen that day.

At the western end of the oval glade a path ran straight away as far as we could see, seeming to pierce the western wall of the hills. The little brook followed at.

As Lois knelt to drink, the Sagamore whispered to me:

"This is the pa.s.s to the Vale Yndaia! You shall not tell her yet--not till we have dealt with Amochol."

"Not till we have dealt with Amochol," I repeated, staring at the narrow opening which crossed this black and desolate region like a streak of suns.h.i.+ne across burnt land.

Tahoontowhee examined the trail; nothing had pa.s.sed since the last rain, save deer and fox.

So I went over to where Lois was bathing her flushed face in the tiny stream, and lay down to drink beside her.

"The water is cold and sweet," she said, "not like that bitter water in the swamp." She held her cupped hands for me to drink from. And I kissed the fragrant cup.

As we rose and I shouldered my rifle, the Grey-Feather began to sing in a low, musical, chanting voice; and all the Indians turned merry faces toward Lois and me as they nodded time to the refrain:

"Continue to listen and hear the truth, Maiden Hidden and Hidden Youth.

The song of those who are 'more than men'!

*Thi-ya-en-sa-y-e-ken!"

[* "They will (live to) see it again!"]

"It is the chant of the Stone Throwers--the Little People!" said Mayaro, laughing. "Ye two are fit to hear it."

"They are singing the Song of the Hidden Children," I whispered to Lois. "Is it not strangely pretty?"

"It is wild music, but sweet," she murmured, "--the music of the Little People--che-kah-a-hen-wah."

"Can you catch the words?"

"Aye, but do not understand them every one."

"Some day I will make them into an English song for you. Listen! 'The Voices' are beginning! Listen attentively to the Chant of *Ta-neh-u-weh-too!"

[* "Hidden in the Husks."]

The Night Hawk was singing now, as he walked through the sunlit glade, hip-deep in scented ferns and jewel-weed. Two brilliant humming-birds whirled around him as he strode.

A VOICE

"Who shall find my Hidden Maid Where the ta.s.selled corn is growing?

Let them seek her in Kandaia, Let them seek her in Oswaya, Where the giant pines are growing, Let them seek and be afraid!

Where the Adriutha flowing Splashes through the forest glade, Where the Kennyetto flowing Thunders through the hemlock shade, Let them seek and be afraid, From Oswaya To Yndaia, All the way to Carenay!"

ANOTHER VOICE