Part 12

Then, after what seemed like another long time, without any warning sound two figures suddenly stepped from the dark into the fire-light. They were the Buck and Guyasuta, with rain-water running down their painted faces.

They sat. Pretty soon Half-King said:

“Guyasuta may tell us what he and the Buck found.”

“We followed the back trail of the two men and found where they came from,” reported Guyasuta. “They came from a company. The company will be camped not far away. We think it is the same company that was spying near Gist’s place.”

Tanacharison did not speak, for a minute. He was making up his mind. Then he said:

“You are right. The two men are going to the fort at the Forks. The company will wait till they return. If the English wish to fight, now is the time.” And he said to Robert: “You go back to Washington. Tell him his brothers the Mingo know where fifty of the French are, getting ready to strike him. Let him come here at once, with his men. We will show him how to surprise the French before they grow greater in number, for they have sent off two men whose tracks we have seen.”

Out went Robert, into the dark and rain. The camp of Washington in the Great Meadows was no distance at all, by day; he should have reached it in an hour; but to find it tonight was a very different matter. Before he saw its candles glimmer through the wet blackness he feared that he had lost it.

He did not waste any time with the sentries――he slipped through the lines without being hailed and was at Washington’s tent.

Washington was talking with John Davidson the trader. He listened gravely to the message from Tanacharison. Then his blue eyes glowed. He seemed glad. He folded his letter and fastened it and called a soldier and said: “Have this started to Governor Dinwiddie at once in the morning.” And now, to Robert:

“Where is the Half-King?”

“At Big Rock. He waits for Washington.”

“And how far is Big Rock?”

“Not far. Half way to Gist’s place. One hour ride, two hour walk.”

“Do you know, Davidson?” Washington asked.

“Big Rock is an Injun camp spot near where the trail to Gist’s crosses the crest of Laurel Hill, colonel,” said John Davidson. “About six miles from here.”

“We could find it speedily?”

“Not till morning. The night’s pitch dark, the trail’s bad at its best and by night in this weather is no trail at all. You can be sure that the French will stay snug while you do the same.”

“Then all the more reason to move against them, sir,” Washington answered. “They fancy themselves safe. I’ll not have our Indian allies say that when they sent for us with urgent call we preferred comfort to action. We will go at once.”

“I will show the way,” said Robert. “Maybe take a long time, but we find Tanacharison.”

“Well spoken,” Washington praised. “The Hunter came, he can go back.”

“We’ll need Indian senses, that’s sure, colonel,” laughed John Davidson. “You see the boy’s got his war paint on.”

“Maybe Injun now, but American too,” announced Robert.

Washington smiled.

“You may rest while the soldiers are getting ready. How many men has Tanacharison?”

“Scarouady there; White Thunder, Guyasuta, Aroas, Buck, two-three more.”

It was an hour before they all set off――Washington himself, and forty men, and Robert the Hunter as guide. Captain Vanbraam was left with the other men to guard the camp, so that it should not be captured.

The blackness was now so thick that nobody could see where to set his foot down. The rain poured, the wind blew, the men were constantly blundering into trees, and falling down, and losing one another, and voices were drowned. To follow a trail was impossible except by crawling and feeling; and every few minutes a halt had to be made, until the stragglers came in.

So that the six miles up-hill seemed sixty, and Robert the Hunter had to confess that he was as blind as all the rest. Even Washington’s compass was of no use.

They spent the night searching for the Big Rock. When in the first gray of the morning they could see, and the Hunter knew where they were, and they found the Rock, they were a sight――muddy and wan, and as wet as muskrats. Seven men had been lost. But Washington had no notion of giving up.

He and John Davidson and Tanacharison and Scarouady talked, while the men shivered and recharged their guns with dry powder. Robert was so tired that he dozed off. But he awakened. Scarouady and Half-King were standing up, to shake hands with Washington.

“We go for a little bloodying of the hatchet, brothers,” Scarouady said, with a fierce grin, to the soldiers and the warriors. That was enough to arouse anybody.

The forest had grayed, the storm had lessened to a drizzle again and all the dripping world was shrouded in a cold mist. Half-King led out his Indians, Washington led out his Long Knife Americans; and when they all came to the place in the trail where the two Frenchmen had crossed, Guyasuta and the Buck ran ahead to back-trail again, and this time to find the French camp.

They were not gone long. The French company were hidden down at the foot of Laurel Hill, on the edge of the Great Meadows about one-half mile east of the trail from Gist’s! Wah! Yes, they had built bark lodges in a little hollow in the woods, under a ledge of rocks, and were waiting to strike Washington’s camp.

“I will summon them to surrender,” said Washington to Lieutenant Waggener. “But should they fire upon us I shall not hesitate to answer.”

Guyasuta remained to guide the Long Knives by the right; the Mingos filed off by the left; and Robert the Hunter went with the Washington Americans.

The French were astir; for within a short time the heavy air smelled of smoke. The Americans spread out and advanced more cautiously, with guns held so as to shield the locks from the wet. Guyasuta signed that the ledge of rocks was close before. Nothing could be heard from the French camp――the French had thought themselves so well hidden that they needed nobody on watch.

Washington went forward, to peer; and Robert stole after, and the men led by Lieutenant Waggener followed――all without a sound, for the ground was soaked and soft. Somewhere to the left, likewise stealing upon the French, were the Tanacharison party. The French could not escape.

Washington carried no gun, only a stick for a cane. He went around the end of the ledge, as if to call out; then a Frenchman stepped from one of the bark cabins, and saw the soldiers in the woods; he shouted and fired his gun, the French rushed out, and what was said Robert could not hear: both sides were shouting and shooting, and high and terrible rose the Mingo warwhoops.

Several of the French had fallen down; the man who appeared to be their captain was down flat; the French shot from behind their cabins and the Long Knives from behind trees. Washington was standing in the open where the bullets from both sides whizzed; he shouted: “Keep under cover, men! Fire slowly.” Now Lieutenant Waggener came running, and he said:

“You are exposed, colonel. Seek cover yourself.”

“Not for me, sir,” answered Washington. “Go back. I find the situation charming.”

In a few minutes he cried out, and waved his stick――“Hold! Cease firing! They ask quarter.” Down he rushed, for the French were running here and there, and calling, and the Tanacharison party were into them with the tomahawk, or chasing them through the woods. Scarouady, Aroas, the Buck and the others charged, shrieking the scalp yells, and “bloodying the hatchet.”

But Washington hurled them back and ordered them back; and Lieutenant Waggener (who was wounded) and John Davidson and the soldiers interfered; and soon the French were gathered into a bunch.

“Who commands here?” Washington demanded. He was breathless and flushed, and spoke sternly.

The man La Force answered. He it was, and no other; the same cunning, dark man who had made trouble on the trip to Fort Le Boeuf.

“You have killed my commander, the Sieur de Jumonville,” said La Force, angrily. “I speak for Monsieur Druillon, next in command. We surrender but you shall pay dearly for this attack upon a peaceful camp.”

“I deny your words, sir,” Washington replied, turning red. “If you were bent upon peace, why did you hide here in his British Majesty’s territory and spy upon us?”

“We came to treat with you and give you summons to withdraw your forces before committing an act of war, as you have done. You refused to listen to the Sieur de Jumonville, who called to you; but you shot him down,” accused La Force. “For this you shall pay and pay dearly, sir.”

“I will hear no more of such lies,” Washington exclaimed. “The act of war was committed when the fort being builded at the Forks in His Majesty’s territory was seized by force of arms. You say you would have summoned me. You knew where to find me and could have done so. I would have summoned you, but I had no chance. You opened fire upon me directly you saw me. You will now consider yourselves my prisoners, at the disposal of the Governor of Virginia.”

The French had lost Captain de Jumonville and ten men killed, and one man wounded; the prisoners unhurt were twenty-one, and one man had run off. The Long Knife loss was one soldier killed and Lieutenant Waggener and two men wounded.

It was easy to see that Washington was proud of his victory in the first battle that he had ever fought. But the Half-King said:

“Had Washington left matters to us we would have killed them all, for they are spies. But I will send off these few scalps to show the Delaware and Shawnee that the English are in earnest.”

This day, which was May 28, 1754, they marched in triumph back to the Great Meadows. Washington gave La Force and Ensign Druillon some of his own clothes; then all the prisoners were sent as a present to the Governor of Virginia.

Half-King at once dispatched a hatchet and a belt of black wampum to King Shingis, bidding him come with his Delawares. Scarouady set out with the scalps and four hatchets and more black wampum, to visit the other Delawares, and the Shawnees, the Wyandots and the Miamis of the Ohio country, and call them to help the English.

If Washington had had more soldiers and enough to eat, things would have been better. But his men numbered only about one hundred, now――without tents and without flour, and with scarcely any meat. And when the French soldier who had escaped barefoot during the battle got to the Forks, the commander there would be hot for revenge.

XIV

BRIGHT LIGHTNING LENDS A HAND

Several weeks had passed. On this day, after the middle of the month called June, instead of being with the Washington Long Knives Robert was perched in a tree and watching the great fort named Duquesne, of the French.

This had come about through no other than Bright Lightning, as shall now be told.

Since the battle, matters at Great Meadows had gone only fairly well. Tanacharison had sent to the planting grounds and to Logstown for the Mingo families, and Queen Allaquippa had moved in. But these were the only Delawares, and they, like the Mingos, were mainly women and children, and all had to be fed.

“I will be among the last men to leave the Ohio,” Washington had said. While waiting for help he proceeded to build a fort of logs and pickets. That was slow work; the soldiers were thin and weak. Then, before much had been done, another company of Long Knives arrived. Their chief captain was an old soldier named Muse――Major Muse, whom Washington seemed delighted to see. Colonel Fry had died from an accident at Will’s Creek, and now Washington was colonel in command of all the Virginia Americans.

Major Muse had brought nine cannon, in wagons, but little food. A Captain James Mackaye was following with a company of soldiers from South Carolina; and Colonel Innes, another old soldier, would come with three hundred and fifty men from North Carolina.

A merry, red-headed young Long Knife doctor named James Craik, whom Washington especially welcomed as a brother, had marched with that other old friend Major Muse, to attend to the sick and wounded. And Andrew Montour the white Seneca, and Trader George Croghan of Pennsylvania, were here. And sometimes Christopher Gist.

Andrew Montour had brought wampum and medals from Assaragoa the Governor, for the Indian chiefs; and one medal for Washington himself. At a council the oldest son of Queen Allaquippa had been given a medal and the English name Colonel Fairfax (who was the odd old man in Virginia). Half-King had been given a medal and the English name Dinwiddie, which was the name of Assaragoa the Governor also, and meant Head of All.

Washington was given the Indian name Connotaucarius or Devourer of Lands. He liked that, but he did not like the pipe that he was obliged to smoke.

Captain Mackaye arrived with his South Carolina company of one hundred men, with sixty cows, but scarcely any ammunition or flour. The South Carolina men would not work on the fort or at cleaning brush unless they were paid extra. They said they were soldiers in the service of the King and not of Virginia; and Captain Mackaye said that they did not have to obey Washington, who commanded only the Virginia Volunteers.

So the Captain Mackaye King’s soldiers sat idly, which displeased Tanacharison.

“Washington is too good-natured,” he complained. “These men of Mackaye should be made to work or else sent to fight. We stay here from one full moon to another and nothing is done except to start this little thing called a fort, in the open meadow, as if the French would march out of the woods against it and be killed. Meanwhile the French are growing and care nothing about the fort. Why do not the English march on and shut the French up? Where are the other soldiers whom Assaragoa is sending?”

But the Half-King kept scouts out; they brought word that the French at the Forks were growing indeed. Scarouady was still absent with his hatchets and scalps and wampum. The Shingis Delawares had not come in, neither had the Shawnees or Miamis or Wyandots. Scarouady, however, sent the message that certain chiefs would join Washington at Redstone Creek. He asked Washington not to attack the French fort until he should be back.

There now were four hundred men at the Great Meadows. Washington, too, was tired of waiting. No other companies showed up. So he left the Mackaye soldiers to guard the half-completed fort; and he took his three hundred Long Knives, to cut a road to the mouth of Redstone Creek, at the Monongahela, and build another fort there, nearer to the Forks.

Gist’s place, thirteen miles beyond the Laurel Hills, was to be the first stop. And they all had been on the way a week, making only a mile a day in order to open a road through the forest and a rocky gorge, in order that the wagons and the cannon might be hauled; and the war paint of Robert the Hunter had been washed off by sweat and rain; and as tired as the tiredest he was trying to rest, this evening, when he felt a pebble strike his cheek.

He looked aside, and what should he see, in the dusk, but the face of Bright Lightning, White Thunder’s daughter, twinkling at him from behind a tree. She beckoned to him to come.

Wah! This was no place for women or girls. The Mingo women and children had stayed down at the Great Meadows, where they would be safe. But Bright Lightning was pretty and spoiled, and usually did as she chose. Thereupon he got up and followed her into the shadows.

“What are you doing here?” he asked. “You’d better go home.”

“Listen, Hunter,” she said: “Do you want to be a warrior?”

“I am a warrior,” he answered. “I do not talk with girls.”

“Just because you wear panther claws!” Bright Lightning laughed. “Where is your war paint? I know you did find your way through the dark and you saw scalps taken, but now you cut trees like the white people. You have turned white. All right; be a tree cutter if you like, but I am going to find the French.”

“Where?”

“At their great house in the Forks, of course.”

“Wah!” exclaimed the Hunter. “You’re a girl. Who sent you? What can you do? You’re speaking foolish.”

“I can count them,” declared Bright Lightning.

“That is man’s work. Guyasuta and Buck and others are spying,” said Robert. “They bring word.”

“What word?” Bright Lightning answered scornfully. “One day one thing, one day another. The French are giving presents; they buy the Indians and send out lies to Washington. Even the heart of Tanacharison is getting weak. Yes, I am a girl, but I can go inside the French house, and see, and nobody will mind; then I can come out and tell you. You will tell Washington the truth.”

“Wah!” the Hunter exclaimed. “I?”

“Yes.” Bright Lightning continued breathlessly. “I have your horse. He will carry us to the Forks. Then you will hide outside and I will go inside, and you shall wait. So if you want to play warrior, come, or I go alone. But two are better than one.”

“Good!” said the Hunter. Now he was tired no longer; he was all on fire with the scheme. It was true that many of the Indians who came with word of the French were probably spies, with forked tongues. The French were strong and clever, and gave more presents than the English. But Bright Lightning was smart, too; and women and girls could go in and out of places and not be noticed.

Maybe he should tell Washington first. No! This was Indian work, again. He might not be missed at all; Indians came and went and Washington was busy with the Long Knives, making the road.

So he said only: “Wait.” And he ran and got his blanket. He had carried his gun with him from his bed. One did not stir from camp without one’s gun.

He joined Bright Lightning. She guided him to the horse, and he mounted and she mounted behind him, and they rode north for the Forks, to learn what the French were doing at their great house named Fort Duquesne.

It was the second morning when they arrived. Over the point of land and over the two rivers that made it, and over the Ohio beyond, there lay a white fog. That was lucky. Out of the fog sounds floated――distant voices of persons and dogs, as if a large village were waking.

“Wah! To go in would be easy for even you,” said Bright Lightning. “But you might not get out again. I will go in. When I come out I will meet you here.”

So she hurried down into the fog blanket, and left the Hunter here upon the hill above it. The horse had been hidden in a leafy hollow near a spring. Robert promptly climbed into a tree, for the sun was rising and the fog would soon break.

What an amazing sight that was, below, as the fog blanket presently vanished in rifts and tatters! He saw the blue Monongahela and the blue Allegheny and the blue Ohio――all like a forked stick open toward him; and in the fork the strong fort of the French from Onontio, upon the very spot where he had met Washington and Gist bound for Logstown and Venango and Fort Le Boeuf, and from which Lieutenant Ward had been driven.

His hill was an excellent spying spot; from his tree he could look down upon that land, not more than one whoop away. The French had done wonders. They had built a fort shaped like a star; with a high fence of log pickets on the river sides, and a high wall of logs on the other sides, and a wide ditch with the dirt thrown up, surrounding on all the sides. The fence and the walls were pierced for cannon and muskets. Within the fence and walls there were many log houses and many people moving about. The forest had been cut down everywhere within gunshot; upon Robert’s side, which was the land side, an enormous cornfield extended from the Monongahela around to the Allegheny; and between the cornfield and the fort ditch a great number of Indians were camped.

Well, Bright Lightning could go through the cornfield and come out among the Indians; and no doubt that was what she was doing. Nobody would care. She was only a girl, and pretty, and the Delawares would be glad to see her.

The point was a busy spot. Robert the Hunter had a view into the fort, where Indians and blue-uniformed soldiers swarmed, and much went on. Indians were constantly coming and going, in canoes or afoot; soldiers were marched out, and were marched in again. Why, Washington had not been told all lies. There were a thousand and more French and Indians here; and what could four hundred half-starved Americans do?

No one bothered him, on his hill. He stayed in the tree most of the day, waiting for Bright Lightning and watching people of the fort. As Bright Lightning did not come back, he knew that she was down there, using her wits while she visited.

This night there was a war-dance by some of the Indians in the camp. The inside of the fort was noisy, too, with lights carried here and there, as though the soldiers were getting ready for a march. Evidently something had been planned.

But in the morning Bright Lightning had not turned up. Inside the fort soldiers had been formed, and Indians in war paint had gathered. That was plain to the Hunter’s keen eyes. What was to happen? He wished that he knew. Then, about four hours after sunrise, a great yelling was heard, from up the Allegheny; and the Indians of the fort yelled; and looking, he saw a fleet of canoes and wooden boats, bristling with Indians, dash down from the north. They beached amid a tremendous hooting and cheering; a French officer sprang out, and the Indians followed; they seemed to be more Hurons and French Iroquois; the Delawares and Shawnees and Wyandots greeted them, and the French officer was taken into the fort.

Now what? The soldiers broke ranks, but there was much excitement. The excitement continued all day; late in the afternoon French officers spoke to a great council inside the fort. Their voices reached Robert, but he could not hear what was said. He had begun to be angry with Bright Lightning when she came hurrying through the dusk――

“Quick!” she panted. “Go to Washington, Hunter. Tell him the French march with soldiers and Indians to attack him.”

“When?”