Maryland independent. [volume] (Port Tobacco, Md.) 1874-current, 1931-04-03
CHAPTER x-Continued

But this happier spirit could not
endure long with the people Death
had settled on them heavily. No word
had come from Tiaoga and his war
riors. There were whisperings that
they had been annihilated in battle
and would never return. Anxiety
grew into fear, fear into certainty.
The grimness of a tragedy darker
than the sable robes of the priest how
cred over Chenufsio.
In their happiness. Jeems and Tol-
nette did not feel the undercurrent of
change about them. Their abiding
place became home whose roots
spread so securely that death could
not have torn them up. The cloud Of
the tragedy through which they had
passed was curtain vaguely soft and
distant behind them; they thought of
it, they talked of 1t, and dreams some
times awakened Toinette to find COM
fort in Jeems' arms. But its memories
did not wound so deeply. The spirits
of Tonteur and of Jeems' mother drew
nearer to them each day, strengthen
ing with Invisible chains the love
which bound them. 1t was the Thrush
who first made them see what was
happening about them. AS days and
weeks passed without word from
Tiaoga, the fear that Shindas was
dead clutched her with an evil hand.
She began to avoid Toinette and kept
to herself. The hardness which had
settled in the faces about her came
into her own. She was a changed
Mary Daghlen. She was Opitchi the
Seneca.
1t was this change in the one she
had come to regard as sister which
startled Toinette into a realization of
the situation which was gathering
about her and Jeems, and she was now
destined to witness in all of its saw
agery that streak in Indian character
which arouses hate and the desire for
vengeance in the face of adversely at
the hands of human enemies. Jeems
marked its rising symptoms. He was
no longer greeted with friendliness.
Men were sullen and aloof, and women
toiled without their usual chatter.
Death and misfortune had ridden too
hard, and human nerves were at the
breaking point. Chenufsio was like
handful of powder ready for the touch
of fire.
Then came the lightning flash.
1t was an afternoon late in May
when Shindas appeared in Chenufsio.
He was alone. His arms and Shout
ders were hacked and cut and some
of the wounds were scarcely healed.
A scar lay across his cheek. His moe
casins were in tatters, and his eyes
held the ferocious light of a wolf that
had been hunted. He made no effort
to soften the news of which he was
the bearer. He had come from the
border of the Cayuga country as a
messenger from Tiaoga and was many
hours ahead Of his comrades. Tiaoga
was returning with nine Of his thirty
warriors The others were dead.
This tragedy was cataclysmic one
even for a tribe Of the most warlike
of the Six Nations. Nothing had
equaled it in Seneca history for gen.
erations. Twenty were dead out of
thirty-the flower of Chenufsio-the
very sinew of Tiaogas peoplel
Shindas waited until his words sunk
like barbs of iron into the hearts of
the men and women about him. He
waited until there seemed no relief
from the despair which settled over
them, and then slowly gave the names
of those who had been slain by their
enemies. A white man had killed
three of the twenty warriors. He was
a prisoner now-with Tiaoga. They
had put out his eyes so that he could
not see. They had built fire around
him in which it had been their inten-
ton to see him die. But in the last
moment when the flames were scorch-
ing him Tiaoga had pulled the blazing
fuel away with his own hands in order
that the people Of Chenufsio could
witness his writings at the fire
stake.
After this one might have thought
that mad men and women and not
grief-stricken people filled Chenufsio..
For hours the lament of the women
did not die out. Still Toinette saw no
tears. Her horror increased as she
observed the preparations for ven
geance; the rigging of hole and the
setting in it of a tall stake, all by
women's hands the gathering of pitchy
fuel by little children and their moth
ers; the transformation Of friends she
had known into fiends whose eyes
filed with hatred when they looked at
her. She tried to hide from these
things in their home and to keep
Jeems with her. Shindas came to
them. He had command from
Tiaoga for Jeems. 1t was that Jeems
should go to the village Of Kanestio
seventy miles distant and bear news
of war party from that town. Shin
das gave him the message and saw
that he departed with 1t. He was no
longer brother. He disclosed no
sign Of pleasure when he learned that
Toinette was Jeems' wife. Mary
Daghlen found him SO grimly changed
that he frightened her.