The Rulers of the Lakes: A Story of George and Champlain

THE KINDLY BRIDGE

The thicket in which the three lay was of low but dense bushes, with high grass growing wherever the sun could reach it.  In the grass tiny wild flowers, purple, blue and white were in bloom, and Robert inhaled their faint odor as he crouched, watching for the enemy who sought his life.  It was a forest scene, the beauty of which would have pleased him at any other time, nor was he wholly unconscious of it now.  The river itself, as Tayoga had stated, was narrow.  At some points it did not seem to be more than ten or fifteen yards across, but it flowed in a slow, heavy current, showing depths below.  Nor could he see, looking up and down the stream, any prospect of a ford.

Robert’s gaze moved in an eager quest along the far shore, but he detected no sign of Tandakora, the Frenchman or their men.  Yet he felt that Tayoga and Willet were right and that foes were on watch there.  It was inevitable, because it was just the place where they could wait best for the three.  Nevertheless he asked, though it was merely to confirm his own belief.

“Do you think they’re in the brush, Dave?”

“Not a doubt of it, Robert,” the hunter whispered back.  “They haven’t seen us yet, but they hope to do so soon.”

“And we also, who haven’t seen them yet, hope to do so soon.”

“Aye, Robert, that’s the fact.  Ah, I think I catch a glimpse of them now.  Tayoga, wouldn’t you say that the reflection in the big green bush across the river is caused by a moonbeam falling on a burnished rifle barrel?”

“Not a doubt of it, Great Bear.  Now, I see the rifle itself!  And now I see the hands that hold it.  The hands belong to a live warrior, an Ojibway, or a Pottowattomie.  He is kneeling, waiting for a shot, if he should find anything to shoot at.”

“I see him, too, Tayoga, and there are three more warriors just beyond him.  It’s certainly the band of Tandakora and De Courcelles, and they’ve set a beautiful trap for three who will not come into it.”

“It is so, Great Bear.  One may build a splendid bear trap but of what use is it if the bear stays away?”

“But what are we to do?” asked Robert.  “We can’t cross in the face of such a force.”

“We’ll go down the stream,” replied Willet, “keeping hidden, of course, in the thickets, and look for a chance to pass.  Of course, they’ve sent men in both directions along the bank, but we may go farther than any of them.”

He led the way, and they went cautiously through the thickets two or three miles, all the time intently watching the other shore.  Twice they saw Indian sentinels on watch, and knew that they could not risk the passage.  Finally they stopped and waited a full two hours in the thickets, the contest becoming one of patience.

Meanwhile the night was absolutely silent.  The wind was dead, and the leaves hung straight down.  The deep, slow current of the river, although flowing between narrow banks, made no noise, and Robert’s mind, colored by the conditions of the moment, began to believe that the enemy had gone away.  It was impossible for them to wait so long for foresters whom they did not see and who might never come.  Then he dismissed imagination and impression, and turned with a wrench to his judgment.  He knew enough of the warriors of the wilderness to know that nobody could wait longer than they.  Patience was one of the chief commodities of savage life, because their habits were not complex, and all the time in the world was theirs.

He took lessons, too, from Tayoga and Willet.  The Onondaga, an Indian himself, had an illimitable patience, and Willet, from long practice, had acquired the ability to remain motionless for hours at a time.  He looked at them as they crouched beside him, still and silent figures in the dusk, apparently growing from the earth like the bushes about them, and fixed as they were.  The suggestion to go on that had risen to his lips never passed them and he settled into the same immobility.

Another hour, that was three to Robert, dragged by, and Tayoga led the way again down the stream, Robert and the hunter following without a word.  They went a long distance and then the Onondaga uttered a whisper of surprise and satisfaction.

“A bridge!” he said.

“Where?  I don’t see it,” said Robert.

“Look farther where the stream narrows.  Behold the great tree that has been blown down and that has fallen from bank to bank?”

“I see it now, Tayoga.  It hasn’t been down long, because the leaves upon it are yet green.”

“And they will hide us as we cross.  Tododaho on his star has been watching over us, and has put the bridge here for our use in this crisis.”

Tayoga’s words were instinct with faith.  He never doubted that the great Onondaga who had gone away four hundred years ago was serving them now in this, their utmost, need.  Robert and Willet glanced at each other.  They, too, believed.  An electric current had passed from Tayoga to them, and, for the moment, their trust in Tododaho was almost as great as his.  At the same time, a partial darkening of the night occurred, clouds floating up from the south and west, and dimming the moon and stars.

“How far would you say it is from one shore to the other?” asked Robert of Willet.

“About sixty feet,” replied the hunter, “but it’s a long tree, and it will easily bear the weight of the three of us all the way.  We may be attacked while we’re upon it, but if so we have our rifles.”

“It is the one chance that Tododaho has offered to us, and we must take it,” said Tayoga, as he led the way upon the natural bridge.  Robert followed promptly and Willet brought up the rear.

The banks were high at that point, and the river flowed rather more swiftly than usual.  Robert, ten feet beyond the southern shore, looked down at a dark and sullen current, seeming in the dim moonlight to have interminable depths.  It was only about fifteen feet below him, but his imagination, heightened by time and place, made the distance three or fourfold greater.

He felt a momentary fear lest he slip and fall into the dark stream, and he clung tightly to an upthrust bough.

The fallen tree swayed a little with the weight of the three, but Robert knew that it was safe.  It was not the bridge that they had to fear, but what awaited them on the farther shore.  Tayoga stopped, and the tense manner in which he crouched among the boughs and leaves showed that he was listening with all his ears.

“Do you hear them?” Robert whispered.

“Not their footsteps,” Tayoga whispered back, “but there was a soft call in the woods, the low cry of a night bird, and then the low cry of another night bird replying.  It was the warriors signaling to one another, the first signal they have given.”

“I heard the cries, too,” said Willet, behind Robert, “and no doubt Tandakora and De Courcelles feel they are closing in on us.  It’s a good thing this tree was blown down but lately, and the leaves and boughs are so thick on it.”

“It was so provided by Tododaho in our great need,” said Tayoga.

“Do you mean that we’re likely to be besieged while we’re still on our bridge?” asked Robert, and despite himself he could not repress a shiver.

“Not a siege exactly,” replied Willet, “but the warriors may pass on the farther shore, while we’re still in the tree.  That’s the reason why I spoke so gratefully of the thick leaves still clinging to it.”

“They come even now,” said Tayoga, in the lowest of whispers, and the three, stopping, flattened themselves like climbing animals against the trunk of the tree, until the dark shadow of their bodies blurred against the dusk of its bark.  They were about halfway across and the distance of the stream beneath them seemed to Robert to have increased.  He saw it flowing black and swift, and, for a moment, he had a horrible fear lest he should fall, but he tightened his grasp on a bough and turning his eyes away from the water looked toward the woods.

“The warriors come,” whispered Tayoga, and Robert, seeing, also flattened himself yet farther against the tree, until he seemed fairly to sink into the bark.  Their likeness to climbing animals increased, and it would have required keen eyes to have seen the three as they lay along the trunk, deep among the leaves and boughs thirty feet from either shore.

Tandakora, De Courcelles and about twenty warriors appeared in the forest, walking a little distance back from the stream, where they could see on the farther bank, and yet not be seen from it.  The moon was still obscured, but a portion of its light fell directly upon Tandakora, and Robert had never beheld a more sinister figure.  The rays, feeble, were yet strong enough to show his gigantic figure, naked save for the breech cloth, and painted horribly.  His eyes, moreover, were lighted up either in fact or in Robert’s fancy with a most wicked gleam, as if he were already clutching the scalps of the three whom he was hunting so savagely.

“Now,” whispered Tayoga, “Tododaho alone can save us.  He holds our fate in the hollow of his hand, but he is merciful as well as just.”

Robert knew their danger was of the uttermost, but often, in the extreme crises of life and death, one may not feel until afterward that fate has turned on a hair.

De Courcelles was just behind Tandakora, but the light did not fall so clearly upon him.  The savage had a hideous fascination for Robert, and the moon’s rays seemed to follow him.  Every device and symbol painted upon the huge chest stood out like carving, and all the features of the heavy, cruel face were disclosed as if by day.  But Robert noticed with extraordinary relief that the eyes so full of menace were seeking the three among the woods on the farther shore, and were paying little attention to the tree.  It was likely that neither Tandakora nor De Courcelles would dream that they were upon it, but it was wholly possible that the entire band should seek to cross that way, and reach the southern shore in the quest of their prey.

The three in the depths of the boughs and leaves did not stir.  The rising wind caused the foliage to rustle about them again.  It made the tree sway a little, too, and as Robert could not resist the temptation to look downward once, the black surface of the river seemed to be dancing back and forth beneath him.  But, save the single glance, his eyes all the while were for the Ojibway and the Frenchman.

Tandakora and De Courcelles came a little closer to the bank.  Apparently they were satisfied that no one was on the farther shore, and that they were in no danger of a bullet, as presently they emerged fully into the open, and stood there, their eyes questing.  Then they looked at the bridge, and, for a few instants, Robert was sure they would attempt the crossing upon it.  But in a minute or so they walked beyond it, and then he concluded that the crisis had passed.  After all, it would be their plan to hold their own shore, and prevent the passage of the three.

Yet Tandakora and De Courcelles were cruelly deliberate and slow.  They walked not more than fifteen feet beyond the end of the tree, and then stood a while talking.  Half of the warriors remained near them, standing stolidly in the background, and the others went on, searching among the woods and thickets.  The two glanced at the tree as they talked.  Was it possible that they would yet come back and attempt the crossing?  Again Robert quivered when he realized that in truth the crisis had not passed, and that Tandakora and De Courcelles might reconsider.  Once more, he pressed his body hard against the tree, and held tightly to a small bough which arched an abundant covering of leaves over his head.  The wind rustled among those leaves, and sang almost in words, but whether they told him that Tandakora and De Courcelles would go on or come upon the bridge he did not know.

Five minutes of such intense waiting that seemed nearer to an hour, and the leaders, with the band, passed on, disappearing in the undergrowth that lined the stream.  But for another five minutes the three among the boughs did not stir.  Then Tayoga whispered over his shoulder: 

“Great is the justice of Tododaho and also great is his mercy.  I did not doubt that he would save us.  I felt within me all the time that he would cause Tandakora and De Courcelles to leave the bridge and seek us elsewhere.”

Robert was not one to question the belief of Tayoga, his sagacious friend.  If it was not Tododaho who had sent their enemies away then it was some other spirit, known by another name, but in essence the same.  His whole being was permeated by a sort of shining gratitude.

“At times,” he said, “it seems that we are favored by our God, who is your Manitou.”

“Now is the time for us to finish the crossing,” said Willet, alive to the needs of the moment.  “Lead, Tayoga, and be sure, Robert, not to give any bough a shake that might catch the eye of a lurking savage in the forest.”

The Onondaga resumed the slow advance, so guiding his movements that he might neither make the tree quiver nor bring his body from beneath the covering of leaves.  Robert and the hunter followed him in close imitation.  Thus they gained the bank, and the three drew long breaths of deep and intense relief, as they stepped upon firm ground.  But they could not afford to linger.  Tayoga still in front, they plunged into the depths of the forest, and advanced at speed a half hour, when they heard a single faint cry behind them.

“They’ve found our trail at the end of the natural bridge,” said Willet.

“It is so,” said Tayoga, in his precise school English.

“And they’re mad, mad clean through,” said the hunter.  “That single cry shows it.  If they hadn’t been so mad they’d have followed our trail without a sound.  I wish I could have seen the faces of the Ojibway and the Frenchman when they came back and noticed our trace at the end of the tree.  They’re mad in every nerve and fiber, because they did not conclude to go upon it.  It was only one chance in a thousand that we’d be there, they let that one chance in a thousand go, and lost.”

The great frame of the hunter shook with silent laughter.  But Robert, in very truth, saw the chagrin upon the faces of Tandakora and De Courcelles.  His extraordinary imagination was again up and leaping and the picture it created for him was as glowing and vivid as fact.  They had gone some distance, and then they had come back, continually searching the thickets of the opposite shore with their powerful and trained eyesight.  They had felt disappointed because they had seen no trace of the hunted, who had surely come by this time against the barrier of the river.  Frenchman and Ojibway were in a state of angry wonder at the disappearance of the three who had vanished as if on wings in the air, leaving no trail.  Then Tandakora had chanced to look down.  His eye in the dusky moonlight had caught the faint imprint of a foot on the grass, perhaps Robert’s own, and the sudden shout had been wrenched from him by his anger and mortification.  Now Robert, too, was convulsed by internal laughter.

“It was our great luck that they did not find us on the tree,” he said.

“No, it was not luck,” said Tayoga.

“How so?”

“They did not come upon the tree because Tododaho would not let them.”

“I forgot.  You’re right, Tayoga,” said Robert sincerely.

“We’ll take fresh breath here for five minutes or so,” said the hunter, “and then we’ll push on at speed, because we have not only the band of Tandakora and De Courcelles to fear.  There are others in the forest converging on Fort Refuge.”

“Great Bear is right.  He is nearly always right,” said Tayoga.  “We have passed one barrier, but we will meet many more.  There is also danger behind us.  Even now the band is coming fast.”

They did not move until the allotted time had passed.  Again Robert’s mind painted a picture in glowing colors of the savage warriors, led by Tandakora and De Courcelles, coming at utmost speed upon their trail, and his muscles quivered, yet he made no outward sign.  To the eye he was as calm as Tayoga or Willet.

An hour after the resumption of their flight they came to a shallow creek with a gravelly bed, a creek that obviously emptied into the river they had crossed, and they resorted to the commonest and most effective of all devices used by fugitives in the North American wilderness who wished to hide their trail.  They waded in the stream, and, as it led in the general direction in which they wished to go, they did not leave the water until they had covered a distance of several miles.  Then they emerged upon the bank and rested a long time.

“When Tandakora and De Courcelles see our traces disappear in the creek and fail to reappear on the other side,” said Willet, “they’ll divide their band and send half of it upstream, and half downstream, looking everywhere for our place of entry upon dry land, but it’ll take ’em a long time to find it.  Robert, you and Tayoga might spread your blankets, and if you’re calm enough, take a nap.  At any rate, it won’t hurt you to stretch yourselves and rest.  I can warn you in time, when an enemy comes.”

The Onondaga obeyed without a word, and soon slept as if his will had merely to give an order to his five senses to seek oblivion.  Robert did not think he could find slumber, but closing his eyes in order to rest better, he drifted easily into unconsciousness.  Meanwhile Willet watched, and there was no better sentinel in all the northern wilderness.  The wind was still blowing lightly, and the rustling of the leaves never ceased, but he would have detected instantly any strange note, jarring upon that musical sound.

The hunter looked upon the sleeping lads, the white and the red.  Both had a powerful hold upon his affection.  He felt that he stood to them almost in the relationship of a father, and he was proud, too, of their strength and skill, their courage and intelligence.  Eager as he was to reach Fort Refuge and save the garrison and people there, he was even more eager to save the two youths from harm.

He let them sleep until the gold of the morning sun was gilding the eastern forest, when the three drew further upon their supplies of bread and venison and once more resumed the journey through the pathless woods towards their destination.  There was no interruption that day, and they felt so much emboldened that near sundown Tayoga took his bow and arrows, which he carried as well as his rifle, and stalked and shot a deer, the forest being full of game.  Then they lighted a fire and cooked delicate portions of the spoil in a sheltered hollow.  But they did not eat supper there.  Instead, they took portions of the cooked food and as much as they could conveniently carry of the uncooked, and, wading along the bed of a brook, did not stop until they were three or four miles from the place in which they had built the fire.  Then they sat down and ate in great content.

“We will fare well enough,” said Willet, “if it doesn’t rain.  ’Tis lucky for us that it’s the time of year when but little rain falls.”

“But rain would be as hard upon those who are hunting us as upon us,” said Robert.

“’Tis true, lad, and I’m glad to see you always making the best of everything.  It’s a spirit that wins.”

“And now, Great Bear,” said Tayoga, his eyes twinkling, “you have talked enough.  It is only Dagaeoga who can talk on forever.”

“That’s so about Robert, but what do you mean by saying I’ve talked enough?”

“It is time for you to sleep.  You watched last night while we slept, and now your hour has come.  While you slumber Dagaeoga and I will be sentinels who will see and hear everything.”

“Why the two of you?”

“Because it takes both of us to be the equal of the Great Bear.”

“Come, now, Tayoga, that’s either flattery or irony, but whatever it is I’ll let it pass.  I’ll own that I’m sleepy enough and you two can arrange the rest between you.”

He was asleep very soon, his great figure lying motionless on his blanket, and the two wary lads watched, although they sat together, and, at times, talked.  Both knew there was full need for vigilance.  They had triumphed for the moment over Tandakora and De Courcelles, but they expected many other lions in the path that led to Fort Refuge.  It was important also, not only that they should arrive there, but that they should arrive in time.  It was true, too, that they considered the danger greater by night than by day.  In the day it was much easier to see the approach of an enemy, but by night one must be very vigilant indeed to detect the approach of a foe so silent as the Indian.

The two did not yet mention a division of the watch.  Neither was sleepy and they were content to remain awake much longer.  Moreover, they had many things of interest to talk about and also they indulged in speculation.

“Do you think it possible, Tayoga,” asked Robert, “that the garrison, hearing of the great cloud now overhanging the border, may have abandoned the fort and gone east with the refugees?”

“No, Dagaeoga, it is not likely.  It is almost certain that the young men from Philadelphia have not heard of General Braddock’s great defeat.  French and savage runners could have reached them with the news, could have taunted them from the forest, but they would not wish to do so; they seek instead to gather their forces first, to have all the effect of surprise, to take the fort, its garrison and the people as one takes a ripe apple from a tree, just when it is ready to fall.”

“That rout back there by Duquesne was a terrible affair for us, Tayoga, not alone because it uncovers the border, but because it heartens all our enemies.  What joy the news must have caused in Quebec, and what joy it will cause in Paris, too, when it reaches the great French capital!  The French will think themselves invincible and so will their red allies.”

“They would be invincible, Dagaeoga, if they could take with them the Hodenosaunee.”

“And may not this victory of the French and their tribes at Duquesne shake the faith of the Hodenosaunee?”

“No, Dagaeoga.  The fifty sachems will never let the great League join Onontio.  Champlain and Frontenac have been gone long, but their shadows still stand between the French and the Hodenosaunee, and there is Quebec, the lost Stadacona of the Ganegaono, whom you call the Mohawks.  As long as the sun and stars stand in the heavens the Keepers of the Eastern Gate are the enemies of the French.  Even now, as you know, they fight by the side of the Americans and the English.”

“It is true.  I was wrong to question the faith of the great nations of the Hodenosaunee.  If none save the Mohawks fight for us it is at least certain that they will not fight against us, and even undecided, while we’re at present suffering from disaster, they’ll form a neutral barrier, in part, between the French and us.  Ah, that defeat by Duquesne!  I scarcely see yet how it happened!”

“A general who made war in a country that he did not know, with an enemy that he did not understand.”

“Well, we’ll learn from it.  We were too sure.  Pride, they say, goes before a fall, but they ought to add that those who fall can rise again.  Perhaps our generals will be more cautious next time, and won’t walk into any more traps.  But I foresee now a long, a very long war.  Nearly all of Europe, if what comes across the Atlantic be true, will be involved in it, and we Americans will be thrown mostly upon our own resources.  Perhaps it will weld our colonies together and make of them a great nation, a nation great like the Hodenosaunee.”

“I think it will come to pass, Dagaeoga.  The mighty League was formed by hardship and self-denial.  A people who have had to fight long and tenaciously for themselves grows strong.  So it has been said often by the fifty sachems who are old and very wise, and who know all that it is given to men to know.  Did you hear anything stirring in the thicket, Dagaeoga?”

“I did, Tayoga.  I heard a rustling, the sound of very light footfalls, and I see the cause.”

“A black bear, is it not, seeing what strangers have invaded the bush!  Now, he steals away, knowing that we are the enemies most to be dreaded by him.  Doubtless there are other animals among the bushes, watching us, but we neither see nor hear them.  It is time to divide the watch, for we must save our strength, and it is not well for both to remain awake far into the night.”

It was arranged that Robert should sleep first and the Onondaga gave his faithful promise to awaken him in four hours.  The two lads meant to take the burden of the watch upon themselves, and, unless Willet awoke, of his own accord, he was to lie there until day.

Robert lay down upon his blanket, went to sleep in an instant, and the next instant Tayoga awakened him.  At least it seemed but an instant, although the entire four hours had passed.  Tayoga laughed at the dubious look on his face.

“The time is up.  It really is,” he said.  “You made me give my faithful promise.  Look at the moon, and it will tell you I am no teller of a falsehood.”

“I never knew four hours to pass so quickly before.  Has anything happened while I slept?”

“Much, Dagaeoga.  Many things, things of vast importance.”

“What, Tayoga!  You astonish me.  The forest seems quiet.”

“And so it is.  But the revolving earth has turned one-sixth of its way upon itself.  It has also traveled thousands and thousands of miles in that vast circle through the pathless void that it makes about the sun.  I did not know that such things happened until I went to the white man’s school at Albany, but I know them now, and are they not important, hugely important?”

“They’re among the main facts of the universe, but they happen every night.”

“Then it would be more important if they did not happen?”

“There’d be a big smash of some kind, but as I don’t know what the kind would be I’m not going to talk about it.  Besides, I can see that you’re making game of me, Tayoga.  I’ve lived long enough with Indians to know that they love their joke.”

“We are much like other people.  I think perhaps that in all this great world, on all the continents and islands, people, whether white or red, brown or black, are the same.”

“Not a doubt of it.  Now, stop your philosophizing and go to sleep.”

“I will obey you, Dagaeoga,” said Tayoga, and in a minute he was fast asleep.

Robert watched his four hours through and then awakened the Onondaga, who was sentinel until day.  When they talked they spoke only in whispers lest they wake Willet, whose slumbers were so deep that he never stirred.  At daybreak Tayoga roused Robert, but the hunter still slept, his gigantic bulk disposed at ease upon his blanket.  Then the two lads seized him by either shoulder and shook him violently.

“Awake!  Awake, Great Bear!” Tayoga chanted in his ear.  “Do you think you have gone into a cave for winter quarters?  Lo, you have slept now, like the animal for which you take your name!  We knew you were exhausted, and that your eyes ached for darkness and oblivion, but we did not know it would take two nights and a day to bring back your wakefulness.  Dagaeoga and I were your true friends.  We watched over you while you slept out your mighty sleep and kept away from you the bears and panthers that would have devoured you when you knew it not.  They came more than once to look at you, and truly the Great Bear is so large that he would have made breakfast, dinner and supper for the hungriest bear or panther that ever roamed the woods.”

Willet sat up, sleep still heavy on his eyelids, and, for a moment or two, looked dazed.

“What do you mean, you young rascals?” he asked.  “You don’t say that I’ve been sleeping here two nights and a day?”

“Of course you have,” replied Robert, “and I’ve never seen anybody sleep so hard, either.  Look under your blanket and see how your body has actually bored a hole into the ground.”

Then Willet began to laugh.

“I see, it’s a joke,” he said, “though I don’t mind.  You’re good lads, but it was your duty to have awakened me in the night and let me take my part in the watch.”

“You were very tired,” said Robert, “and we took pity on you.  Moreover, the enemy is all about us, and we knew that the watch must be of the best.  Tayoga felt that at such a time he could trust me alone, and I felt with equal force that I could trust him alone.  We could not put our lives in the hands of a mere beginner.”

Willet laughed again, and in the utmost good humor.

“As I repeat, you’re sprightly lads,” he said, “and I don’t mind a jest that all three of us can enjoy.  Now, for breakfast, and, truth to say, we must take it cold.  It will not do to light another fire.”

They ate deer meat, drank water from a brook, and then, refreshed greatly by their long rest, started at utmost speed for Fort Refuge, keeping in the deepest shadows of the wilderness, eager to carry the alarm to the garrison, and anxious to avoid any intervening foe.  The day was fortunate, no enemy appearing in their path, and they traveled many miles, hope continually rising that they would reach the fort before a cloud of besiegers could arrive.

Thus they continued their journey night and day, seeing many signs of the foe, but not the foe himself, and the hope grew almost into conviction that they would pass all the Indian bands and gain the fort first.