CHAPTER XIV.

SQUAW VENGEANCE, AND SQUAW RAGE.

Mayne Fairfax and his red companion soon gained the immediate neighborhood of the exciting scene that was being enacted.

On the southern side of the village square, and before the door of the prison lodge, surged a crowd of women with disheveled tresses, and hands full of clubs, hatchets, and knives.

Against the door of the hut stood Tecumseh, with flashing eyes and drawn tomahawk; and confronting the chief were two gaunt hags--perfect furies in looks and contour--demanding the surrender to them and their supporters, of the two prisoners.

A short distance from the sachem stood Jim Girty, smiling upon the vengeful work of his hands.

Tecumseh maintained a firm and dignified bearing, though a close observer might have noticed sighs of trepidation, as his piercing eye took in the scene.

The leaders of the mob were the squaws, or Indian wives, of the chiefs Sagasto and Nethoto, slain by Oonalooska at the hermit’s cave. The mad women could not bide the time set apart by Tecumseh for the execution of the prisoners. Their hideous cries for blood, roused the village from slumber, and at the head of a motley crowd, composed of warriors, women, and children, they started to the prison-house. But Tecumseh, having been awakened, met them at the door, and refused them admittance.

He had recourse to many arguments to induce the rioters to return to their respective lodges, and wait till the coming day for the death of their prisoners; but they fell upon deaf ears.

“The squaws of Nethoto and Sagasto love Tecumseh,” spoke Nethoto’s wife. “They would not harm a hair of his head; but, unless he gives the pale-face and the red traitor to them, there may be no Tecumseh--the leader’s lodge may be empty to-morrow.”

Tecumseh saw the angry look that accompanied those threatening words. Everywhere knives glittered, and he realized that he had bloodthirsty _women_ to deal with, not men.

“The squaws are very mad,” said Girty, stealing to Tecumseh’s side. “They will have the prisoners, though they walk over Tecumseh. Why bid them wait till day, and die? Let Tecumseh glide to his beaded lodge, if he would not see the prisoners die.”

“Tecumseh will go,” answered the chief. “He would not witness the work of the mad women. White Wolf, do not let them burn the prisoners. Tecumseh will have no such work within sound of his lodge. If they _must_ burn, let them be carried to the wood.”

The chief threw a parting look at the mad squaws, and glided through the crowd to his lodge. As he left the throng, Jim Girty threw himself before the door of the hut, and his strong voice rent the air:

“Tecumseh has listened to the words of Amasqua,” he said. “The pale-face and red traitor must not die in the village. Let them be borne to the wood.”

His speech was received with yells of satisfaction, and the renegade tore Tecumseh’s wampum from the door of the hut. Throwing himself against the barrier, he forced himself into the structure, and a minute later the hermit and his red companion found themselves in the hands of the most furious band of humans that ever surrounded a prisoner.

“To the wood! the dark wood!” was the import of the chorus of vengeful yells that floated heavenward, and away toward the gloomy tarn the twain were hurried.

Alaska and Mayne Fairfax followed in the rear of the band. Many a lowering glance was thrown at the young hunter, and had it not been for the presence of his strong protector and her guard of brutes, he would soon have stood at the prisoners’ side.

Mayne Fairfax kept from the sight of Oonalooska and the hermit. He did not wish them to know that he was a forced witness to their doom, and a refusal to accompany his mad mother might have proved his death-warrant.

The wood was soon reached, and two lithe trees selected for the death-stakes.

Jim Girty was now beside himself with fiendish triumph, and his stentorian voice rung loud and clear above the yells of the red-skins.

He insulted Hewitt in every way that suggested itself to his devilish mind. He struck him with his open hand, spit in his face, and plucked out a handful of his beautiful beard! Hewitt stood his indignities without a murmur, but a sarcastic smile lurked around his lips. Failing to draw a groan from the hermit, the renegade turned to Oonalooska, but was obliged to desist with the same result.

“To the trees!” he said at last, and the hands of the prisoners were momentarily unbound, that they might be fastened to the saplings.

As the hermit felt his hands spring from the thongs, he darted a look at Oonalooska, and his lips parted to utter a single word, which drew a spark of fire from the young brave’s eyes.

The next instant the twain sprung forward, and, before the mob could recover from its surprise, Oonalooska had snatched the tomahawk from Amasqua, and Jim Girty staggered to the earth beneath Hewitt’s clenched hand. Then, having driven the Indians back a goodly space, by their unexpected movements, the twain turned, and darted through the forest with the speed of the deer.

To pursue by sight was utterly useless, for the captives had disappeared in an instant, and Jim Girty, who was the first to recover his senses, darted to Alaska’s side.

“The white-face and the red traitor who shot Alaska’s wolves have escaped,” he cried, pointing in the direction of the trail of the twain. “Let Alaska throw her children upon the trail, that her enemies may die.”

“Do not, my mother,” cried Fairfax, laying his hand upon Alaska’s arm, before she had a chance to reply to the renegade. “If the Lone Man and Oonalooska die, Alaska’s child will not become King of the Wolves.”

The Wolf-Queen looked down upon the face upturned to her--the face of, as she believed, her son, and Fairfax discovered that he held an unbounded influence over that mad-woman.

“Alaska’s wolves shall scent no trail to-night,” she said, addressing him, and then she turned to Girty, and the mad, clamoring clique that surrounded him. “The captives may fly,” she said, with teeth firm-set, as her dark eyes fell upon the renegade, thence wandering to the bloodthirsty band. “Alaska hears the words of her son, and the wolves strike not a pale-face trail to-night. If the White Wolf and Amasqua would catch the lost birds, they must find them without Alaska’s children. Alaska and her white son, who soon will be a Shawnee and King of the Wolves, will return to her lodge.”

The queen made a retiring motion, when Girty turned to the band.

“Shall the Shawnees’ captives escape by the words of a white-livered dog?” he hissed, pointing to young Fairfax. “The weakling rules Alaska, and he is turning her against her people. Shall the Shawnees tamely submit to this? If so, let them not touch the white-faced dog!”

His words drew yells from the lips of the baffled band, and, with glittering blade, Amasqua, Nethoto’s vengeful wife, stepped forward.

“Would Amasqua meet Ogita?” cried the Wolf-Queen, suddenly catching up one of her wolves, and raising him on high.

The mad widow paused, and, still holding the wolf aloft, Alaska retrograded toward the village, her eyes shooting defiance at the mob. Close to her side moved the young Virginian, inwardly rejoicing at the double escape, but not forgetful of his own imminent danger.

Slowly Alaska retreated, and slowly her enemies followed, afraid to raise a hand.

Jim Girty quivered with rage, in the spasm of which he would have shot the mad queen of the wolves; but the hermit had snatched his rifle from his grip, and not a savage had borne his from the village. He dared not raise his hand to hurl a hatchet at the lunatic, for such a movement would bring the wolf to his throat; and the renegade feared the queen’s wolves as he feared unnatural death.

For Fairfax’s intercession, he would have the man’s blood, and he now saw that that hour had not arrived.

The mad squaws, too, were afraid to raise a hand against the passioned queen, and dark were the plots against her and her “son” that then found birth in their bosoms.

Step by step Alaska retreated, with seven gaunt wolves covering her track, and, as she and the hunter glided into the double lodge, a chorus of baffled cries smote the air of night, and fell faintly upon listening ears far up the moonlit Scioto.