CHAPTER IX.

ONE OF ALASKA’S WHIMS.

While the Shawnee council was deciding the doom of the three hunters, Alaska silently left the spot, and sought her wigwam. Her countenance bore but few traces of insanity. The wild fire of lunacy had grown dim in her eyes, and a casual observer would have believed her possessed of sanity.

From a cache beneath several strips of bark, comprising a portion of the floor of her lodge, she drew some large pieces of illy-cooked venison which she fed to her wolves that crowded around, eager for their daily repast.

“Ah! my children!” she cried, as piece after piece of venison dropped into the red mouths; “the White Chief would cheat you out of the meat of the pale-faces, and Oonalooska, the red traitor. Shall he do it? The giant slew Lupino, your brother, and now he is among our lodges. Hist!” and springing to her feet, she bounded to the door of the wigwam.

“The council is ended, and the red-men conduct the three pale men to the strong lodge. But, ha! ha! ha! why leans the White Chief on the shoulder of Laulewasikaw? He walks as though he were drunk with the fire-water of the pale-faces in Chillicothe. And the White Lily walks beside Kalaska, to the White Chief’s lodge. Why is all this? Alaska’s ears must hear it!” and from the lodge she bounded toward the party who were just leaving the council-house.

“Whose fingers closed on White Chief’s throat?” she demanded of the Prophet, when her eye--once more fired with insanity--fell upon the renegade’s throat.

“The giant pale-face,” answered the sorcerer. “He dies to-night.”

“Yes, curse him!” hissed Jim Girty, placing his hand on his throat, which still bore the marks of Hewitt’s fingers, “I’ll file teeth in my knife, and by Heaven! I’ll saw his skin off by inches! Then I’ll throw him to Alaska’s wolves.”

The renegade’s words did not please the mad queen.

“When the White Chief throws the Lone Man to Alaska’s children, his flesh would be cold,” she said. “They shall not touch him after the White Chief’s knife has robbed him of his skin. They shall tear his throat, and the throats, too, of the young hunter and Oonalooska.”

“Curse her mad whims!” grated Girty, motioning the Prophet to resume his march.

Alaska did not follow, but turned on her heel and resought her lodge.

“The White Chief must keep his eyes on Alaska,” said Laulewasikaw, “or she will have her wolves upon the Shawnees’ prisoners, and his knife will not touch their flesh.”

“I will watch the mad she-devil,” hissed the renegade. “When night comes, I will throw a guard around her wigwam, and she shall be my prisoner until the bones of the hated three become ashes beneath the stake.”

“But who will be so brave as to guard Alaska and her wolves?” asked the Prophet.

The question nonplussed the renegade.

“Ah! the White Chief is puzzled!” said Laulewasikaw; “but the Great Prophet of the Shawnees can cut the sinews. In his paint-bag he carries the juice of a leaf that kills.”

The eyes of the renegade lighted up with a new, fierce fire, and he bade the Prophet keep silent until some future time.

The remainder of the distance to the renegade’s lodge was traversed in silence, and again Eudora found herself beneath Jim Girty’s roof.

“My throat feels better, now,” he said. “Oh, curse that giant villain; his hand seemed a mighty vice moved by some infernal machinery, and I saw every star that ever glittered in the sky since the creation. Now let Laulewasikaw speak of the leaf that kills.”

Thus spoke the renegade when the twain found themselves in a lodge, belonging, by the right of erection, to the Prophet. Several guards had been stationed by Eudora’s prison, rendering her escape impossible.

Before the Prophet answered Girty, he drew a bunch of leaves from his medicine-pouch, and bruised them between two small, flat stones. A greenish liquid exuded from the leaves, and into this the Indian dipped his finger.

“Long ago Laulewasikaw discovered the juice that kills,” said the Prophet, looking up at Girty, who had watched his movements with feverish impatience. “Now let the White Chief and a trusty brave go to Alaska’s lodge, and let him throw to her wolves venison drunk with the juice of Watchemenetoc’s plant. Without her wolves, Alaska can do nothing.”

“I fear not the mad queen,” said Girty; “but her wolves.”

“Has the White Chief a brave in his band who is not afraid to enter Alaska’s lodge?”

“Yes,” said Girty, quickly. “Newaska is welcome to Alaska’s lodge. Her wolves wag their tails when he approaches.”

“Ah! he shall go!” cried the Prophet. “When the sun goes down he must go to the queen’s lodge, and awhile after he has sat down in the midst of her children, we will take the prisoners to the forest.”

“I will seek Newaska at once,” cried the renegade, springing to his feet. “My hour of triumph over all I hate is at hand, and once more Jim Girty will be enemyless!”

The Prophet remained in the lodge, and a short time after the renegade’s departure, a young brave entered the structure.

It was Newaska, the young warrior deputed to poison Alaska’s wolves.

For a number of years the young Shawnee had been a favorite of the Wolf-Queen’s; often he had slept in her double lodge, and caressed the lupine gang whose fangs were harmless playthings to him. But, by and by Jim Girty drew him into his band of merciless braves, and Newaska became the renegade’s most pliant tool.

To the Prophet, by the poisoner, the White Chief sent several pieces of venison, into which the sorcerer infused a quantity of the juice of the deadly nightshade.

“Now,” said he, “Newaska will throw the venison to Alaska’s children, and step from her lodge.”

“When does it send them on the trail of death?” asked the young brave, thrusting the meat into a pouch beneath his robe.

“Before Newaska can repeat the names of the chiefs of his nation,” was the reply. “He must get Alaska beyond his sight before he feeds her children.”

“Newaska will work like the serpent,” said the brave, and glided from the Prophet’s lodge.

Meanwhile the day passed quickly to the doomed prisoners in the strong lodge. They saw no hope with cheering lay ahead.

Oonalooska was sullen and silent; and, weakened by the scenes through which he had passed within the last twenty-four hours, and his wounds irritated by fatigue, Mayne Fairfax slumbered.

The hermit’s spirits did not desert him. Now and then he would walk to the heavy oaken door, shaped and hung by Girty’s hands, whence he would shower defiant words upon his guards.

“I say,” he cried once, “did I choke the white devil to death?”

“No,” answer the only guard who replied to him; “the White Chief is in the Prophet’s lodge.”

“Still at his old trade!” returned Hewitt, “plotting chief. I want another chance at him to-night, and I hope and pray that I may get it.”

“The pale giant should sing his death-song,” said the guard. “The great light of the Manitou nears the hills, and when the lesser lights come forth, we will lead the three to the trees.”

“Where’s Tecumseh?”

“Tecumseh sits in his lodge. He has spoken against the great Prophet, and the Manitou is angry with him. He can not save the enemies of the Shawnees from being skinned and burned.”

Hewitt knew that, and turned from the door.

In silence another hour passed, and through the crevices our three friends saw the light fade, and the stars come forth.

Suddenly many feet approached the prison, and the door was thrown open. A band of four-score warriors, headed by Jim Girty, greeted the eyes of the trio, and soon they were marching to the already blackened trees, at which more than one brave life had gone out amid flames.

“See!” cried Girty, thrusting into the hermit’s face, a blade which he had converted into a saw. “Didn’t I say that I would _saw_ your skin off? By heaven! I’m going to do more than that! You shall eat that weakling’s heart;” and the brute’s hand pointed at Mayne Fairfax.

“Courage, boy, courage!” whispered the hermit, as the renegade returned to the head of the band. “If they just free my hands a moment, I’ll rid the world of a devil. I’ll make sure work of him, this time.”

“I fear not death!” answered the young man. “But the thought that I must leave Eudora in the hands of that demon. Oh, it is terrible!”

As the band hurried through the village Hewitt noticed the absence of the women and children, who always showed themselves on such occasions.

Regarding their absence he questioned a Shawnee, who walked at his side.

“The squaws are at the trees,” was the reply, “and there, too, stand all the warriors, waiting to see the captives die.”

The band was near Alaska’s lodge, when, suddenly, the yelp of a wolf, quickly followed by a human voice, half-shriek--half-groan, fell distinctly upon the ears of all.

“That means something,” whispered Hewitt to the young hunter, and in the darkness Oonalooska’s finger pressed the giant’s shoulder.

The strange cry caused the renegade to start, and he and the Prophet exchanged fearful glances.

A moment later the captives were hurried forward on a run!