The Chouacha was stolid, but even he could see that a massacre was on foot. Anthony tried to tell himself that this meeting might be only some savage fresh-meat feast or barbecue. While his better thoughts said this, the cold sinking pit of his stomach told him otherwise.
The Picard du Gay had seen many red dances, but never a black one. His numbed brain could not give in detail afterward the little he witnessed of this. The old man led the singing of that same moaning, diabolical song which Anthony had caught on his fiddle-strings. All the slaves singing it marched round him, while he alone danced barefooted in and out of the living fire, treading down the coals as though they were leaves. He conjured with toads; he drooled incantations; his nose-ring flopped; his amulets rattled.
The sultriness of the swamp oppressed the watchers. The air was heavy and ominously still, as though a storm were coming. Anthony began to have all sorts of ticklings; something might be crawling on his neck or coiling round his ankles. He wanted to get away and run to tell the French of possible danger. He could not stir; the dance had hypnotized him.
Something glistening slid along a tree on the opposite side of the firelit group. It thrust a serpent's head into the light. The old man rested a hand upon it. As the thing shook the man shook; as the man shook all the blacks shook. Their bodies quivered, their eyes rolled, the very ground seemed to tremble. Anthony felt the contagion spreading over him from top to toe.
Voodoo! The wizened old blackamoor was a wizard! Voodoo!
"I go," whispered the Chouacha, "to rouse the town!"
Was Anthony afraid? Certainly not! Did he believe he could be changed by an evil charm into a beast? Of course he didn't! But he hated snakes; and in his nervousness he did an unwise thing. He leveled his pistol through an opening in the bushes, drew a delicate bead on that wavering demon, and with one quick, splitting, banging shot he blew away the serpent's head.
The voodoo doctor was almost stunned. A full moment of tense silence followed this unexpected sorcery. Then the sky was crossed from side to side with a great white bolt of fire. By its light all saw the distant Chouacha running. Then came crash on crash of thunder in the sudden darkness. On the ears of the frenzied voodoo dancers it beat like the summons of a tom-tom. The voodoo himself answered with a shout.
Brandishing their knives, they followed him in a roaring mob as he started after the Chouacha to hoodoo their masters and all the race of whites.
The Sieur de Bienville, always suspicious of the colonists from the West Indies, was armed, as usual, and ready to respond at once to the Chouacha's alarm.