The noise that had startled him, instead of increasing, died away. He looked keenly forward; a train of human beings swept out from the heart of the camp, headed by a single horse, whose tramp echoed harshly back from the mellow sound of a hundred pair of retreating moccasins.
“By the great Medicine, she has left the camp!” almost shouted Brant. “I tell you, Sir John, that woman would shame the bravest officer in your king’s army.”
As he spoke a savage came forward and addressed Brant. A tent had been pitched near that of Queen Esther, and she had politely left an invitation that he and the baronet would take possession of it, and rest after their journey.
“This does not look like auto-da-fe,” said Sir John, preparing to accept the invitation.
“The more for this politeness,” was the answer, “as I told you. Queen Esther carries the etiquette of her father’s court even into her son’s camp. The daughter of a French governor, the widow and mother of savages, is always courteously cruel. We shall see what all this means when she returns.”
“Why wait for that? Supposing we take to the woods again. My cousin Guy must be in force somewhere in the district; I have no fancy for hospitality like this.”
“Take to the woods!” cried Brant, with a scornful laugh—“what, run from a woman? Not I; besides, Sir John, just look at this fellow—with all his sullen civility, he is nothing more nor less than a guard set to watch us. So make the best on’t; till the fate of that scoundrel Butler is ascertained, we are nothing more nor less than prisoners.”
“But what if the rebels have killed him?”
“No danger,” cried Brant, with a scornful lift of the shoulder, which made all the fringes on his hunting-shirt rattle again; “the fellow wasn’t born to be killed in honest battle! he’ll turn up somewhere, depend on’t. So as the tent is ready, and our guard of honor set, let’s take a little rest while the old silver headed dame settles our fate.”
Brant strode off to the tent as he spoke, followed by Sir John, who was not a little crestfallen and apprehensive. Up to this time he had met the Indians as a monarch musters his vassals, on the steps of his father’s hall, with wealth, power, and a vast tenantry to back him. Now he was a fugitive, separated from his followers, in the hands of a woman exasperated by the loss of her favorite, and evidently filled with scorn of his cowardly desertion both of the home of his ancestors, and the companion of his flight. It was an unpleasant position, and one which Brant maliciously rendered more distressing by his cool review of the dangers that surrounded them. The crafty and brave Indian gloated over the cowardly fears of his companion, for in the depths of his heart he both hated and despised his white allies. It was his happiness to torment them whenever the opportunity arose. Though a willing tool in their hands, he was not a blind one.