“My daughter!” She rose to her feet again and repeated the words with a gasp, as if she were shaking a great weight from her heart. “My daughter!”
“Save her. The battle rages close by the island where she lives. Go with me; your presence alone will protect her.”
The anguish of his tone might have roused marble to consciousness; it brought back Catharine’s tottering reason.
“Child—Mary—daughter—I will go, I will go. At least, we can die together! I and that child whom the angels loved, but would not take.”
She rushed from the tent, followed by Varnham. They met Tahmeroo, who had just landed.
“They are near the fort,” she cried, “fighting like wolves. The chief and Queen Esther are in the thickest of the battle, and Butler, too, my husband—oh, my husband!”
“Fly to her, and say her mother is coming, Varnham. Man, or ghost, help me,” cried Catharine. “I cannot speak—I cannot even have your forgiveness; but we will save her, and then God may be good, and let us die.”
He rushed to his canoe without a word, and sped down the waters like an arrow from a bow. All of Catharine’s strength came back. With resolute command she put off the madness which had begun to creep over her, and turned to Tahmeroo.
“Follow me to the island near the fort. There is a young girl there. Oh, my God, my God! let me see her once more! Let me call her my child, and die.”
They pushed off in their canoe, and kept steadily down the stream until within a mile of the island.