“Go; if you return with new victories, you will be welcome.”
“Never fear; I shall do my best. Tahmeroo stays behind; she would only be in my way. I hope when I get back I shan’t find Catharine Montour with all her old insolence and power opposed to you.”
Queen Esther laid her hand on his arm; her lips moved, but she checked her utterance, though the light in her eyes revealed the murderess in her soul. Making a gesture to Butler, signifying that their conference had ended, she rode on, followed by her troops.
On the fifth day the armies separated; the Tories, under the command of the two Butlers, marching in the direction of Niagara, while the Indians continued their course towards Seneca Lake.
Tahmeroo was wild with grief at parting from her husband, but he promised a speedy return, and quieted her with elaborate kindness. After he had left them, Catharine required all her care, and she had little time to brood over her loneliness.
Catharine Montour’s condition was a most critical one, and for days she hovered between life and death; but the chief never inquired after her, or paused, except for their accustomed rest. When Catharine came back to consciousness, she was far away from Wyoming. For a while she believed that all had been a dream; but at length thought came more clearly back, and with it remembrance. She started feebly up, with a faint cry for her child.
Tahmeroo heard the voice, and parting the curtains of the litter, said:
“I am here, mother.”
“Not you,” murmured the sufferer—“it is not you I call for.”
She fell back on the pillows, too weak for words, powerless even to think collectedly. Day after day she remained thus, with life struggling feebly for supremacy, listening to Tahmeroo’s conversation, or the hollow tramp of the savages who bore her swiftly on. She only remembered that Murray was dead, his cold face seemed lying forever on the pillow close to hers. She had a child—a husband—both lived, and she was separated from them, perhaps to all eternity. It was better thus, she felt almost a sense of relief in that rapid retreat—another meeting with husband or child, or even a clear thought of one who had been so closely linked with her past history, would have brought back the madness which a free life in the forest had so long kept at bay.