He raised his voice in a shout.
"To your arms, O Keepers of the Trail! The Iroquois are upon us!"
But his words were drowned in a racket of firing from the heart of the Evil Wood. A number of the False Faces emerged from the shelter of the firs, their awful masks wabbling unsteadily.
"The People of the Long House!" they wailed. "The People of the Long House are come!"
"We are attacked back and front," snarled Murray. "Well, Master Ormerod, you and your friend the chief are excellent hostages."
He bellowed a series of commands which brought some degree of order out of the confusion, and dispatched one party of Keepers into the Wood to resist the attack from that quarter. Another body he sent through the village to hold the approaches of the Doom Trail. Under his directions the remainder of the warriors unbound the surviving prisoners from the stakes and escorted us to the stockaded house in which he dwelt.
As we passed the chapel we saw Black Robe standing in the doorway. His eyes were fixed upon the heavens.
"You were a chosen people!" he cried. "You were the few selected from the many! The Word of God was brought to you, and you saw the light—or said you did. Your feet were set upon the narrow way. A great work was given you to do.
"But you wandered far afield, back into unexplored realms of the ancient wickedness of your race. You became devil-worshipers in secret; aye, eaters of human flesh. You lived a life of deceit. You became tools of Ha-ne-go-ate-geh.
"Great was your fall, and great will be your punishment therefor. You will be torn up, root and branch. You will be banished from your villages and exiled to a strange country. Your warriors will die under the tomahawk, your children will be reared by your enemies. You will perish, O Keepers of the Trail! Your end is——"