“As thyself, little brother. She is the daughter of Delaroche Telfair, the friend of Tecumseh, who died at Pickawillany fifteen years ago. Moreover, she is very fair.”
The Indian spoke simply. He did not ask whether Jack would come; the latter’s acceptance of the belt pledged him to that course and to question him further would be insulting. He did not ask any pledge as to the treatment of the girl; apparently he well knew that none was necessary.
Jack considered. “I will find the maiden at Wapakoneta?” he questioned.
“If my brother comes quickly. My brother knows that war is in the air. If my brother is slow let him inquire of Colonel Johnson at Upper Piqua. The maiden is known as Alagwa (the Star). Has my brother more to ask?”
Jack shook his head. If he held been speaking to a white man he would have had a score of questions to ask; but he had learned the Indian taciturnity. All had been said; why vainly question more?
“No!” he answered. “I have nothing more to ask. My brother may expect me at Wapakoneta as quickly as possible. I go now to make ready.” He did not again press his hospitality on the chief. He knew it would be useless.
The Shawnee bowed slightly; then he turned on his heel and melted noiselessly into the underbrush.
Jack stared after him wonderingly. Then he stared at the belt in his hand. So quickly the chief had come and so quickly he had gone that Jack needed the sight of something material to convince himself that he had not been dreaming.
Not the least amazing part of the chief’s coming had been the message he had brought. Jack had heard of Delaroche Telfair, but he had heard of him only vaguely. When his Huguenot forefathers had fled from France, a century and a quarter before, one branch had stopped in England and another branch had come to America. The American branch, at least, had not broken off all connection with the elder titled branch of the family, which had remained in France. Indeed, as the years went by and religious animosities died out, the connection had if anything grown closer. Communication had been solely by letter, but it is not rare that relatives who do not see each other are the better friends. A hundred years had slipped by and then the Terror had driven the Count Telfair and his younger brother, Delaroche, from France. The count had stayed in London and bye and bye had gone back to join the court of Napoleon. But Delaroche had shaken the soil of France from his feet and had crossed to America with a number of his countrymen and had founded Gallipolis, on the banks of the Ohio, the second city in the state. Later he had become a trader to the Indians and at last was rumored to have joined the Shawnees. That had been fifteen years before and none of the Alabama Telfairs had heard of him since.
And now had come this surprising news. He was dead! His daughter had been brought up by the great chief Tecumseh and was nearly grown and was the heiress of great estates. Brito Telfair—Jack vaguely recalled the name as that of the head of the branch that had stopped in England—sought to get possession of her. Tecumseh liked him, but, bound by a promise to the girl’s dead father, had refused to give her up and had sent all the weary miles from Ohio to Alabama to seek out the American Telfairs and keep his pledge. More, he might have long contemplated the necessity of keeping it. It might have been at his suggestion that his mother, Methowaka, who had been born in Alabama, at Takabatchi, on the Tallapoosa River, not twenty miles from the Telfair barony, had revisited her old home about ten years before, shortly before her tribe had gone north for good and all, and had “raised up” Jack as a member of the great Panther clan.