In Search of Mademoiselle

by George Gibbs

Then De Brésac planned quickly. “If we go to the beach,” he said, “they will surely take us. There they can drive us into the sea, or prison us on one of these sand-spits, and take us at their ease. Let us keep among the woods and the swamps. There we can retreat at will, and may support life until we can find a friend, or come to the great inland channel of which they speak. We may come upon the canoes of the Indians of Satouriona, for the Potanous are far to the west, and the Thimagoas of Outina are to the south.”

We saw that what he said was wise, for Menendez, now thinking the beach his natural shambles, would certainly try again to find us there.

At any rate, where we were was no comfortable neighborhood, for some stray Spaniard might at any moment be stumbling upon us, and then there would surely be more killing, and I was sick at the sight of blood, and wanted no more of it. So in some fashion, when he had got his breath, we put Goddard on his feet and moved steadily forward, pausing only now and then to listen for the signs of pursuit. In this way we moved for two hours through the moss-hanging forest. We talked but little, having need of all our strength and breath.

Goddard managed to tell his story. He had been struck upon the head and had fallen for dead under a pile of corpses. When he had come to himself it was dark, and the Spaniards had gone. He had come across the bay at night in a canoe he found at the landing-place. He possessed himself of the arms and weapons of a Spaniard who was sleeping in the woods,—and who sleeps there yet; cutting off the soldier’s beard and fastening the hair of it upon himself with tree-gum. Then making a detour, he had come in at nightfall, following in the footsteps of a detachment of the soldiery who had marched down from Fort San Mateo, and in the confusion and debauchery of the camp, by simulating dumbness, escaped detection, taking the sentry duty with little difficulty. It was a most wonderful thing; but Goddard would say little further than this, only smiling when he spoke of the Spaniard in the woods. He took off his morion and mopped the sweat from his brow.

“Master Sydney, I saw Jem Smith die, sir,” he said. “He went to join his martyrs with a smile on his lips. He wore his velvet suit o’ black, an’ he was beautiful to see. I saw him die, sir,—cut down like a dog afore my eyes. An’, sir, I saw the man as did it.” He tapped the Spanish morion with a significant gesture, and then grimly,—“’Twas him!”

We had covered a distance of perhaps three leagues when we came to a body of water, which seemed a kind of river, but not so wide as the River of May; only a hundred yards across to the thither bank. There we stopped to plan, for Goddard could not swim. It looked but a short time before the day, for the heavens were brightening through the great trees behind us. If we could place Job Goddard upon the trunk of a tree, then we might push him across the stream; there was one floating out in the current. De Brésac had removed his boots to swim for it, and had even taken a step down into the slime of the bank, when, as we looked, the log began sluggishly to move, but against the current, and then we saw the thing was alive. De Brésac rushed out upon high ground in terror, for the log was no log at all, but one of those great horny lizards, which Admiral Hawkins has since reported, and which are called crocodiles, or alligartos. If the Spaniards had come upon us at that moment, they could have taken us without a fight, for this beast was of such a great size and length, so ugly moreover and slimy, that we stood with knees trembling upon the bank. But by and by Job Goddard, plucking his courage up, cast a stone at it, and as the missile fell in the water the great beast, with a flurry and a splash of its tail, went plowing down the stream more frightened even than we.

The heavens were well alight before we could persuade ourselves to make the attempt to cross. Sure at last that there was no fording place, we three got astride of a wide log and began the passage of this treacherous stream, expecting each moment to have a leg nipped off at the knee. We had long pieces of bark for paddles, and made a great commotion, thinking thus to scare these monstrous animals away; and finally we arrived upon the other bank, wet, and trembling with fright, but safe.

Upon the third day the Chevalier shot at a furry wild animal which lay in a ball at the top of a tree. He had the skill to carry away the twig on which it swung. The beast fell to the ground snarling like a dog, to be killed in a trice by Goddard, who pinned it to the earth with his pike. We were most hungry and fell to upon this beast like wolves, hardly waiting for the flesh to be cooked through. ’Twas little enough, but kept us alive two days. On the morning of the fifth day we saw the great inland channel, which we afterwards discovered was a part of the River of May, and by good fortune came upon a hunting party of Satouriona’s warriors. I have said that we came upon them, but it were more truthful to say that they came upon us. For an arrow whirred past and we looked around to see half a score of them coming from the thicket. I held up my hand, shouting loudly “Antipola! Antipola bonnasson!”—which means “friend”—and they came forward and welcomed us with great rejoicing. They fed us on game which they had shot with arrows, and took us at last in a canoe to their village. I had seen the Paracousi—the “Chief,”—when we first came to Fort Caroline. He was named Emola and entertained us in his lodge, sparing nothing for our comfort.

De Brésac was tireless. Liberty was breath to his nostrils, and he went about in the village inquiring and planning, making ready to continue our pilgrimage to the coast when we should be rested.