Night was upon him, and supper over, he retired early, dozing a bit before the “witching hour.” As the old Berks County tall clock in the entry struck twelve, he began to watch for Yolande’s accustomed entrance. But not a shadow appeared. The clock struck the quarter, the half, three quarters and one o’clock. No Yolande or anything like her came; she was true to her promise, as true as he had been false. It was an advantage to be a ghost in some ways. They were honorable creatures.
Adam did not know whether to feel pleased or not. His vanity had been not a little appealed to by a dead wife visiting him nightly; now he was sure that it wasn’t for love of him or jealousy, she had been coming back, but to see that the children got the money that had been buried in the cellar. And at last she had spoken rather unkindly, so the great change called death had ended her love, and she wasn’t grieving over his second marriage at all. However, he fell to consoling himself that she had chided him for breaking his word and marrying again; she must have cared for him or she would not have said those things. Then the thought came to him that she wasn’t really peeved at anything concerning his marriage to Alvira except that the children had gotten a stepmother. He wondered if Alvira would continue to be kind to them. Just as he went to sleep he had forgotten both Yolande and Alvira, chuckling over a pretty High School girl he had seen on the street at the ’burg, and whom he had winked at.
III.
The Prostrate Juniper
Weguarran was a young warrior of the Wyandots, who lived on the shores of Lake Michigan. In the early spring of 1754 he was appointed to the body-guard of old Mozzetuk, a leader of the tribe, on an embassy to Bethlehem, in Pennsylvania, to prevail on the holy men there, as many Indians termed the Moravians, to send a band of Missionaries to the Wyandot Country, with a view of Christianizing the tribe, and acting as advisors and emissaries between[between] the Wyandots and allied nations with the French and other white men, who were constantly encroaching on the redmen’s territories.
Weguarran the youngest and the handsomest of the escort[escort], was very impressionable, and across Ohio and over the Alleghenies, he made friends with the Indian maidens of the various encampments passed en route.
The reception at Bethlehem was cordial, but not much hope was held out for an immediate despatch of Missionaries as the Moravians were anxious to avoid being drawn into the warlike aspirations of the English and French, preferring to promote the faith in pacified regions, as very few of them were partisans, but if they had a leaning at all, it was toward the French. This was due to the fact that the French always understood the Indians better than the English, were more sympathetic colonizers, and while many French Missionaries carried forward the tenets of Rome, there was no religious intolerance, and Missionaries of every faith seemed to thrive under their leadership.
While at Bethlehem and Nazareth, Weguarran was much favored by the Indian maids of those localities, but did not wholly lose his heart until one afternoon at the cabin of an old Christian Pequot named Michaelmas. This old Indian, a native of Connecticut, lived in a log cabin on a small clearing near the Lehigh River, where he cultivated a garden of rare plants and trees, and raised tobacco. All his pastimes were unusual; he captured wild pigeons, which he trained to carry messages, believing that they would be more valuable in wartime than runners. He also practiced falconry, owning several hawks of race, goshawks, marsh hawks and duck hawks. The goshawks he used for grouse, wood-cocks and quails; the marsh hawks for rabbits, hares and ’coons; and the duck hawks for wild ducks and other water birds, which fairly swarmed on the Lehigh in those days. He was a religious old man, almost a recluse, strong in his prejudices, and was much enthused by the Wyandot embassy, giving his waning hopes a new burst of life for an Indian renaissance.
He took a great fancy to the manly and handsome Weguarran, inviting him to his cabin, and it was there that the youthful warrior met the old man’s lovely daughter, Wulaha. She was an only child, eighteen years of age. Her mother belonged to the Original People and was also a Christian.
Love progressed very rapidly between Weguarran and Wulaha, and as the time drew near for the embassy to depart, the young girl intimated to her lover that he must discuss the subject with old Michaelmas, and secure his approval and consent, after the manner of white Christians.