Both the gentlemen smiled, His Excellency being less genuine than the colonel. “To be an ambitious fire-eater is not a bad quality in these times,” said the governor. “As to intrigue, so long as it is for Virginia I will not condemn it too strongly. What other charges are there in your arraignment?”
“I do not arraign him,” I retorted. Believing I had gone too far ever to retrieve myself in the governor’s good graces, and being made angry by the thought, I boldly continued: “Connolly is too autocratic. He carries things with too high a hand. He takes measures which neither Your Excellency, nor any other of His Majesty’s governors would dream of indulging in. He arrests and imprisons citizens without any pretense at legal procedure. It is because of such actions that many in Pennsylvania expressed the wish we might lose the war. I will add that I heard no such expressions of ill-will since the white families were murdered along the Monongahela.”
“It does make a difference as to whose ox is being gored,” grimly commented Colonel Lewis.
“Does Pennsylvania still blame Michael Cresap for the death of Logan’s people?” asked the governor.
“Many of them do, because Connolly reduced him in rank. His reinstatement at Your Excellency’s command is not so generally known.”
“Confusion and bickering!” wrathfully exclaimed the governor. “Virginia demanding a decisive war—England opposed to it. Our militia captains stealing each other’s men—Sir William Johnson’s death is most untimely.”
Sir William Johnson dead! For the moment I was stunned. My facial expression was so pronounced that His Excellency kindly added:
“The sad news has just reached us. Never was he needed more and wanted more. The colonies have been so used to having him hold the Iroquois in check that few have paused to picture what might happen if his influence were removed from the Six Nations.”
He rose and paced the room for a few turns. Then with a short bow to me he addressed the colonel, saying:
“With your permission, Colonel, I believe I shall retire for an hour. When the man Ward comes I wish to question him.”