On the south flowed the Ohio River, along which 78 white men were pushing their way, and settling on land in what is now Kentucky and Tennessee, and looking with covetous eyes on the land between that river and the lakes, but which the Indians claimed had been reserved to them by treaty. The shrewder among the Indian leaders foresaw the time when they would have to fight and overwhelm the intruders or submit to their hunting grounds being spoiled by the white man. This feeling of uneasiness was spreading among the tribes, and the younger warriors were eager to fight and not infrequently were guilty of marauding expeditions.
One day a party of young braves had returned from a hunting expedition down in what was called “the dark and bloody ground,” Kentucky, which the Indians of the North and the Cherokees and Chickasaws of the South made common use of for a hunting place. Frequent were the bloody skirmishes fought by these hostile tribes in this territory, though none of the Indians made permanent homes there. This party had brought back several scalps and among them Conrad noted two torn from the heads of white men. Ahneota had looked grave and the boy shuddered, and for the first time his dreams about his future were not as bright as they had been.
One day there had come to the village a Frenchman, clad in the picturesque garb of a voyageur, wearing a gaudy handkerchief about his head and a gay capote, or blanket coat which the savages much admired. With him was a half-breed woman and Louis, then 79 not quite ten years old. Conrad thought this boy the most attractive person he had ever met and the little fellow, clad in the softest of deerskin tastefully ornamented and wearing a jaunty cap of the same material, was indeed a handsome lad. Conrad had attached himself to the boy as does a dog to his master. When Rodney arrived, and the little fellow preferred him to his former companion, then Conrad, who in one year of the wild life had become an Indian in looks, became one at heart.
CHAPTER X
HATING, BUT WAITING
Ahneota was an Indian of superior intelligence and varied experience. As the summer advanced, and the corn and tobacco which the squaws had planted in the meadow put forth glossy leaves and promise of the harvest, the boy’s visits to the old chief became more interesting as well as more frequent. Rodney recognized in him his only safety and instinctively knew that the Indian liked him.
The more he learned of the aged man’s wisdom and his kindness toward the people of the village, the greater his wonder at the ferocious expression in the face of this savage when persuaded to recount his exploits. There could be no mistaking that this otherwise kindly old man bore the whites a bitter hatred, though more tolerant of the French than of the English.
In his youth Ahneota had been taught by a Jesuit missionary, indeed had been regarded as a convert. He had retained, however, many of the superstitions of the savage; believed in all sorts of evil as well as 81 good spirits, thought animals had spirit existence after death, had faith in dreams, and, though he had little to do with the arts of the “medicine man,” so great was his dislike of Caughnega, Rodney became convinced the chief also believed in them, to some extent, at least.