Every year, as winter came on, the Catawbas journeyed back to Dismonguepeuc, their home on the mainland west of the island of Roanoke.
Here and there flitted the Virginia Water Lily, now watching the men burn out the poplar logs for canoes and bend the witch hazel branches into bows, now searching for flint stones to be sharpened into arrow heads. She talks with the birds of the forests and with the cranes by the water side. She knew the secret of the plants with healing in their leaves.
Day by day her influence over the tribe grew stronger. Did she possess some invisible power? Her voice alone could soothe the savage outbursts of Winginia’s wrath and cause him to spare the culprit.
It was written in the book of destiny that she should repay the debt of life she owed Winginia.
He had fallen upon the Tuscaroras, hoping to exterminate them as he had done the Croatans, but this time the fortunes of war were against him. His warriors came back bringing their chief grievously wounded by a poisoned arrow. They laid him in his house of poles and bark, and the medicine men in all their hideous paint and feathers came to chant their incantations.
The tender heart of the Virginia Water Lily ached to see the stoical Winginia suffer. Kneeling by his side, she bared the wound, and placing her soft lips upon it, sucked the poison out. Soon health and strength returned to him.
Day by day she roved the forest; but she loved best the springtime when the Catawbas went to Croatan for the herring fishing. Her nimble fingers sharpened the poles that were to spear the gleaming herring, or fashioned the weirs of rushes to catch the fish.
For hours she would sit on the beach and gaze across the vast waste of waters. Then a longing for something she could not understand caused her breast to heave and sink, but no distinct recollection of mother or father remained to her. Sometimes a voice crooning a few notes of melody would float across her memory but it was gone in an instant.
Twelve times she had seen the Indian maidens hunt for the red ear among the corn. A blush mantled her cheek when she thought that at the next harvest she too would join in the search.
Already the eyes of the bravest youth among the warriors had marked her for his own. Many a time he had given her the seat next the fire when the icicles rattled on the branches of the trees, and she felt that she would gladly go to the wigwam of Ensinore the Swift One.