Chapter Thirty Eight.
Cashiering the Chiefs.
To-day the commissioner showed a bolder front. A bold part had he resolved to play, but he felt sure of success; and consequently there was an air of triumph in his looks. He regarded the chiefs with the imperious glance of one determined to command them; confident they would yield obedience to his wishes.
At intervals his eye rested upon Osceola with a look of peculiar significance, at once sinister and triumphant. I was in the secret of that glance: I guessed its import; I knew that it boded no good to the young Seminole chief. Could I have approached him at that moment, I should have held duty but lightly, and whimpered in his ear a word of warning.
I was angry with myself that I had not thought of this before. Haj-Ewa could have borne a message on the previous night; why did I not send it? My mind had been too full. Occupied with my own thoughts, I had not thought of the danger that threatened my friend—for in this light I still regarded Powell.
I had no exact knowledge of what was meant; though, from the conversation I had overheard, I more than half divined the commissioner’s purpose. Upon some plea, Osceola was to be arrested.
A plea was needed; the outrage could not be perpetrated without one. Even the reckless agent might not venture upon such a stretch of power without plausible pretext; and how was this pretext to be obtained?
The withdrawal of Onopa and the “hostiles,” while Omatla with the “friendlies” remained, had given the agent the opportunity. Osceola himself was to furnish the plea.