"Que dieu me damne!" he said, spitefully. "But you have a mauvais quart d'heure ahead, Connolly!—curse me if you have not! Faith, I wash my hands of you, and you had best make your sulky savage yonder some good excuse for the war."
Connolly's deep voice replied evasively, but Dunmore clipped him short:
"Oh no! Oh no! The people won't have that, Connolly!—skewer me if they will! Body o' Judas, Connolly, you can't make them believe Cresap started this war!"
Connolly whispered something.
"Eh? What? I say I wash my hands o' ye! Didn't you hear me say I washed my hands? And mind you clear me when you answer your filthy savage. I'll none of it, d'ye hear?"
Connolly flushed darkly and leaned back. Gibson appeared nervous and dispirited, but Captain Murdy smiled cheerfully on everybody and took snuff with a zest.
"And, Connolly," observed Dunmore, settling himself in his gilded chair, "you had best announce the restoration to rank and command of Cresap. Ged!—that ought to put the clodhoppers yonder in good humour, to keep them from snivelling while your dirty savage speaks."
Presently Connolly arose, and, making a motion for silence, briefly announced the restoration of Cresap to command. There was no sound, no demonstration. Those in the balconies cared nothing for Cresap, those on the floor cared too much to compromise him with applause.
I heard Dunmore complaining to Gibson that the first part of Connolly's programme had fallen flat and that he, Dunmore, wanted to know what Gibson thought of refusing Logan the right of speech.
Gibson nervously shook his head and signalled to the interpreter, a grizzled sergeant of the Virginia militia, to take his station; and when the interpreter advanced, announcing in English and in the Cayuga language that the Governor of Virginia welcomed his brother, Logan, chief of the Cayugas, warrior of the clan of the Wolf, and "The White Man's Friend," I saw Patrick Henry touch Logan on the shoulder.