“No! no!” cried Coleola, at this, “the White Snake lives to die—to be skinned alive by the blunt knife of Coleola. She caught her in the Swamp Oak’s cave, but she fled like the hunted fox, while Coleola sought the red dog that stole her child many moons ago. But ah! Coleola caught her child, and from her mouth she has plucked her lying tongue.”
As she finished, Nehonesto rose to his feet, and faced the chief—the leader of the war-band.
“Chiefs, decide between Nehonesto and Coleola,” he said. “He claims the pale flower, and the giant hunter. Shall they die by the knife of a mad-woman—they and their brethren,” and he glanced at the trader and Somerville—“or shall they become the captives of Nehonesto, the War Eagle of the Ojibwas?”
A fateful silence followed the Indian’s speech, and the chiefs addressed looked into each other’s faces.
“Decide for Coleola!” cried the Snake Queen, “or the plagues of Watchemenetoc shall fall upon the red-men like rain-drops, and of all this band not one shall sleep in the lodges again.”
The cheeks of the sachems paled at this, and trembling at the dreadful threat, the warriors shrunk from the demoness, shouting:
“Give the pale-faces to Coleola, and let her skin them, else we fall like blades of grass in the country of the Peorias.”
The chiefs were dismayed, and the captives and Nehonesto read in their terror-stricken faces the decision. Suddenly Odatha stepped forward to announce the decision, but before his lips parted, a shrill cry burst upon the ears of all, and, turning, they discovered a solitary Indian running toward them, along the Cahokia’s bank.
He wore the habiliments of a Piankishaw warrior, and paused all breathless in the circle of red-men that surrounded the white captives.
Then he was recognized.