In despair at getting no more information, I put on my steel cap (about all that was left of my original garments) and followed her down the long street of the village, now alight with torches, and thronged with young braves and maidens, while from the lodges there peered out the faces of the squaws. Before the doors gathered the old warriors, pipes in hand, talking over the hunt and planning some foray against their enemies. The hum of many voices arose as we passed through the crowd down to where the feasters gathered.
I might almost at first glance have passed for an Indian myself in the twilight, for my doublet and hose had long since worn out. I now wore the deerskin and leggins of the savages, and the moccasins that Winona had made me were on my feet.
No day had passed since I had been a captive among them, that I had not planned to escape, but someone was ever watchfully at my heels. My weapons had been taken from me, and I seemed as far from escape as I had ever been. Of Manteo and the party who had gone to Roanoke there had been heard no word, and I had given them up for lost. Windango and a band of his warriors had only yesterday taken the trail for a scout against their enemies, the Tuscaroras. The braves only awaited his return to muster their fighting men to the war path.
Winona had halted by the open space, around which the crowd had gathered. It was perhaps a hundred feet square, and now within it there leaped and shouted a medicine man in his skins and paint, a great round club in his hand which he shook fiercely to and fro, as he sang a wild ditty, keeping time to the music with his feet. With a loud yell, he threw himself upon his face.
"What is this for, Winona?" I whispered to the girl as we stood watching him.
"It is to frighten away evil spirits," she replied gravely, in the same low tone.
And now a party of maidens sprang into the cleared space. Their long hair wreathed with wild flowers, decked in their finest garments, with branches of green leaves in their hands, they stood motionless an instant at the further end of the square.
"Wait for me here," whispered the girl by my side. "I go to join them," and she darted rapidly away. A few minutes later, I saw her take her place among the throng.
And now they raised a loud chant, and with waving branches began a marvelous dance, now advancing, now retreating, winding in and out among each other to the sound of their voices. Slowly forward they moved toward the other end of the square, their merry, laughing faces making a pretty picture against the black background of the night. Their clear voices arose upon the air like the sound of some wild strains of barbaric music. Faster and faster they turned, until they only seemed one dark mass of moving figures, twisting in and out among one another.