The Deerslayer; or, The First Warpath . . . Volume 1

by James Fenimore Cooper

  “You good,” whispered the young Indian; “you good, I know; it so long since Wah-ta!-Wah have a friend--a sister--any body to speak her heart to! you Hist friend; don’t I say trut’?”

  “I never had a friend,” answered Hetty, returning the warm embrace with unfeigned earnestness; “I ’ve a sister, but no friend. Judith loves me, and I love Judith; but that’s natural, and as we are taught in the Bible; but I should like to have a friend! I’ll be your friend, with all my heart; for I like your voice, and your smile, and your way of thinking in every thing, except about the scalps --”

  “No t’ink more of him--no say more of scalp,” interrupted Hist, soothingly; “you pale-face, I red-skin; we bring up different fashion. Deerslayer and Chingachgook great friend, and no the same colour; Hist and--what your name, pretty pale-face?”

  “I am called Hetty, though when they spell the name in the Bible, they always spell it, Esther.”

  “What that make?--no good, no harm. No need to spell name at all. Moravian try to make Wah-ta!-Wah spell, but no won’t let him. No good for Delaware girl to know too much--know more than warrior some time; that great shame. My name Wah-ta!-Wah--that say Hist, in your tongue; you call him, Hist--I call him, Hetty.”

  These preliminaries settled to their mutual satisfaction, the two girls began to discourse of their several hopes and projects. Hetty made her new friend more fully acquainted with her intentions in behalf of her father; and, to one in the least addicted to prying into the affairs of others, Hist would have betrayed her own feelings and expectations in connection with the young warrior of her own tribe. Enough was revealed on both sides, however, to let each party get a tolerable insight into the views of the other, though enough still remained in mental reservation, to give rise to the following questions and answers, with which the interview in effect closed. As the quickest-witted, Hist, was the first with her interrogatories. Folding an arm about the waist of Hetty, she bent her head so as to look up playfully into the face of the other; and, laughing, as if her meaning were to be extracted from her looks, she spoke more plainly.

  “Hetty got broder, as well as fader?” she said; “why no talk of broder, as well as fader?”

  “I have no brother, Hist. I had one once, they say; but he is dead many a year, and lies buried in the lake, by the side of mother.”

  “No got broder--got a young warrior; love him, almost as much as fader, eh? Very handsome, and brave-looking; fit to be chief, if he good as he seem to be.”

  “It’s wicked to love any man as well as I love my father, and so I strive not to do it, Hist,” returned the conscientious Hetty, who knew not how to conceal an emotion by an approach to an untruth as venial as an evasion, though powerfully tempted by female shame to err; “though I sometimes think wickedness will get the better of me, if Hurry comes so often to the lake. I must tell you the truth, dear Hist, because you ask me; but I should fall down and die in the woods, if he knew it!”

  “Why he no ask you, himself? Brave looking--why not bold speaking? Young warrior ought to ask young girl; no make young girl speak first. Mingo girls too shame for that.”

  This was said indignantly, and with the generous warmth a young female of spirit would be apt to feel, at what she deemed an invasion of her sex’s most valued privilege. It had little influence on the simple-minded, but also just-minded Hetty; who, though inherently feminine in all her impulses, was much more alive to the workings of her own heart, than to any of the usages with which convention has protected the sensitiveness of her sex.

  “Ask me what?” the startled girl demanded, with a suddenness that proved how completely her fears had been aroused. “Ask me, if I like him as well as I do my own father! Oh! I hope he will never put such a question to me, for I should have to answer, and that would kill me!”

  “No--no--no kill, quite almost,” returned the other, laughing in spite of herself. “Make blush come--make shame come, too; but he no stay great while; then feel happier than ever. Young warrior must tell young girl he want to make wife, else never can live in his wigwam.”

  “Hurry don’t want to marry me--nobody will ever want to marry me, Hist.”

  “How you can know? P’r’aps every body want to marry you, and by-and-bye, tongue say what heart feel. Why nobody want to marry you?”

  “I am not full-witted, they say. Father often tells me this; and so does Judith, sometimes, when she is vexed; but I shouldn’t so much mind them, as I did mother. She said so once; and then she cried as if her heart would break; and, so, I know I’m not full-witted.”

  Hist gazed at the gentle, simple, girl, for quite a minute, without speaking; when the truth appeared to flash all at once on the mind of the young Indian maid. Pity, reverence, and tenderness seemed struggling together in her breast; and then, rising suddenly, she indicated a wish to her companion that she would accompany her to the camp, which was situated at no great distance. This unexpected change, from the precaution that Hist had previously manifested a desire to use, in order to prevent being seen, to an open exposure of the person of her friend, arose from the perfect conviction that no Indian would harm a being whom the Great Spirit had disarmed, by depriving it of its strongest defence, reason. In this respect, nearly all unsophisticated nations resemble each other; appearing to offer spontaneously, by a feeling creditable to human nature, that protection by their own forbearance, which has been withheld by the inscrutable wisdom of Providence. Wah-ta!-Wah, indeed, knew that, in many tribes, the mentally imbecile and the mad, were held in a species of religious reverence; receiving from the untutored inhabitants of the forest respect and honours, instead of the contumely and neglect that it is their fortune to meet with, among the more pretending and sophisticated.

  Hetty accompanied her new friend without apprehension or reluctance. It was her wish to reach the camp; and, sustained by her motives, she felt no more concern for the consequences, than did her companion herself, now the latter was apprised of the character of the protection that the pale-face maiden carried with her. Still, as they proceeded slowly along a shore that was tangled with overhanging bushes, Hetty continued the discourse, assuming the office of interrogating, which the other had instantly dropped, as soon as she ascertained the character of the mind to which her questions had been addressed.

  “But you are not half-witted,” said Hetty; “and there’s no reason why the Serpent should not marry you.”

  “Hist prisoner, and Mingo got large ear. No speak of Chingachgook when they by. Promise Hist that, good Hetty.”

  “I know--I know,” returned Hetty, half-whispering, in her eagerness to let the other see she understood the necessity of caution. “I know--Deerslayer and the Serpent mean to get you away from the Iroquois; and you wish me not to tell the secret.”

  “How you know?” said Hist, hastily; vexed at the moment, that the other was not even more feeble-minded than was actually the case. “How you know? Better not to talk of any but fader and Hurry; Mingo understand that; he no understand t’other. Promise you no talk about what you no understand.”

  “But I do understand this, Hist; and so I must talk about it. Deerslayer as good as told father all about it, in my presence; and, as nobody told me not to listen, I overheard it all, as I did Hurry and father’s discourse about the scalps.”

  “Very bad for pale-faces to talk about scalps, and very bad for young woman to hear over! Now you love Hist, I know, Hetty, and so, among Indians, when love hardest never talk most.”

  “That’s not the way among white people, who talk most about them they love best. I suppose it’s because I ’m only half-witted that I don’t see the reason why it should be so different among red people.”

  “That what Deerslayer call their gift. One gift to talk; t’other gift to hold their tongue. Hold-tongue your gift, among Mingos. If Serpent want to see Hist, so do Hetty want to see Hurry. A good girl never tell secret of a friend.”

  Hetty understood this appeal; and she promised the Delaware girl
not to make any allusion to the presence of Chingachgook, or to the motive of his visit to the lake.

  “Maybe he get off Hurry and fader, as well as Hist, if let him have his way,” whispered Wah-ta!-Wah to her companion, in a confiding, flattering way, just as they got near enough to the encampment to hear the voices of several of their own sex, who were apparently occupied in the usual toils of women of their class. “Think of that Hetty, and put two, twenty finger on mouth. No get friends free without Serpent do it.”

  A better expedient could not have been adopted, to secure the silence and discretion of Hetty, than that which was now presented to her mind. As the liberation of her father and the young frontier-man was the great object of her adventure, she felt the connection between it and the services of the Delaware; and with an innocent laugh, she nodded her head, and in the same suppressed manner, promised a due attention to the wishes of her friend. Thus assured, Hist tarried no longer, but immediately and openly led the way into the encampment of her captors.

  CHAPTER XI.

  “The great King of kings Hath in the table of his law commanded,

  That thou shalt do no murder.

  Take heed; for he holds vengeance in his hand,

  To hurl upon their heads that break his law.”

  Shakspeare. That the party to which Hist compulsorily belonged was not one that was regularly on the war-path, was evident by the presence of females. It was a small fragment of a tribe that had been hunting and fishing within the English limits, where it was found by the commencement of hostilities, and, after passing the winter and spring by living on what was strictly the property of its enemies, it chose to strike a hostile blow before it finally retired. There was also deep Indian sagacity in the manœuvre which had led them so far into the territory of their foes. When the runner arrived who announced the breaking out of hostilities between the English and French--a struggle that was certain to carry with it all the tribes that dwelt within the influence of the respective belligerents--this particular party of the Iroquois were posted on the shores of the Oneida, a lake that lies some fifty miles nearer to their own frontier than that which is the scene of our tale. To have fled in a direct line for the Canadas, would have exposed them to the dangers of a direct pursuit; and the chiefs had determined to adopt the expedient of penetrating deeper into a region that had now become dangerous, in the hope of being able to retire in the rear of their pursuers, instead of having them on their trail. The presence of the women had induced the attempt at this ruse; the strength of these feebler members of the party being unequal to the effort of escaping from the pursuit of warriors. When the reader remembers the vast extent of the American wilderness, at that early day, he will perceive that it was possible for even a tribe to remain months undiscovered in particular portions of it; nor was the danger of encountering a foe, the usual precautions being observed, as great in the woods, as it is on the high seas, in a time of active warfare.

  The encampment being temporary, it offered to the eye no more than the rude protection of a bivouac, relieved in some slight degree by the ingenious expedients which suggested themselves to the readiness of those who passed their lives amid similar scenes. One fire, that had been kindled against the roots of a living oak, sufficed for the whole party; the weather being too mild to require it for any purpose but cooking. Scattered around this centre of attraction, were some fifteen or twenty low huts--perhaps kennels would be a better word--into which their different owners crept at night, and which were also intended to meet the exigencies of a storm. These little huts were made of the branches of trees, put together with some ingenuity, and they were uniformly topped with bark that had been stripped from fallen trees; of which every virgin forest possesses hundreds, in all stages of decay. Of furniture, they had next to none. Cooking utensils of the simplest sort were lying near the fire; a few articles of clothing were to be seen in, or around the huts; rifles, horns, and pouches leaned against the trees, or were suspended from the lower branches; and the carcases of two or three deer were stretched to view on the same natural shambles.

  As the encampment was in the midst of a dense wood, the eye could not take in its tout ensemble at a glance; but hut after hut started out of the gloomy picture, as one gazed about him in quest of objects. There was no centre, unless the fire might be so considered--no open area where the possessors of this rude village might congregate; but all was concealed, dark, covert and cunning, like its owners. A few children strayed from hut to hut, giving the spot a little the air of domestic life; and the suppressed laugh, and low voices of the women occasionally broke in upon the deep stillness of the sombre forest. As for the men, they either ate, slept, or examined their arms. They conversed but little, and then usually apart, or in groups withdrawn from the females; whilst an air of untiring, innate watchfulness and apprehension of danger seemed to be blended even with their slumbers.

  As the two girls came near the encampment, Hetty uttered a slight exclamation, on catching a view of the person of her father. He was seated on the ground, with his back to a tree, and Hurry stood near him, indolently whittling a twig. Apparently they were as much at liberty as any others in or about the camp; and one unaccustomed to Indian usages would have mistaken them for visiters, instead of supposing them to be captives. Wah-ta!-Wah led her new friend quite near them, and then modestly withdrew, that her own presence might be no restraint on her feelings. But Hetty was not sufficiently familiar with caresses, or outward demonstrations of fondness, to indulge in any outbreaking of feeling. She merely approached and stood at her father’s side without speaking, resembling a silent statue of filial affection. The old man expressed neither alarm, nor surprise, at her sudden appearance. In these particulars, he had caught the stoicism of the Indians; well knowing that there was no more certain mode of securing their respect than by imitating their self-command. Nor did the savages themselves betray the least sign of emotion at this sudden appearance of a stranger among them. In a word, this arrival produced much less visible sensation, though occurring under circumstances so peculiar, than would be seen in a village of higher pretensions to civilization, did an ordinary traveller drive up to the door of its principal inn. Still, a few warriors collected, and it was evident by the manner in which they glanced at Hetty as they conversed together, that she was the subject of their discourse, and probable that the reasons of her unlooked-for appearance were matters of discussion. This phlegm of manner is characteristic of the North American Indian-- some say of his white successor also--but, in this case, much should be attributed to the peculiar situation in which the party was placed. The force in the ark, the presence of Chingachgook excepted, was well known, no tribe or body of troops was believed to be near, and vigilant eyes were posted round the entire lake, watching, day and night, the slightest movement of those whom it would not be exaggerated now to term the besieged.

  Hutter was inwardly much moved by the conduct of Hetty, though he affected so much indifference of manner. He recollected her gentle appeal to him, before he left the ark, and misfortune rendered that of weight, which might have been forgotten amid the triumph of success. Then he knew the simple, single-hearted fidelity of this child, and understood why she had come, and the total disregard of self that reigned in all her acts.

  “This is not well, Hetty,” he said, deprecating the consequences to the girl herself, more than any other evil. “These are fierce Iroquois, and as little apt to forget an injury, as a favour.”

  “Tell me, father,” returned the girl, looking furtively about her, as if fearful of being overheard, “did God let you do the cruel errand on which you came? I want much to know this, that I may speak to the Indians plainly, if he did not.”

  “You should not have come hither, Hetty; these brutes will not understand your nature, or your intentions!”

  “How was it, father? neither you, nor Hurry, seems to have any thing that looks like scalps.”

  “If that will set your mind at peace, child, I can
answer you, no. I had caught the young creatur’ who came here with you, but her screeches soon brought down upon me a troop of the wild-cats, that was too much for any single Christian to withstand. If that will do you any good, we are as innocent of having taken a scalp this time, as I make no doubt we shall also be innocent of receiving the bounty.”

  “Thank you for that, father! Now I can speak boldly to the Iroquois, and with an easy conscience. I hope Hurry, too, has not been able to harm any of the Indians?”

  “Why, as to that matter, Hetty,” returned the individual in question, “you ’ve put it pretty much in the natyve character of the religious truth. Hurry has not been able, and that is the long and short of it. I ’ve seen many squalls, old fellow, both on land and on the water, but never did I feel one as lively and as snappish as that which come down upon us, night afore last, in the shape of an Indian hurrah-boys! Why, Hetty, you ’re no great matter at a reason, or an idee that lies a little deeper than common; but you’re human, and have some human notions;--now, I ’ll just ask you to look at these circumstances. Here was old Tom, your father, and myself, bent on a legal operation, as is to be seen in the words of the law and the proclamation, thinking no harm; when we were set upon by critturs that were more like a back of hungry wolves, than mortal savages even, and there they had us tethered like two sheep, in less time than it has taken me to tell you the story.”

  “You are free now, Hurry,” returned Hetty, glancing timidly at the fine unfettered limbs of the young giant. “You have no cords, or withes, to pain your arms, or legs, now.”

  “Not I, Hetty. Natur’ is natur’, and freedom is natur’, too. My limbs have a free look, but that’s pretty much the amount of it, sin’ I can’t use them in the way I should like. Even these trees have eyes; ay, and tongues, too; for was the old man, here, or I, to start one single rod beyond our gaol limits, sarvice would be put on the bail afore we could ‘gird up our loins’ for a race; and, like as not, four or five rifle-bullets would be travelling after us, carrying so many invitations to curb our impatience. There isn’t a gaol in the Colony as tight as this we are now in; for I’ve tried the vartue of two or three on ’em, and I know the mater’als they are made of, as well as the men that made ’em; takin’ down being the next step in schoolin’ to puttin’ up, in all such fabrications.”