It was, I should judge, nearly five o'clock when we descended by the open stairway to the ground floor. I held the window wide; she placed her hands on the sill and leaped lightly to the grass. I followed. Presently the lilac thicket parted and the tall Oneida appeared, leading my horse. One keen, cunning glance he gave at the girl, then, impassive, stood bolt upright beside my horse. He was superb, stripped naked to clout and moccasin, head shaved, body oiled and most elaborately painted; and on his broad breast glimmered the Wolf lined in sapphire-blue. When the long roll of the dead thundered through the council-house, his name was the fourth to be called--Shononses. And never was chief of the Oneida nation more worthy to lift the antlers that no grave must ever cover while the Long House endures.
"Has my brother learned news of the gathering in the north?" I asked, studying the painted symbols on his face and body.
"The council sits at dawn," he replied quietly.
"At dawn!" I exclaimed. "Why, we have no time, then----"
"There is time, brother. There is always time to die."
"To--die!" I looked at him, startled. Did he, then, expect no mercy at the council? He raised his eyes to me, smiling. There was nothing of fear, nothing of boastfulness, even, in attitude or glance. His dignity appalled me, for I knew what it meant. And, suddenly, the full significance of his paint flashed upon me.
"You think there is no chance for us?" I repeated.
"None, brother."
"And yet you go?"
"And you, brother?"
"I am ordered; I am pledged to take such chances. But you need not go, Little Otter. See, I free you now. Leave me, brother. I desire it."
"Shononses will stay," he said impassively. "Let the Long House learn how the Oneidas die."
I shuddered and looked again at his paint. It was inevitable; no orders, no commands, no argument could now move him. He understood that he was about to die, and he had prepared himself. All I could hope for was that he had mistaken the temper of the council; that the insolence of a revolted nation daring to present a sachem at the Federal-Council might be overlooked--might be condoned, even applauded by those who cherished in their dark hearts, locked, the splendid humanity of the ancient traditions. But there was no knowing, no prophesying what action a house divided might take, what attitude a people maddened by dissensions, wrought to frenzy by fraternal conflict, might assume. God knows the white man's strife was barbarous enough, brother murdering brother beneath the natal roof. What, then, might be looked for from the fierce, proud people whose Confederacy was steadily crumbling beneath our touch; whose crops and forests and villages had gone roaring up into flames as the vengeance of Sullivan, with his Rangers, his Continentals, and his Oneidas, passed over their lands in fire!