Eliot Pattison - Eye of the Raven

Conawago did not respond.

Duncan stepped to the bench to stand behind Mokie. The girl pushed a heel of bread toward him.

"So you left the Society of Jesus in search of Adam and Eve?" his friend asked.

A Jesuit. At last Duncan understood. The Frenchman had been a Jesuit priest and had asked about two of the Jesuit missions that operated in the northern Iroquois lands. Though Conawago had never entirely embraced their faith, he had been in the care of Jesuits in Canada and Europe for much of his youth and had great respect for many of them.

The Frenchman set his fiddle on the table and paced around the old Indian, studying him with a new intensity. "I came not to search for Adam and Eve but to ensure Eden might become the fortress they need to withstand the onslaught from without."

"A mission by another name then," Conawago replied.

"My name is Rideaux, old man. My Jesuit robe was ripped off my back before I had the chance to throw it off. And I tend to take criticism only from my friends, not trespassers."

Conawago gave a small, bitter grin.

"You redeem the Indians by building carousels and fur presses?" Duncan broke in. "Your mission has a decidedly commercial feel." He studied the man's huge beard, which covered most of his face. "You are the great bear?"

Rideaux's eyes flared. "Who are you?" he demanded, his gaze shifting from one man to another. "No one invited you inside my walls."

"Like you," Duncan offered, "seekers of truth. Believers in new beginnings. Escorts for a young slave girl."

"Slave no longer. Virginia property rights do not extend to our country."

"Your country?" Duncan asked.

"Iroquoia.

"I thought we were in the province of Pennsylvania."

"You are misinformed. This land has never been legally surrendered. Technically the colony's boundary ends miles to the south. We recognize no European sovereignty here."

"We?"

Rideaux did not answer, but looked past Duncan. Duncan slowly turned to see a dozen Indians, both men and women, watching from the shadows at the back of the chamber. "Your business is done here," the Frenchman muttered. "We thank you for delivering the girl."

Mokie linked her arm with Duncan's. "We were promised supplies," she said. "In Shamokin there would be supplies."

"Not here, mademoiselle. In town. The log cabin with two floors. I will take you there."

Mokie shook her head. "I am with them. If they say I must return to the Virginians I will do so," she said with a conviction that quite astonished Duncan.

Rideaux's expression darkened. Something seemed to pass between him and the Indians. Duncan rose and stood beside Conawago. The questions that had leapt to his tongue suddenly seemed far less important than finding a safe egress from their host's strange compound. Several of the men, sturdy warriors all, began advancing, one with a length of rope, one with an iron bar, one with an ax.

"Skanawati!" Mokie suddenly blurted out. She darted from Duncan's side to stand between himself and the Indians. She pronounced the name again, like a loud command. The company froze.

Rideaux stared as if dumbstruck. "What did you say, ma petite?"

"We come from the Great Chief of the Iroquois!" She spoke still loudly but faster, as if rushing to get all her words out before her nerve broke. "Mr. McCallum and Mr. Conawago are trying to keep him from being hung from a Pennsylvania gallows! Mr. Conawago was going to die when my master was nailed to a tree, and Mr. Skanawati took his place, and the Hurons attacked us in a field of skulls to take an old smelly body, and they tried for my scalp but I fought them off with stones!"

Rideaux's eyes grew round with wonder, then he shot several quick syllables toward the Indians in the shadows. Two of the men darted out the door. A woman came forward with a heavy clay jug and several wooden cups. The Frenchman's dangerous glint softened, and a narrow grin returned as he gestured to the table. "I think we shall have some cider," he announced.

The telling of a story, Indian fashion, was never in the linear style of Europeans, Duncan had learned. Now he saw that their taking of a story was much the same. He began to explain the death of the Virginia officer, then one of the Indians insisted on hearing about the field of skulls. He described Conawago's arrest and the trial at Ligonier only to be interrupted with questions about whether Iroquois were scouts at that garrison. When Mokie mentioned Penn's birth the night before the chiefs confession, an Indian woman broke in to inquire about the stars and moon that night, to Conawago's approving nod. At last, after nearly an hour the violent and bizarre events of the past week were out, spread on the table before them as it were, where they continued to be dissected and digested.

"Did Skanawati wear paint when he confessed?" one of the men asked.

Duncan's confirmation brought a flurry of quick, worried whispers among the Indians.

"The trees you speak of," an aged woman asked. "Are they all on the old Warriors Path?"

Conawago slowly nodded.

"They tried once before," she replied.

"Tried what exactly?" Duncan wanted to know.

"The Virginians attempted to take our land. In 1744. They came to a treaty conference and took away a piece of paper from some Oneidas that said they owned all the Ohio country."

"What happened?"

"Everyone lied," the woman replied.

"The Six Nations agreed to sell rights to the valley called Shenandoah," Rideaux explained. "Afterward the Virginians said the wording included all the lands in the west."

Conawago and Duncan exchanged a worried glance. There seemed too many reasons why an Iroquois chief might want to kill a man from the Shenandoah.

"The Six Nations had no right," the woman interjected. "It was always Shawnee country, not that of the Iroquois."

Her words stilled all conversation. One of the men with his hair in the Mohawk fashion snapped an irritated word at her. For the first time Duncan realized the gathering included members of several different tribes.

"Is he safe?" Rideaux asked at last.

"Skanawati? For now he is protected as part of the convoy en route to the Lancaster treaty talks. But then there will be a trial."

"You said he confessed."

"Even if he were the killer there could be circumstances that might avoid a hanging."

"You act as though you don't believe him. He is a chief of the Grand Council."

"The killings continue. At the southern boundary tree we found two who had been murdered last summer. Was Skanawati on the Monongahela last summer?"

Rideaux chewed on Duncan's words. "He stayed close to his family's village," he revealed in a low voice. "There was sickness, much sadness."

"But you misunderstand the Virginians," the Frenchman added after a moment. "To their leaders the world is divided between those who have land and those who are slaves in one fashion or another. They are wise to the ways of the tribes."

"I'm sorry?"

"A powerful chief like Skanawati is the perfect killer as far as they are concerned."

"But hanging him will only excite the tribes against them," Duncan countered. "They could hope for no more land, no more treaties."

"To the contrary, Skanawati will never be permitted to die," Rideaux said. "Have you not heard of condolences? When someone in the tribes is slain the killer's family has the right to offer payment. Blankets. Flints. Baskets of corn. When the victim's family accepts the gifts the murder is resolved, harmony is restored."

"The Virginians have no need for blankets and corn."

The Frenchman rolled his eyes upward as if praying for patience to deal with the thick-skulled Scotsman before him. "For Virginia, this new treaty is all about perfecting its claim to the western lands. The Iroquois have protested that the new contract is not valid, that it was signed by minor chiefs in some tavern. But apart from Old Belt himself, Skanawati is the most revered chief in all the Six Nations. They will do most anything to save his life."