University of Virginia Library

13. CHAPTER XIII.

The fugitives reached the Block House in safety,
and found the few hours of repose which they could
snatch between the time of their midnight escape and
daylight, highly grateful from the fatigues which they
had undergone. The upper apartments were appropriately
divided between the commissioners and
Granger, who, with his wife, instead of seeking sleep
on their arrival, proceeded with all the usage of the
trader, to attend, first, to the proper safety and arrangement
of his stock in trade; which, consisting of a
few unsold goods, of a description adapted to the wants

of that region, and some small bundles of furs, intrinsically
of little value, were yet to the selfish tradesman
of paramount importance.

It was early sunrise on the morning following the
wild events narrated in our last chapter, when Gabriel
Harrison, of whom we have seen little for some time
past, appeared on the edge of the little brow of hill,
known as the Chief's Bluff, which immediately overlooked
the Pocota-ligo river. In the distance, some ten
or twelve miles, unseen, lay the Indian village or town
of the same name. Immediately before him, say one
or two miles above, in the broadest part of the stream,
rested motionless as the hill upon which he stood, the
sharp clipper-built vessel, which has already called
for some of our attention, and which at this moment
seemed to attract no small portion of his. Sheltered
by the branches of a single tree, which arose from
the centre of the bluff, Harrison continued the scrutiny,
with here and there a soliloquizing remark, until
interrupted by the presence of the commissioners,
who, with Granger, now came towards him from the
Block House.

“Ha, Sir Edmund—gentlemen—how fares it, and
when came you from Pocota-ligo?” was the salutation
of Harrison to the deputation.

“At midnight, my lord—at midnight, and in a hurry;
we had the nation upon us. There has been a commotion,
and by this time, I doubt not, the Yemassees
have cut the throats of all the chiefs friendly to our
proposed treaty.”

“Indeed, but this is worse and worse. I feared
something, and warned the assembly against this
movement. But their cursed desire to possess the lands
must precipitate all the dangers I have been looking
for. I told them that the Yemassees were discontented,
and that the utmost care must be taken not to
goad them too greatly. I saw this in the sullenness of
old Sanutee himself, and they have given wings to the
mischief by their imprudence. But how was it, Sir
Edmund?” let us have particulars.

The circumstances, as already narrated, were soon
told, and the countenance of Harrison bespoke the
full thoughts in his bosom. Turning to Granger, at
length he addressed the trader inquiringly:

“Can you say nothing more than this—what have
you learned touching Ishiagaska? Was it as I feared?
Had he been to St. Augustine?”

“He had, my lord,—”

“Harrison—Harrison—Captain Harrison,” impatiently
exclaimed the person addressed—“forget not
that here I have no other title. Go on.”

“Ishiagaska, sir, and old Choluculla, both of them
have been to St. Augustine, and but a week ago returned,
loaded with presents.”

“Ay, ay, the storm gathers, and we must look to it,
gentlemen commissioners. This matter hurries it onward.
They were making their preparations fast
enough before, and they will now see no reason in this
to pause. Yet you say that Sanutee saved you.”

“He did, and seemed friendly enough.”

“Said he aught of disapproval to their proceedings?
—made he any professions of regard to the English?”

“He said little, but that was friendly, and his interposition
for our safety—”

“Was his policy. He is a cunning savage, but I
see through him. He does not wish to alarm us, for
they can only conquer by disarming our caution; and
this is my greatest fear. Our people are so venturous
that they refuse to believe any evidence short of actual
demonstration, and every day finds them thrusting their
heads and shoulders farther and farther into the mouth
of the enemy, and without the chance of support from
their friends. They will grow wise at a fearful price,
or I am greatly deceived.”

“But what do you propose, my lord, if you look for
an insurrection near at hand?” asked Sir Edmund
Bellinger.

“I might answer you readily enough, Sir Edmund,
by asking you wherefore I am here. But please
style me Harrison, and if that be too abrupt in its

expression, Master or Captain Gabriel Harrison. It
is something of my game to see for myself the difficulties
and the dangers at hand, and for this reason I
now play the spy. Here, I am perfectly unknown,
save to one or two;—except as the captain of a little
troop, whose confidence I secured in the affair with
your Coosaws and Ashepoos, and which I imbodied on
that occasion. Still they only know me as Captain
Harrison, and somehow or other, they are well enough
content with me in that character.”

“And think you this insurrection nigh at hand?”

“Nay, Sir Edmund, that is the question, and it is
exceedingly important to know. Our borderers are
not willing to come out, unless for serious cause, and
to call them out prematurely would not only tax the
colony beyond its resources, but would dismiss the
present rulers of the people, with curses both loud and
deep, to the unambitious retreats of home and fireside.
They are turbulent enough now, and this matter of
religion, which our lords proprietors in England, the
bigoted old Granville in particular, seem so willing
with all their usual tyranny to meddle with, has completely
maddened these same people, in whose watery
county of Granville we now stand.”

“And what do you propose to do?”

“Why, surely, to gain what information we can,
before calling the people to arms. To make them
cautious, is all that we can do now. The evidence
which I have of this approaching insurrection, though
enough for suspicion, will scarcely be considered
enough for action; and I must spy myself, and engage
others in the work, so as to keep pace with their
movements. They must be watched closely,—ay,
and in every quarter, Sir Edmund, for let me tell you,
that in your own barony of Ashepoo, they are quite
as devilishly inclined as here. They are excited all
around us.”

“But I have seen nothing of all this,” was the reply
of the landgrave. “The Ashepoos, what are left of
them, seem quiet enough in my neighbourhood.”

“To be sure they are, in the presence of Sir
Edmund Bellinger, the immediate authority of the
English in their country. But did you strip yourself
of your authority, as I have done, for I am just from
that very quarter; put on the dress, and some of the
slashing and bilbo swagger of a drunken captain from
the Low Countries, to whom a pot of sour ale was the
supreme of felicity, they had shown you more of their
true nature. Some of my evidence would amuse you.
For example, I crossed the river last night to the
house of Tamaita, an old squaw who tells fortunes
in the very centre of Terrapin swamp, where she is
surrounded by as damnable an assemblage of living
alligators, as would have made happy all the necromancers
of the past ages, she told me my fortune,
which she had ready at my hand, and which, if true,
will certainly make me a convert to her philosophy.
But, with her predictions, she gave me a great deal of
advice, probably with the view to their being more
perfectly verified. Among other things, she promised
me a great deal of lightning, a promise which you
would naturally enough suppose, meant nothing more
than one of our summer afternoon thunder storms,
which, by the way, are terrible enough.”

“What else should she mean?”

“Her lightning signified the arrows of the Yemassees.
In this way, they figure the rapidity and the
danger attending the flight of their long shafts. The
promise tallied well with the counsel of Sanutee, who
advised me yesterday to be off in the big canoe.”

“Which advice you decline—you propose still to
continue here, my lord—Captain Harrison, I mean,”
replied Sir Edmund.

“Of God's surety, I will, Sir Edmund. Can I else
now? I must watch this movement as well as I can,
and make our people generally do so, or the tomahawk
and fire will sweep them off in a single night. Apart
from that, you know this sort of adventure is a pleasure
to me, and there is a something of personal interest in
some of my journeyings, which I delight to see ripen.”

Bellinger smiled, and Harrison continued with an air
of the most perfect business.

“But go on, gentlemen—the sooner, the better.
Make the best of your way to Charlestown, but trust
not to cross the land as you came. Keep from the
woods, for the journey that way is a slow one, and if
things turn out as I fear, they will swarm before long
with enemies, even to the gates of Charlestown. Do
me grace to place these despatches safely with their
proper trusts. The assembly will read these in secret.
This to the lieutenant-governor, who will act upon it
immediately. Despatch now, gentlemen—I have hired
boat, which Granger will procure for you from Grimstead.”

The commissioners were soon provided, and took
their departure at once for the city. Granger, after
this, returned to the conference with Harrison at the
Chief's Bluff, where the latter continued to linger.

“Have you seen Hector?” asked the latter.

“I have not, sir.”

“Indeed. Strange! He had a charge from me
yesterday to take the track of a sea-faring fellow,
whom I encountered, and of whom I had suspicions—
after that, he was to cross, and give you intelligence
of my being here.”

“I have seen nothing of him.”

“The blockhead has plunged into trap then, I doubt
not. Confound him, for a dull beast. To be absent at
this time, when I so much want him.”

While Harrison thus vented his anger and disquiet,
Granger, suddenly recollecting that he was called
to the afternoon before, by one in a boat, as he was
proceeding rapidly to join the commissioners in Pocota-ligo,
though without knowing the voice or hearing
it repeated, now related the circumstance, and
at once satisfied the person he addressed of the correctness
of his apprehensions.

“Ha—he is then in that sailor's clutches. But
he shall disgorge him. I'll not lose Hector, on any
terms. He's the very prince of body servants, and

loves me, I verily believe, as I do my mistress. He
must not suffer. Look forth, Granger, you have sharp
eyes—look forth, and say what you think of the
craft, lying there at the Broad-bend.”

“I have watched her, sir, for the last hour, but can't
say for certain what to think. It is easier to say what
she is not, than what she is.”

“That will do—say what she is not, and I can readily
satisfy myself as to what she is.”

“She has no colours—her paint's fresh, put on since
she's been in these waters. She is not a Spaniard,
sir, nor is she English, that's certain.”

“Well, what next, Sagacity?”

The trader paused a few moments, as if to think,
then, with an assured manner, and without seeming
to annex any great importance to the communication
which he made, he dryly replied—

“Why, sir, she's neither one thing nor another in
look, but a mixture of all. Now, when that's the case
in the look of a vessel, it's a sign that the crew is a
mixture, and that there is no one person regulating.
It's left to them to please their taste in most things,
and so that paint seems put on as if Dutch, and French,
Spanish, and Portuguese, and English, all had some
hand in it. There's yellow and black, red and green,
and all colours, I make out, where no one nation would
employ more than one or two of them.”

“Well, what do you infer from all that?”

“I think, sir, she's a pirate, or what's no better, a
Spanish guarda-costa.”

“The devil you do, and Hector is in her jaws. But
what other reasons have you for this opinion?”

“What is she doing here—having no intercourse
with the people—keeping off from the landing—showing
no colours, and yet armed to the teeth? If there
be nothing wrong, sir, why this concealment and distance?”

“You jump readily and with some reason to a conclusion,
Granger, and you may be right. Now hear
my thought. That vessel comes from Saint Augustine,

and brings arms to the Yemassees, and urges on this
very insurrection of which you had a taste last night.”

“Very likely, and she may be a pirate too. They
are thick about the coast.”

“Ay, Granger, as the contents of some of your
packages might tell if they had tongues,” said Harrison,
with a smile.

“God forbid, captain,” exclaimed the trader, with a
simple gravity, which rose into honest dignity as he
continued—“I can show bills for all my goods, from
worthy citizens in Charlestown and elsewhere.”

“No matter, I charge you not. But you may be
right. To be a pirate and a Spaniard are not such
distinct matters, and now I think with you, the probability
is, she is both. But what I mean to say, Granger,
is this—that now she comes here with no piratical
intent, but to serve other and perhaps worse purposes
—else, what keeps her from plundering the shore?”

“The best reason in the world, sir; it's a long reach
she must go through before she safely keels the sea.
It's slow work to get from the bay of the Broad, and a
wind takes its pleasure in coming to fill up a sail in this
crooked water. Let them once do what they came for,
and make the coast, then look out for the good merchantmen
who find their way into the Gulf of Mexico.”

“Well, whether Spaniard or pirate, or Dutch Flyaway,
we must get Hector out of her jaws, if it's only
to keep him a gentleman. And—but stay, she drops
a boat. Do you make out who comes in it?”

“Two men pull—”

“Certain. Who again, Mercury?”

“A bluff, stout fellow, sits astern, wears a blue jacket,
and—”

“A gold chain?”

“He does, sir, with thick-hanging shining buttons.”

“The same. That's Hercules.”

“Who, sir?”

“Hercules or Ajax, I don't remember which. I
gave him one or other, or both names yesterday, and
shall probably find another for him to-day, for I must
have Hector. He shapes for the shore—does he?”

“Yes, sir; and, from his present course, he will
make the Parson's landing.”

“Ha! say you so, most worthy trader—we shall
be at the meeting.”—“Yes,” muttered the speaker,
rather to himself than to his companion—“we shall
be at the meeting! He must not look upon my pretty
Bess without seeing the good fortune which the fates
yield her, in the person of her lover. We shall be
there, Granger; and, not to be unprovided with the
means for effecting the escape of Hector, let us call
up some of our choice spirits—some of the Green
Foresters—they know the signal of their captain, and,
thanks to fortune, I left enough for the purpose at the
smithy of Dick Grimstead. Come, man of wares and
merchandises—be packing.”

Leading the way from the hill, Harrison, followed
by Granger, descended to the level forest about a mile
off, in the immediate rear of the Block House, and
placing his hunting horn to his lips, he sounded it
thrice with a deep clear note, which called up a dozen
echoes from every dell in the surrounding woods.
The sounds had scarcely ceased to reverberate, before
they were replied to, in a long and mellow roll, from
one, seemingly a perfect master of the instrument, who,
even after the response had been given, poured forth a
generous blast, followed by a warbling succession of
cadences, melting away at last into a silence which
the ear, having carefully treasured up the preceding
notes, almost refused to acknowledge. From another
point in the woods, a corresponding strain thrice repeated,
followed soon after the first, and announced an
understanding among the parties, to which the instrument
had been made ably subservient.

“These are my Green Jackets, Granger, you have
made money out of that colour, my Plutus—my own
green jacket boys, true as steel, and swift as an Indian
arrow. Come, bury deeper in the thick woods, where,
in half an hour, you may see a dozen of the same
colour at the gathering.”