The Sun Maid: A Story of Fort Dearborn

Then Mercy retreated within doors and directed the Sun Maid to:

“Fly ’round right smart now an’ set the house to one side. Whisk them flapjacks over quicker ’an that, then they’ll not splish-splash all over the griddle. When I was a little girl nine years old I could fry cakes as round as an apple. No reason why you shouldn’t, too, if you put your mind to it.”

The Sun Maid laughed. No amount of fret or labor had ever yet had power to dim the brightness of her nature. Was it the Sun Maid, though? One had to look twice to see. For this tall, slender girl now wore her glorious hair in a braid, and her frock was of coarse blue homespun.

Her feet were bare, and her plump shoulders bowed a little because of the heavy burdens which her “mother Mercy” saw fit to put upon them.

“But I guess I don’t want to put my mind to it. I can’t see anything pretty in ’jacks which are to be eaten right up. Only I like to have them taste right for the folks. That’s all.”

Abel and Gaspar came in, and Kitty placed a plate of steaming cakes before them. Mercy hurried to the big churn outside the door and began to work the dasher up and down as if she hadn’t an ounce of butter in her dairy and must needs prepare this lot for the festival. As she churned she kept up a running fire of directions to the household within, finally suggesting, in a burst of liberality due to the occasion:

“You can fry what flapjacks you want for yourself, Wahneeny. An’ I don’t know as I care if you have a little syrup on ’em to-day – just for once, so to speak.”

However, Wahneenah disdained even the cakes, and the syrup-jug was deposited in its place with undiminished contents.

“Be you all through, then? Well, Kit, fly ’round. Clear the table like lightning, an’ fetch that butter bowl out the spring, an’ see if the salt’s all poun’ an’ sifted; an’ open the draw’s an’ lay out my clothes, an’ – Dear me! Does seem ’s if I should lose my senses with so much to do an’ no decent help, only – ”

“Hold on, Mercy! What’s the use of rushin’ through life ’s if you was tryin’ to break your neck?”

“Rushin’! With all that’s comin’ here to-day!”

“Well, let ’em come. We’ll be glad to see ’em. Nobody gladder ’n you yourself. But you fair take my breath away with your everlastin’ hurry-skurry, clitter-clatter. Don’t give a man a chance to even kiss his little girl good-mornin’. Do you know that, Sunny Maid? Hain’t said a word to your old Daddy yet!”

The child ran to him and fondly flung her arms as far as they would go around the settler’s broad shoulders. It was evident that there was love and sympathy between these two, though they were to be allowed short space “for foolin’” that day, and Mercy’s call again interrupted them:

“Come and take this butter down to the brook, Kit, an’ wash it all clean, an’ salt it just right – here ’tis measured off – an’ make haste. I do believe you’d ruther stand there lovin’ your old Abel – homely creatur’! – than helpin’ me. Yet, when I was a little girl your age, I could work the butter over fit to beat the queen. Upon my word, I do declare I see a wagon movin’ ’crost the prairie this very minute! Oh! what shall I do if I ain’t ready when they get here!”

Catching at last something of the pleasurable excitement about her, Kitty lifted the heavy butter-tray and started for the stream. The butter was just fine and firm enough to tempt her fingers into a bit of modelling, such as she had picked up for herself; and very speedily she had arranged a row of miniature fruits and acorns, and was just attempting to copy a flower which grew by the bank when Wahneenah’s voice, close at hand, warned her:

“Come, Girl-Child. The white mistress is in haste this morning. It is better to carry back the butter in a lump than to make even such pretty things and risk a scolding.”

“But father Abel would like them for his company. He is very fond of my fancy ‘pats’.”

“But not to-day. Besides, if there is time for idleness, I want you to pass it here with me, in my own wigwam.”

The Sun Maid looked up. “Shall you not be at the feasting, dear Other Mother? You have many friends among those who are coming.”

“Friendship is proved by too sharp a test sometimes. The way of the world is to follow the crowd. If a person falls into disfavor with one, all the rest begin to pick flaws. More than that: the temptation of money ruins even noble natures.”

“Why, Wahneenah! You sound as if you were talking riddles. Who is tempted by money? and which way does the ‘crowd’ you mean go? I don’t understand you at all.”

“May the Great Spirit be praised that it is so. May He long preserve to you your innocent and loyal heart.”

With these words, the Indian woman stooped and laid her hand upon the child’s head; then slowly entered her lodge and let its curtains fall behind her. There was an unusual sternness about her demeanor which impressed Kitty greatly; so that it was with a very sober face that she herself gathered up her burdens and returned to the cabin.

Yet on the short way thither she met Gaspar, who beckoned to her from behind the shelter of a haystack, motioning silence.

“But you mustn’t keep me, Gaspar boy. Mother Mercy is terribly hurried this morning, and now, for some reason, Other Mother has stopped helping and has gone home to the tepee. If I don’t work, it will about crush her down, Mercy says.”

“Hang Mercy! There. I don’t mean that. I wish you wouldn’t always look so scared when I get mad. I am mad to-day, Kit. Mad clear through. I’ve got to be around amongst folks, too, for a while; but the first minute you get, you come to that pile of logs near Wahneenah’s place, and I’ll have something to tell you.”

“No you won’t! No you won’t! I know it already. I heard father Abel talking. There is to be a horse race, after the harvesting and the supper are over. There is a new man, or family, moved into the neighborhood and he is a horse trader. I heard all about it, sir!”

“You heard that? Did you hear anything else? About Wahneenah and money?”

“Only what she told me herself”; repeating the Indian woman’s words.

“Then she knows, poor thing!” cried Gaspar, indignantly.

CHAPTER XIII.

THE HARVESTING

Kitty had no time to ask further explanation. Already there was an ox team driving up to the cabin and, scanning the prairies, she saw others on the way, so merely stopped to cry, eagerly:

“They’ve come! The folks have come!” before she hastened in with the butter and to see if she could in any way help Mercy dress for the great occasion.

She was just in time, for the plump housewife was vainly struggling to fasten the buttons of a new lilac calico gown which she had made:

“A teeny tiny mite too tight. I didn’t know I was gettin’ so fat, I really didn’t.”

“Oh! it’s all right, dear Mother Mercy. It looked just lovely that day you tried it on. I’ll help you. You’re all trembling and warm. That’s the reason it bothers.”

She was so deft and earnest in her efforts that Mercy submitted without protest, and in this manner succeeded in “making herself fit to be seen by folks” about the moment that they arrived to observe. Then everything else was forgotten, amid the greetings and gayety that followed. For out of what purported to be a task the whole community was making a frolic.

While the men repaired to the golden fields to reap the grain the women hurried to the smooth grassy place where the harvest-dinner was to be enjoyed out-of-doors.

Most of the vehicles – which brought whole families, down to the babe in long clothes – were drawn by oxen, though some of the pioneers owned fine horses and had driven these, groomed with extraordinary care and destined, later on, to be entered in the races which should conclude the business and fun of the day.

Both horses and oxen were, for the present, led out to graze upon a fine pasture and were supposed to be under the care, while there, of the young people. These were, however, more deeply engaged in playing games than in watching, and for once their stern parents ignored the carelessness.

“Oh, such bright faces!” cried the Sun Maid to Mercy. “And yours is the happiest of all, even though you did have such a terrible time to get ready. See, they are fixing the tables out of the wagon boards, and every woman has brought her own dishes. They’re making fires, too, some of the bigger boys. What for, Mother Mercy?”

“Oh! don’t bother me now. It’s to boil the coffee on, and to bake the jonny-cakes. ‘Journey-cakes,’ they used to call them. Mis’ Waldron, she’s mixin’ some this minute. Step acrost to her table an’ watch. A girl a’most ten years old ought to learn all kinds of housekeepin’.”

Kitty was nothing loath. It was, indeed, a treat to see with what skill the comely settler of the wilderness mixed and tossed and patted her jonny-cake, famous all through that countryside for lightness and delicacy; and as she finished each batch of dough, and slapped it down upon the board where it was to cook, she would hand it over to Kitty’s charge, with the injunction:

“Carry that to one of the fires, an’ stand it up slantin’, so ’s to give it a good chance to bake even. Watch ’em all, too; an’ as soon as they are a nice brown on one side, either call me to turn ’em to the other, or else do it yourself. As Mercy Smith says, a girl can’t begin too early to housekeep.”

“But this is out-door keep, isn’t it?” laughed the Sun Maid, as, with a board upon each arm, she bounded away to place the cakes as she had been directed.

In ordinary, Mercy Smith was not a lavish woman; but on such a day as this she threw thrift to the wind and, brought out the best she could procure for the refreshment of her guests; and everybody knows how much better food tastes when eaten out-of-doors than in regular fashion beside a table. The dinner was a huge success; and even Gaspar, whom Kitty’s loving watchful eyes had noticed was more than usually serious that day, so far relaxed his indignation as to partake of the feast with the other visiting lads.

But, when it was over and the women were gathering up the dishes, preparatory to cleansing them for their homeward journey, the child came to where Mercy stood among a group of women, and asked:

“Shall I wash the dishes, Mother Mercy?”

“No, sissy, you needn’t. We grown folks’ll fix that. If you want something to do, an’ are tired of out-doors, you can set right down yonder an’ rock Mis’ Waldron’s baby to sleep. By and by, Abel’s got a job for you will suit you to a T!”

Kitty was by no means tired of out-doors, but a baby to attend was even a greater rarity than a holiday; so she sat down beside the cradle, which its mother had brought in her great wagon, and gently swayed the little occupant into a quiet slumber. Then she began to listen to the voices about her, and presently caught a sentence which puzzled her.

“Fifty dollars is a pile of money. It’s more ’n ary Indian ever was worth. Let alone a sulky squaw.”

“Yes it is. An’ I need it. I need it dreadful,” assented Mercy, forgetful of the Sun Maid’s presence in the room.

“Well, I, for one, should be afraid of her,” observed another visitor, clattering the knives she was wiping. “I wouldn’t have a squaw livin’ so near my door, an’ that’s a fact.”

Kitty now understood that these people were speaking of Wahneenah, and listened intently.

“Oh! I ain’t afraid of her. Not that. But I never did like her, nor she me. She’s sullen an’ top-lofty. Why, you’d think I wasn’t no better than the dirt under her feet, to see her sometimes. She was good to the childern, I’ll ’low, afore me an’ Abel took ’em in. But that’s four years ago, an’ I’ve cared for ’em ever since. Sometimes I think she’s regular bewitched ’em, they dote on her so. If you believe me, they’ll listen to her leastest word sooner ’n a whole hour of my talk!”

“I shouldn’t be surprised,” quietly commented one young matron, who was jogging her own baby to sleep by tipping her chair violently back and forth upon its four legs.

Continued Mercy:

“She wouldn’t eat a meal of victuals with me if she was starvin’. Yet I’ve treated her Christian. Only this mornin’ I give her leave to fry cakes for herself, an’ even have some syrup, but she wouldn’t touch to do it. Yes; fifty dollars of good government money would be more to me ’n she is, an’ she’d be took care of, I hear, along with all the rest is caught. It’s time the country was rid of the Indians an’ white folks had a chance. There’s all the while some massacrein’ an’ fightin’ goin’ on somewhere.”

“Oh! I guess the government just puts ’em under lock an’ key, in a guard-house, or some such place, till it gets enough to send away off West somewheres. I’d get the fifty dollars, if I was you, and march her off. She’ll be puttin’ notions into the youngsters’ heads first you see an’ makin’ trouble.”

“I don’t know just how to manage it. Abel, he’s queer an’ sot. He’s gettin’ tired, though, of some things, himself.”

“Manage it easy enough. Like fallin’ off a log. My man could do you that good turn. She could be took along in our wagon as far as the Agency. Then, next time he comes by with his grist on his road to mill, he could fetch you the money. I’d do it, sure. I only wish I had an Indian to catch as handy as she is.” Having given this advice, Mercy’s guest sat down.

There was a rush of small feet and the Sun Maid confronted them. Her blue eyes blazed with indignation, her face was white, and her hair, which the day’s activity had loosed from its braid, streamed backward as if every fibre quivered with life. With heaving breast and clenched hands, she faced them all.

“Oh, how dare you! How dare you! You are talking of my Wahneenah; of selling her, of selling her like a pig or a horse. Even you, Mrs. Jordan, though she nursed your little one till it got well, and only told you the truth: that if you’d look after it more and visit less it wouldn’t have the croup so often. You didn’t like to hear her say it, and you do not love her. But she is good, good, good! There is nobody so good as she is. And no harm shall come to her. I tell you. I say it. I, the Sun Maid, whom the Great Spirit sent to her out of the sky. I will go and tell her at once. She shall run away. She shall not be sold – never, never, never!”

The women remained dumfounded where she left them, watching her skim the distance between cabin and wigwam, scarcely touching the earth with her bare feet in her haste to warn her friend of this new danger which threatened her and her race. For it was quite true, this matter that had been discussed. The Indians had given so much trouble in the sparsely settled country that the authorities had offered a price for their capture; and it was this price which money-loving Mercy coveted.

Like a flash of a bird’s wing, Kitty had darted into the lodge and out again, with an agony of fear upon her features; and then she saw Gaspar beckoning.

As she reached him he motioned silence and drew her away into the shadow of the forest, that just there fringed the clearing behind the tepee.

“But – Wahneenah’s gone!” she whispered.

“Don’t worry. She’s safe enough for the present. Listen to me. Do you remember the horse-racing last year?”

“Course. I remember I got so excited over the horses, and so sorry for the boys that rode and didn’t win. But what of that? Other Mother has gone!”

“I tell you she’s safe. Safer than you or me. Listen. Abel says we, too, will have to ride a race to-day! On Tempest and Snowbird. Even if we win, the money will belong to him; and if we lose – he’s going to sell one of our horses to pay his loss. I heard him say it.”

“But they are ours!”

“He’s kept them all these years, he says. He claims the right to do with them as he chooses. Bad as that is, it isn’t the worst. Though Wahneenah is safe, still she will not be always. You and I will have to ride this race – to save her life, or liberty!”

“What do – you – mean?”

“I haven’t time to explain. Only – will you do as I say? Exactly?”

“Of course.” Kitty looked inquiringly into her foster-brother’s face. Didn’t he know she loved him better than anybody and would mind him always?

“When we are on the horses if I say to you: ‘Follow me!’ will you?”

“Of course. Away to the sky, over yonder, if you want me.”

“Even if any grown folks should try to stop you? Even if Abel or Mercy?”

“Even” – declared the little girl, sincerely.

“Now go back to the house, or anywhere you please till Abel calls you, or I do. Then come and mount. And then – then – do exactly as I tell you. Remember.”

He went away, back to the group of men about the barn, and Kitty sat down in the shady place to wait. But it was not for long. Presently she heard Mercy calling her, and saw Abel, with Gaspar, leading the black gelding and pretty Snowbird out of the stable toward a ring of other horses. She got up and passed toward the cabin very slowly. Oddly enough, she began to feel timid about riding before all those watching, strange faces; yet did not understand why. Then she thought of Wahneenah, and her returning anger made her indifferent to them.

“Abel wants you, Kit!” cried Mrs. Smith, quite ignoring the child’s recent outbreak, and the girl walked quietly toward him. But it was Gaspar who helped to swing her into her saddle, where she settled herself with an ease learned long ago of the Snake-Who-Leaps. The lad, also, found time to whisper:

“Remember your promise! We are to ride this race for Wahneenah’s life – though nobody knows that save you and me. So ride your best. Ride as you never rode before – and on the road I lead you!”

The sons of the new settler and horse dealer were to ride against these two. There were three of these youths, all well mounted, and the course was to be a certain number of times around the great wheat field so freshly reaped. It was a rough route, indeed, but as just for one as another, and in plain sight of all the visitors. The five horses ranged in a row with their noses touching a line, held by two men, that fell as the word was given:

“One – two – three – GO!”

They went. They made the circuit of the field in fair style, with the three strangers a trifle ahead. On the completion of the second heat, the easterners passed the starting-point alone.

“Why, Gaspar! Why, Kitty!” shouted Abel reprovingly. “How’s this?”

“Maybe they don’t understand what’s meant,” suggested somebody.

Seemingly, they did not. For neither at the third round did they appear in leading. On the contrary, they had started off at a right angle, straight across the prairie; but now so fast they rode, and so unerringly, that long before their deserted friends had ceased to stare and wonder they had passed out of sight.

CHAPTER XIV.

ONCE MORE IN THE OLD HOME

“We can rest a little now, Kit. We are so far away that nobody could catch us if they tried. They won’t try, any way, I guess. They’ll think we’ll go back.”

“Didn’t the horses do finely, Gaspar! I never rode like that, I guess. Where are we going? What did you mean about saving Wahneenah’s life? Where is she?”

“Don’t ask so many questions. I’ve got to think. I’ve got to think very hard. I’m the man of our family, you know, Sun Maid. Wahneenah and you are my women.”

“Oh! indeed!” said the girl, moving a little nearer her foster-brother on the grassy hillock where they had slipped from their saddles, to rest both themselves and the beasts.

“You see: we’ve all run away.”

“Pooh! That’s nothing. I’ve always been running away. Black Partridge said I began life that way.”

“You’re about ten years old, Kit. You’re big enough to be getting womanly.”

“Father Abel said I was. I can sew quite well. If I’m very, very good, I’m to be let stitch a dickey all alone, two threads at a time, for him. Mercy said so.”

“Do you like stitching shirts for that old man?”

“No. I hate it.”

“Poor little Sun Maid. You were made to be happy, and do nothing but what you like all day long. Well, I’ll be a man some day, and build a cabin of my own for you and Wahneenah.”

“That will be nice. Though I’ll be of some use some way, even if I don’t like sewing. Where shall we go when we get rested, boy?”

“To the Fort.”

“The – Fort! I thought it was all burned up.”

“There is a new one on the same old ground. It is our real home, you know. We will be refugees. When we meet Wahneenah, we’ll go and claim protection.”

“Oh! Gaspar, where is she? I want her terribly. I am afraid something will happen to her.”

In his heart the lad was, also, greatly alarmed; but he felt it unwise to show this. So he answered, airily:

“Oh! she’s on, a piece. I pointed her the road, and told her where to meet us. At the top of the sandhills, this side the Fort.”

“The sandhills! That dreadful place. You must be getting a real ‘brave,’ Gaspar boy, if you don’t mind going there again. I’ve heard you talk – ”

“I don’t want to talk even now, Kit. But I had to have some spot we both knew, where we could meet, and we chose that. I expect she’ll be there waiting, and as soon as the horses get cooled a little, and we do, we’ll go on.”

“I’m hungry. I wish we had brought something to eat.”

“I did. It’s here in my blouse. I noticed at the dinner that you did more serving than eating. There’s water yonder, too; in that clump of bushes must be a spring,” and the prairie-wise lad was right.

The supper he produced was an indiscriminate mixture of meats and sweets and, had Kitty not been so really in need of food she would have disdained what she promptly pronounced “a mess.” But she ate it and felt rested by it; so that she began to remember things she had scarcely noticed earlier in the day.

“Gaspar, Wahneenah must have known about this – this money being offered for her and other Indians. She had taken everything out of her wigwam. I thought she was terribly grave this morning, and she kept looking at me all the time. Do you think she knew she was going to run away as she was?”

“Course. She’s known it some days.”

“And didn’t tell me!”

“She couldn’t, because she loves you so. She wouldn’t do a thing to put you in danger. So I thought the matter over, and I tell you I’ve just taken the business right out their hands. I was tired, any way. I’m glad we came. I’m almost a man, Kit; and I won’t be scolded by any woman as Mercy has scolded me. And when I found Abel was getting stingy, too, and claiming our horses for their keep, when they’ve really just kept themselves out on the prairie, or anywhere it happened, I – ”

“Boy, you talk too fast. I – I don’t feel as if I was glad. Except when I remember Other Mother. They were horrid, horrid about her. I hate them for that, though I love them for other things. I wonder what Mother Mercy will say when we don’t come home!”

“She’ll have a chance to say a lot of things before we do, I guess. Well, we’ll be going. I wouldn’t like to miss Wahneenah, and I don’t know but they close the Fort gates at night.”

“Did she ride Chestnut?”

“Course. What a lot of questions you ask!”

The Sun Maid looked into the boy’s face. It was too troubled for her comfort, and she exclaimed:

“Gaspar Keith! There’s more to be told than you’ve told me. What is it you are keeping back?”

“I – I wonder if you can understand, if I do tell you?”

“I think I can understand a good many things. One is: you are making me feel very unhappy.”

“Well, then, I’m going to take Wahneenah to the Fort, and give her up myself!”

They had remounted their horses, and were pacing leisurely along toward the rendezvous, keeping a sharp lookout for the Indian woman; but at this startling statement the Sun Maid reined up short, and demanded:

“What – do – you – mean?”

“Just exactly what I say. I’m going to give her up and get the money.”

Kitty could not speak; and with a perplexity that was not at all comfortable to himself, the lad returned her astonished gaze.

“Then – you – are – just – as – mean – as – Mercy – Smith!”

“I am not mean at all! Don’t you say it. Don’t you understand? I do – or I thought I did. It’s this way. She can’t be given up but once, can she? Well, I’ll do it, instead of an enemy.”

“You – wicked – boy! I can’t believe it! I won’t! You shall not do it; never!”

“Oh, don’t be silly! Of course, I’ll not keep the money. I’ll give it right back to her. Then she can do what she likes with it – make a nice new wigwam near the Fort, and she can get lots of skins, or even canvas, there. Come, let’s ride on.”