Major Richardson

“ Elmsley, who, with her father and husband, had some weeks preceded her to the same quarter.
Little did we at the time, as we shared in the general and sincere homage to her magnificence of person and brilliancy of character, dream that a day would arrive when we should be the chronicler of Mrs. Headley's glory, or have the pleasing task imposed upon us of re-embodying, after death, the inimitable grace and fulness of contour that then fired the glowing heart of the unformed boy of fifteen for the ripened and heroic, although by no means bold or masculine woman of forty. ”

“ There is nothing but falsehood and treachery in their selfish and avaricious nature. They are deceitful, and so given to love rum that when an Indian is seen wallowing like a hog in the gutter, and with the foam disgorging from his blue and lizard-like lips, stabbing right and left indiscriminately, as if hatred and the sight of blood were essential to his very existence, you may at once know him to be a Chippewa. How then can such a man, and of such a race, disgrace and dishonor the councils of the war path of the nobler Pottowatomies? ”

“ Headley entered, unannounced, into the apartment where the Virginian was sitting, he brushed his hand across his eyes, but now they wept not only the emotion of grief that he betrayed, but of joy, of pride, of the fulness of life. He rose, pressed her hand warmly, and, giving her Maria's note to read, took the letter which she proffered in return.
“Ah! Ronayne,” began the first, “what language can express my feelings—my fears—my agony. For the last week I have not seemed to live a human existence. ”

“ Let us go—the night is fast approaching, and the place remains to be reached, and the grave is to be dug. By to-morrow's dawn we travel together and alone through the wilderness, in execution of the will of your friend and my husband. Mark that, Wau-nan-gee! It is his will that we travel together—that you shall be my guide and protector. See this dress, how well it disguises me. I shall be taken, as we journey, for your squaw. Ha! ha! That will be excellent, will it not? Maria Heywood—Ronayne's wife—the mistress of a fiend—then Wau-nan-gee's squaw—and not yet six weeks married to the first! ”

“ Come with the occasion back with Wau-nan-gee. He will conduct you to the tent where now I am, some little distance from the general encampment, and never visited but by Winnebeg and his son. You will say I am but an indifferent soldier's wife to give such counsel to a husband. I confess it; my love for you is greater than my regard for your glory. But what glory do you seek? March with the troops and ingloriously you perish; for what can avail defence against the strong force I know to be fully bent upon your destruction. ”

“ Mrs. Elmsley and Von Voltenberg were there; and even the former must not know the secret. Let all mourn her as one lost to us for, ever, but not through her own fault. Let them continue to believe that she has been violently torn from us, not that she has proved unfaithful to her husband, ungrateful to her friends.”
“Think you not, Ellen, that it would be better to continue Ronayne in the same belief? As you have not opened the subject to him, it is not too late to alter your first intention.”
“Dear Headley, Ronayne must know all. In no other way can the wound at his heart be healed. ”

“ Squatted in a circle, and within a few feet of the wagon in which the tomahawked children lay covered with blood, and fast stiffening in the coldness of death, now sat about twenty Indians, with Pee-to-tum at their head, passing from hand to hand the quivering heart of the slain man, whose eyes, straining, as it were, from their sockets, seemed to watch the horrid repast in which they were indulging, while the blood streamed disgustingly over their chins and lips, and trickled over their persons. ”

“ I cannot endure the sight. They will kill me—ay, worse than kill—tear my heart-strings with slow agony. Ah! dear Mrs. Headley—Mrs. Elmsley—both of you, who loved Maria so well—can you not understand the pangs I suffer! Yesterday I could have defied the world in the vain pride of my happiness and strength; to-day I feel that I am more wretched than the slave that tugs at his chain—more feeble than a child. ”

“ Have we not five hundred Pottowatomie warriors to escort us to Fort Wayne?”
“Alas, my too confiding husband, it is from these very people you have named that most I fear the danger.”
“Nonsense!” returned Captain Headley in a tone of gentle rebuke, while he pressed his lips to the expansive brow of his companion; “this is unkind, Ellen. Why distrust these our staunchest friends? I would rely upon Winnebeg as upon myself. He is too noble a fellow not to hold treachery in abhorrence.” ”

“ The sun of the existence of each, from the commanding officer to the youngest drummer-boy, had been dimmed; and many a weather-beaten soldier, grown grey in the natural apathy of age, now found himself unable to restrain the rising tear. Not a woman, not a child arrived at the years of consciousness, but missed and mourned over the absence of her who had been, not merely the favorite, but the beloved of the whole garrison. ”

“ Advantage was taken of this cessation of combat to bring back what remained of the gallant little band of volunteers within the square. The dead were left to moisten the sands on which they had so bravely fallen. Ronayne still lived, but he could not be removed. The slightest motion of his body brought with it agony little less excruciating than that which his enemy had experienced. He knew he must die, and he begged Captain Headley to let him perish where he was, under the shadow of the guns of his comrades, and in full sight of the forest which he knew contained all that he loved on earth. ”

“ I have been feverish, excited, scarcely conscious of my own acts, and filled with a strong dread of an evil which I know will come, must come, although only protracted. And yet, with all the horror of my position, how much more bitter might have been my self-reproach, my remorse, in having neglected, in my distraction, to inclose the packet for Mrs. Headley, which the noble-hearted, the devoted Wau-nan-gee now conveys. I thought I had given it to Sergeant Nixon, but Wau-nan-gee found it in the pocket of my saddle only yesterday. ”

“ Little more than a month had elapsed since the marriage of the impetuous and generous Ensign Ronayne to the woman he adored. Absorbed by the intensity of their passion, fed by the solitude around, each day increased their attachment, and their full hearts acknowledged that the love which the man bears to his mistress—the affianced sharer of his inmost thoughts—is passionless compared with that which follows the mystic tie, linking their most secret being in fearlessness of devotion. ”

“ There was a pause of a few moments, during which low murmurs broke from the younger Indians, and the dark and subtle eye of Pee-to-tum quailed before the bold look of the commanding officer, who continued:
“As for you, vile Chippewa, you are the sole cause of all these troubles, all this excitement in the young men of the Pottowatomie Nation. You are of that dark and malignant race, as far below the Pottowatomie in everything that is noble and generous and good as the Evil Spirit is below the Good Spirit. ”

“ For myself, I am prepared for the worst; and in order that they shall know how much I mistrust them—nay, how certain I am of what they intend, I shall head the advance with my brave warriors painted as black as the devil himself. And so to prepare ourselves.”
“Corporal Nixon, pull me down that flag,” ordered Ensign Ronayne, pointing to it, when the commanding officer had descended to give directions for the formation of the line of march—“that is my especial charge, and he who may take a fancy to it must win it with my life.” ”

“ As the passion that I feel is fire, hot as the Virginian sun that nurtured me, so will it become ice the moment it ceases to be fed by that which first enkindled it. Yes,” he continued, bitterly, “I could tear my heart out if in its weakness it could pine for one, however once endeared, who had ceased to respond to all its devotedness and worship. I might think of her, but only to sustain my wounded spirit. Contempt and scorn for her fickleness, not love—base and grovelling love—should ever be associated with her image, when undesiredly it arose to my repelling memory. ”

“ Headley,” said Von Voltenberg, who afterwards admitted that, in the whole course of his practice, he had never been similarly touched, “do not check him. Let him give full vent to this emotion, for painful as it now is, both to himself and to us who witness it, this outburst once exhausted, the crisis once past, there will be less fear of a return. See, already the paroxysm is weaker—he is more calm—both mind and body are worn out, and if he can but sleep for a few hours, although he may perhaps awaken to more acute sorrow, no danger to his life need be apprehended.” ”

“ McKenzie with severity, when the door was closed on her, “I am come to use strong language to you, but the occasion justifies it. If you do not rescind your promise of powder to the Indians, the blood of your wife, of my daughter—of every woman and child—of every individual in the garrison, be upon your head! Sir, you will be a murderer, and without the poor excuse of even being compelled to pursue the course you have. Was it not enough to promise them the public stores, without exciting their cupidity still further? ”

“ Your ball was well aimed, Captain Headley, and hastened the death of the loathsome and vindictive savage; but never could he have survived that bayonet wound. Life must have ebbed away with the blood that followed its removal; yet,” and this was said with a significance which his commanding officer seemed to understand, “it must be not a little satisfactory to you to know that your shot saved him from the tomahawk that was already raised to dispatch him.” ”

“ Margaret McKenzie had been born at Chicago, but having lost her mother at an early age, her father, profiting by one of his periodical visits to New York, had taken her with him for the purpose of receiving such an education as would enable her not only to grace a drawing-room, and make her a companion to a man of sense and refinement, but to fit her for those more domestic duties which the uncertain character of so secluded a life might occasionally render necessary, and where luxury and education alone were insufficient to a trading husband's views of happiness. ”

“ Elmsley; that given, we return our answer,” remarked Captain Headley.
“Winnebeg,” said the lieutenant, addressing him for the first time, “one question I would ask you first: know you anything of our wives—are they dead—and where is Mr. McKenzie?”
“They are all alive,” returned the chief with animation—“bad wound, though—Winnebeg help save him himself.”
Human nature could stand no more. Both officers, as if actuated by the same common impulse, met and embraced each other warmly. ”

“ Elmsley, had ridden up with the rear. “Better to be shot down there than tomahawked near the wagons. Besides our presence will encourage the men—will it not, my lads?” A loud cheer burst from the ranks. Each man, certainly, felt greater confidence than before.
“Then forward, charge!” shouted Capt. Headley, availing himself of this moment of enthusiasm; “recollect, you fight for your wives and children; if you drive not the Indians, they perish!”
“Nay, forget not, you fight for your colors!” cried Ronayne, galloping furiously through the sand to the front, and heading the centre. ”

“ Winnebeg stared and looked as if he did not fully comprehend.
“Oh! quite an adventure, I can assure you; and who do you think was my devoted knight-errant?”
“What a subject to jest about, Ellen!” remarked her husband, half reprovingly. “To whom do you allude?”
“Only the tall warrior who tried so desperately to get your wife's scalp, Mr. Elmsley.” ”

“ Despite all the determination he had formed, Ronayne could not stand this new feature in the scene unmoved. He drew his handkerchief hastily from the bosom of his uniform, and carried it to his eyes. The recollection of the fourth of July, so recently passed, came with irresistible force upon his memory, and even while his own heart was made more desolate, this universal manifestation of the regard in which his wife was held affected him deeply. ”