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These chiefs were glum and uncommunicative. They would not smoke, they would not sit, they demanded Van Dyke, and for some hours resisted all the frantic white men’s offers of seewant, of tobacco, and even - at last in desperation - of rum and ammunition.

It was then, with this last offer, that a gaunt, hideously tattooed sachem spoke up in passable Dutch, and said, “How much rum, and how many pounds of musket balls and powder, General?”

De la Montagne, who was addressed, started and stared hard at the Indian. “,’Tis Nawthorne . . .” he murmured to Van Tienhoven. “The Siwanoy who led us to the Massacre in Greenwich, betrayed his people.”

“He might again,” whispered back the Fiscal. “Draw him off, and let’s talk to him alone,”

Nawthorne was willing. The other sachems murmured and watched while the erstwhile Tomac chieftain palavered, making exorbitant demands. He readily explained that since leaving Greenwich he had been living with the Corchaugs on Long Island’s far eastern tip. He further said that this situation was very grave, the tribes’ long smouldering sense of wrong had burst to flame, but that he - Nawthorne - always the Dutchmen’s friend -
he
would save New Amsterdam. While Nawthorne and the Councillors conferred, a short stocky Indian watched impassively from a corner of the room. He had a face tattooed with black and red dots, and he wore heron feathers tipped with copper in his roach of greasy hair.

Nawthorne came back to the other sachems. He was grinning slyly. He grinned all the time he spoke to diem in the Mohican language which the Dutchmen could not understand at all. When he had finished, the listening Indians grunted and a few of diem laughed.

Nawthorne explained then to the Councillors that the Indians were ready to come to terms. The casks of rum and barrels of ammunition should be heaped for them in the courtyard, and in the meantime the various chiefs would go outside and pass the result of the parley on to their tribes.

“I wonder if we should let them go - “ said de la Montagne uneasily. “This seems too simple.”

“Bah!” said Van Tienhoven. “They’re fools. We’ll water the rum kegs and put sand half-way up the powder barrels. They’ll not find out until they’ve all dispersed. There’ll be no more trouble.”

But Van Tienhoven was wrong. After the chiefs had left the Fort, not twenty minutes passed before the Councillors heard agonizing shrieks splitting the twilit air. And a terrified lad came running to the Fort. “They’ve got Van Dyke,” he screamed. “They chopped his hands off, and then they bashed in his head! They’re killing some other man now!”

The burghers and what guards there were grabbed up their guns. They ran and shot and ran, in panic, but the Indians were scattered through the streets and far too numerous.

Then the Dutch fired the cannon of the Fort - a rusty disused cannon, but the Indians were frightened by the noise, and a few of them were felled by the cannon balls. So they took to their canoes, and paddled swiftly out of range. Some went down the Bay to Staten Island, where there were ninety colonists. The Indians killed them all, and burned their bouweries. They laid waste Hoboken and Pavonia, killing or capturing the inhabitants. And two war canoes sped up the East River, back towards Hell Gate.

The Hallet family supped on the lawn that evening, since the air was summery, and Elizabeth ever preferred to be outdoors when she could.

She was not so tired today, even though she had slept badly. She was rested by the absence of all guests. Little Wickenden had driven off to Flushing with Toby and Anneke. There had been so sign of Susannah Thorne.

Elizabeth had Will to herself, and her family around her. The big boys, Johnny and Robin, were whittling horn spoons, which were to be a wedding present for Hannah when the Dominie Polhemus married her to John Bowne in the spring. Willie lay on his stomach and tickled Don the watchdog’s nose to make him sneeze. Lisbet sat a little apart from the group netting a purse with nimble fingers and humming softly.

Sammy lay on his mother’s lap, drowsily watching the fireflies light their tiny sparks in the syringa bushes.

Will was finishing his last nightly mug of ale, and admiring the trim lines of his house. He had built it all himself, with the boys’ help. And it was as much like his old Dorset homestead as he could manage when the only easily available material was wood. Later, he thought, I’ll build a solid brick one here - like the Dutch. If the crops continued as good as they had been, he would not need to wait long. Or - he thought with pleased excitement - I might build me a kiln. I’m sure the venture’d be profitable. Folk’d drive from Maspeth and even Flushing for the bricks. Be much cheaper than hauling them from Amsterdam.

As he started to tell Elizabeth of this idea, they heard the distant booming from the Fort. “Now what’s that for?” said Will, sitting up and listening. “Sounds like cannon, but I didn’t think those mouldering old relics at the Fort could possibly be fired.”

She listened too, vaguely perturbed. The cannon boomed again.

“Oh, I know what it is,” said Will. “Stuyvesant’s returned. He’s trampled down the Swedes, and is master of the Delaware. New Amsterdam greets its conquering hero.”

Elizabeth smiled, and Lisbet said primly. “Stuyvesant is a rogue and scoundrel, no matter how many Swedes he’s vanquished.”

“Oh, come now, Lis,” said Will, eyeing his stepdaughter with amusement. .”I hear through your silvery tones the strident voice of Captain Underhill. And perhaps he’s right in part. But you must give your mother and me leave to think more kindly of the Governor, at least in one respect.”

“Aye - “ said Elizabeth on a long fervent note. “And of his sweet lady, Judith.”

They were silent, each with private thoughts. Lisbet resumed her humming. The big boys sheathed their whittling knives and stood up.

“ ‘Tis getting dark,” said Will, smothering a yawn. “We’d best go in, and you to bed, Bess. I want you to be sensible until you’re quite rested up.”

“I’m not weary,” she said. “Let’s sit inside a while and talk, when I’ve put Sam and Willie to bed. Or read to me, Will, please, the way you used to? ‘Tis long since you’ve read to me. I’d like to hear ‘L’Allegro’ again.”

He repressed impatience. He wanted to cast up his accounts, see if this year’s profits could possibly justify the brickyard, as well as the purchase of another seven acres that he meant to add to the eastern field. “Oh, Bess, I can’t read tonight,” he said. “I’m busy.”

The quick hurt tears stung her eyes. She bit her lips, and when they went into the kitchen, she walked in stricken silence, which made him feel guilty and consequently cross. He spread his papers out on the table, sharpened a goose-quill pen, and began his figuring.

She put the little boys to bed upstair; in the room they shared with their half-brothers. Robin and John presently went up also. Lisbet retired to the parlour where she slept

Elizabeth came back and sat down between the kitchen fire and the light of the one candle which Will was using. She riffled idly through the calf-bound volume of Mr. Milton’s poems, but none of them caught her interest. She looked at Will with longing which very soon would change to anger, or any weapon which might shatter his imperviousness. He continued to write with his head bent, making neat figures on the paper. Amongst his calculations was one for the procuring of a bondservant for Bess who would need more help when Hannah left. But this Elizabeth did not know. Feeling excluded, unconsidered - she sat staring at his back.

She had cleared her throat for the saying of something sharp when the watchdog lifted his head and began to growl.

Will put down his pen and turned. They both looked at the dog, who growled again and got up, the hairs rising along his backbone.

“Can’t be wolves,” said Will. “There aren’t any this part of the island. Some prowler, maybe.” He rose and started for the pegs where his guns and powder horns were hung.

The dog whined, growled again, then precipitated himself against the outside door.

“Steady, Don, steady, old fellow. We’ll see what it is,” said Will Sure the back door’s bolted, Bess?” She nodded. He poured powder in the flash pan of his musket, pulled the hammer back in readiness, and opening the front door said, “Shan’t be a moment. I expect it’s only a fox.”

She nodded again, not frightened. Her under thoughts were still churning with the angry longing and the need to force him to respond to her.

He opened the door and stepped out. The instant he was off the stoop she heard a sound like the hooting of an owl, then a short high bark like a fox, mixed with the growling of their dog. She got up, still more puzzled than alarmed, and froze with her hand on the chair arm as she heard Will’s voice raised in a wordless shout, as of surprise. Then there was silence for an instant, before the night exploded into pandemonium. Sobbing yells, howls, ululating and inhuman. A lion, she thought, like in Ipswich - there’s panthers out there; her hand clenched tighter on the chair arm, while the uproar outside swelled into hoots and caterwaulings in which she now distinguished spurts of devilish laughter.

“God - “ she whispered. Her numbness broke, she ran to the wall pegs and jerked at the big carbine. It caught on the pegs, nor was it loaded. As she stood there tugging futilely at the carbine, Lisbet rushed in wearing her night shift. “Mother, Mother, what’s ado?”

“Take the fire shovel!” cried Elizabeth. She rushed to the hearth and grabbed the long iron peel. She had no sooner grasped the peel than the front door burst open. Jumping and leaping in orgiastic triumph, a dozen Indians hurtled through the door and filled the kitchen. One knocked the fire shovel out of Lisbet’s hands, and hooting crazily grabbed her by her long flowing flaxen hair. He jerked her to her knees, and yanked her head back and forth by her hair. Lisbet screamed, then fell to sobbing.

Elizabeth raised the peel to strike down the Indian who was tormenting Lisbet. Another Indian by the door took aim and shot at Elizabeth. His shot went slightly wild, for he was drunk with brandy he had stolen in the city. Elizabeth felt a dull, thudding pain in her upper left arm. The heavy peel clattered on the floor. It was Nawthorne who had shot her, but she did not know it. She heard stamping feet and cries and shouts upstairs where several of the Indians had swarmed when they came in. Upstairs where the boys were bedded. “Sammy!” she cried. “Let me have my baby!” and she stumbled towards the stairs.

Nawthorne gave a whinny of laughter. “Let me have my baby - “ he mimicked, in a high squealing voice, and he rushed for Elizabeth with his musket butt upraised. She ran - the Indian who was now binding Lisbet with buckskin thongs stuck his foot out, and Elizabeth fell.

She saw an Indian bending over her, and thought it was the man who shot her. But this Indian had an English hatchet in his hand, she saw the edge of gleaming steel. The Indian grabbed her hair and jerked her head up, so that he might see her face. It was not Nawthorne but another - who had knocked Nawthorne to one side.

Elizabeth stared up from glazed eyes at the face above her; tattooed and painted with the red of war, a mask of furious vengeance, but she recognized it.

“Keofferam . . .” she whispered. “Keofferam . . .”

The Siwanoy chief stood rigid, poised, his left hand gripping her hair, his right drawn back with the gleaming English hatchet. The other Indians all turned to watch, knowing how long Keofferam had waited for this revenge on the white woman who had betrayed the Siwanoy, from whose home the soldiers had marched that day for the destruction of Petuquapan.

“Keofferam . . . have mercy!” she cried as though he could understand her. “I didn’t do it - Telaka knew I didn’t do it . . .”

He heard his sister’s name and his eyelids flickered, while still he gazed down into her hopeless eyes. He gave a sudden shiver, and his hatchet arm went slack. He released her hair.

Nawthorne protested violently. Keofferam answered in tones of sharp command. The Tomac chieftain’s eyes began to glint, seeing the moment come at last when he could rid him of his Siwanoy overlord. An apt moment since the other Indians would not think of this as treachery. “Look how soft and womanlike the once great Siwanoy has grown!” he cried to the Corchaugs. “Look how he weakly spares the life of her who killed his people. Did I not tell you that he has a rabbit heart?” The Corchaugs moved uneasily, watching, uncertain.

“Now!” cried Nawthorne with exultance. “Let him now join the dead white men he so loves!” He lurched around with his long hunting knife and leaped at Keofferam. Keofferam stepped sideways and, as Nawthorne stumbled past
him, brought the English hatchet down across the Tomac’s head.’

Nawthorne’s brains spurted on Elizabeth’s gown and on the polished floorboards. Keofferam picked up one of her dishcloths and wiped his hatchet. He spoke to the other Indians, giving orders which they obeyed at once. If Nawthorne were dead, Keofferam’s authority over this particular band was undisputed. The expedition had been undertaken at Keofferam’s request.

The Indians who had gone upstairs had rounded up Elizabeth’s sons, and bound their wrists for captives - as Lisbet was bound. Grey-faced and trembling the boys stood in the passage. One Indian had the shrieking baby slung across his shoulder.

Keofferam nudged Elizabeth with his foot. “Go!” he said and pointed to the door. She tried to rise and fell back, panting. Keofferam looked at the blood which was soaking down her arm from Nawthorne’s bullet hole. Keofferam picked her up and carried her outside, where he dumped her on the far side of the lawn near Will who lay bound and gagged in the tall grass, and near the dead watchdog who was transfixed by an arrow. The Indians herded out Lisbet and the boys, they put the unhurt Sammy down carefully by his mother’s skirts. Then they went into the house and lit faggots at the fire. They ran quickly through the rooms touching their flaming brands to the curtains and the furniture, they threw fire-sticks upon the roof shingles.

They set the barn alight, the pigsty, dairy, and the henhouses. They tossed a burning brand into the rye field. But they set no fires near to the Hallet family, and they cut the bonds on Lisbet and the boys before they left.