Miracle in the Wilderness (2 page)

Nyagway regarded the white man for an instant but without hostility and then shuffled unhappily back to his position. He was too old and adipose for this sort of work. A vain and lazy man, he had originally defected to the Algonkin in the hope that his knowledge of English would prove useful to the French and bring him a sinecure. Instead, the northern tribe, with contempt for the turncoat, used him on missions involving long and arduous journeys.

Forcing himself to renewed effort, Jasper quickened his pace and the line moved more swiftly through the forest to carry out the cruel and horrid paradox the Indians had set their prisoners: march quicker lest you die now so that you may the faster reach the place where you will die then.

The fearful irony of the command and their situation was plain to Jasper and for a moment anger stabbed him as he thought of his wife’s foolish disregard of his order never to leave the door of the cabin unbarred when he was away or out of sight of the house.

But in an instant love replaced anger with immense pity as he read the anguish of maternity reflected in the eyes that rested on her child. It touched his heart how haggard trial had turned the beauty that had been his delight and because of this he loved her the more.

He found the strength to whisper, “It is better so. If we do their bidding they may adopt the child into the tribe and thus he will live.” In this manner he tried to comfort her. He blamed himself for their plight. He had had no right to expose someone so young and innocent to such a wild and savage land and the dangers of the wilderness. It had been the proximity of the familiar gentle feast of Christmas and the endearing femininity of Dorcas that had been their undoing.

That bright clear sunny morning Jasper had disappeared into the woods to shoot a turkey for their dinner and again admonished her to caution. She had watched him cross the clearing and vanish into the forest with a smile of fond indulgence for his endless warnings. They had lived there for over a year now without so much as a sight of a hostile Indian. The Iroquois were friendly and traded with them or carried news or messages.

The day had been so fine, the sun in the cloudless sky so warm, almost like summer in the still air. Dorcas had moved Asher’s crib outside the cabin to let the child bask some of the winter pallor from his cheeks. Nearby was the pile of holly, mistletoe and pinecones that Jasper had gathered to decorate their cabin. For tomorrow was Christmas, their first since the new house that Jasper had built was finished and she bethought herself how she might make herself attractive and please her husband on this holy and happy Christmas Day.

On an impulse she had climbed up into the loft where the smoked hams hung with the flitches of bacon, bags of filberts and hickory nuts and bundles of dried herbs and in the corner next to the heap of winter apples she had gone delving into the horsehide box she had brought with her all the way from England and where the treasures of her girlhood were stored.

And there she had been trapped, musing over a bit of lace and the matching of some silk ribands to go with the red of the holly berries and the white of the mistletoe, when the raiding Algonkin stormed in. With the child already in their hands it was hopeless. She had fought bravely and desperately and had been brutally subdued. The rising column of smoke from their burning home brought Jasper running from the woods and into the ambush. He had not even time to fire his fowling piece before the Indians were upon him and beat him almost into insensibility with their pogamoggans, as their crooked, knob-headed war clubs were called. They had stopped just short of killing him. Quanta’s orders had been to bring in the captives alive—if possible. Now, on the way back, the Indian leader had not expected to be handicapped by a man hardly able to walk.

And so the captives moved onwards through the snowy forest pierced occasionally by the bright night and slowly approached the end of their resources. Only his determination to save the life of his son if he could and the incredible will to survive that animated the men of those days enabled Jasper to continue the pace. And Dorcas, the weaker vessel, faltered now. As the Indians reckoned time they marched for an hour and rested five minutes. It was not sufficient to restore her and she moved like an automaton, following the child, stumbling, and once Jasper heard her murmur as though her mind was wandering and she thought herself safe at home at her fireside.

At the head of the march, Quanta-wa-neh wrestled with the exigencies. Beneath his furs, his paint, feathers, beads and medicine bags, he was a human being beset by most of the problems that have dogged the footsteps of man and leaders down through the ages. In this case it was protection, providing, acquiring and survival, not only for himself but the lives of his command for which he was responsible. He was sometimes savage and ruthlessly cruel as dictated by tribal custom, policy or necessity but he was no more devoted to such cruelty by nature than, say, his white brothers who in their day had plied the rack, hot irons and thumbscrews for the Inquisition. He was an experienced and practical commander.

It was for these traits among others that Quanta-wa-neh had been assigned to the work at hand. A veteran warrior of some forty odd years he was a tall, wiry Indian with a shrewd, not unpleasant countenance, graceful and moving with the quiet assurance of the born leader who knew what he was about.

Now, slowed in passage beyond what he considered the point of safety in spite of the element of surprise he had achieved, he reviewed his position in the light of his military command and his orders to bring in any captives alive if he could. He had no personal interest in the life or death of his prisoners whatsoever.

The taking of hostages was a part of Indian warfare as well as the white man’s. If and when they became a nuisance or a menace to the safety of an operation they were simply slain out of hand as a matter of military necessity. He would do what was needed.

The way darkened as they passed beneath a canopy of giant oaks and conifers that shut out the light from both the moon and the stars. The sobbing of the woman and the whistling breath of the stricken man reached Quanta’s ears and brought him to the verge of a decision when they reached an opening in the forest, a kind of circular glade made by some ancient vagary of the wind strewing the acorns so that the trees grew in a circle open to the sky.

Into this glade the moonlight shone and, ringed by the dark shadowy forest, illuminated it like an amphitheater. The shaft, as though streaming from an opening in heaven itself, revealed the most extraordinary sight.

Three white-tailed deer knelt in the snow; a buck, his noble antlers not yet shed, his doe and her fawn, as motionless as statues, their gentle faces turned towards the east.

Quanta heard the swift rustle at his side that told him his lieutenant had plucked an arrow from his quiver, notched it to the bowstring and drawn it to his ear, for here was meat. Yet he held up his arm in warning, came to a halt and whispered, “Stay your hand. For such a thing as this I have never seen before.”

Nor had any of the others and for once the Indians were surprised out of their habitual silence as a murmur of astonishment rippled through their ranks and the bowman lowered his weapon muttering, “Look, they do not move. And the fawn, it was born out of season. Is this a magic?”

Yet even more astonishing was the fact that as the party formed a semicircle at the edge of the clearing, the beasts did not take fright but remained motionless in the attitude in which they had been discovered, hind legs erect, their forelegs folded beneath them, all three alike, and in this strange attitude casting a purple shadow upon the snow, their moist muzzles and liquid eyes reflecting moonlight.

The surprise rustled from the leaders down through the ranks of the Indians and still within sight, sound and scent of the presence of man the three beasts remained immovable and undisturbed as though under some kind of spell of devotion.

Now to Jasper Adams it appeared that beyond the mysterious and unfrightened deer, beneath the branches of a great oak, he saw a glowing and at the center of it there was a primitive cradle such as the one he had constructed for Asher to sleep in at home. In it lay a swaddled infant and the glowing that surrounded it came neither from the moon nor the stars.

And it seemed to him too that he heard voices and speech from the beasts of the forest even as the legend had it of the miracles of Christmas Eve and that they were murmuring in unison, “Glory to God in the highest. On earth peace, goodwill toward men.”

Then he likewise knelt in the snow crying to his wife, “Ah, Dorcas! Kneel thou too! For it is midnight of the eve of Christmas when Jesus was born and the beasts of burden and the wild things of the field and forest bend the knee to worship and adore Him and are given the power of speech to pray.”

Dorcas had taken her child from the Algonkin who was too amazed to resist and cradling it in her arms tightly to her breast she also knelt. Her lips moved but her eyes were blinded by tears.

Then Jasper Adams, with no thought of themselves or their plight, prayed a welcome to The Child, “Gentle Jesus, come to be our Savior. I will worship Thee and hearken to Thy commandments. Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace, goodwill toward men . . .”

Quanta was mystified and impressed by the strange sight and the agony which he knew the white man must be enduring for he had both dealt the man some of his wounds and performed the rough surgery on them. Fortitude he could understand and admire but here undoubtedly was a great mystery. He said to Nyagway, “Ask him does he know the meaning of this.”

Nyagway did so. Jasper Adams replied only, “Hush! Kneel down, all ye, and pray likewise. Praise the Lord God on high for this is the hour of the birth of his only begotten Son.”

Confused, the interpreter translated as best he could and the Indians moved uneasily in the presence of the unknown. The antlered buck now heaved himself slowly to his forefeet followed by the doe and the little fawn, but remained yet standing there unafraid on the carpet of snow in the center of the glade.

To Dorcas, too, it seemed as though there had been a peal of sounds of beauty as though from above and she felt herself suffused with a new courage and a great love and she pressed her child more closely to her breast and loved and wept over him.

For yet another moment the buck remained standing, his head raised high seemingly oblivious to those ringing the edge of the glade and to Jasper Adams his proud penetrating glance appeared to be directed at him, piercing him to the marrow as though communicating a shared experience. Then slowly the beast turned and followed in single file by his doe and fawn trotted across the circle and vanished in the darkness of the forest.

The majestic passage of these lords of the woods had hypnotized the Indians into unbelieving silence so that they were hardly aware of the departure until they looked again and saw that the animals had disappeared as though they had never been there. And yet, although the moonbathed glade was empty there was evidence of the disturbed snow where they had knelt and their tracks leading away.

Quanta with a shudder said to Nyagway, “Ask him what is this magic. To what Manitou does he pray?”

Nyagway translated. Jasper Adams endured the torment of regaining his feet, but Dorcas, lacking the strength, remained in the snow rocking her child.

“To the Lord God and His only begotten Son Jesus Christ who was born on this Holy Night for to save the sinners of the world . . .”

Quanta was puzzled. “But what of the deer that knelt?” he asked. “Is there a tale?”

Jasper Adams said to Nyagway, “Tell him aye.”

Quanta instructed, “Release him. Order him that we would hear it now.”

The Indians like children squatted cross-legged, Nyagway in the center, his fat features as placid as a Buddha’s as he attuned himself to his task.

Jasper Adams, his hands freed, stood swaying, fighting to hold himself erect, struggling to remember through the fog of pain his Testaments and childhood teachings.

He began: “A new star appeared in the sky over Bethlehem on such a night as this many hundreds of years ago, one never before seen by any man. In the east, Three Wise Men were traveling. They saw the star in the Heavens and knew that the King of All had been born. They turned aside and followed the star to bring Him gifts. And the shepherds in the fields tending their flocks saw the star and heard an angel and came likewise.”

The encircling Indians listening to the translation grunted “Heh!” or “Hau!” and settled themselves more comfortably. Bethlehem meant nothing to them but they knew of stars and kings and wise men and the tending of flocks in the field. And also they gathered that this was a tale, like so many of their own, that was of old.

Nyagway, the center of attention, was in his element. His flat features became animated, his small eyes glowed. He gestured and his voice picked up the inflections of Jasper Adams who seemed to gain in strength and joy as he unfolded his story.

“To Bethlehem there came two travelers, Mary and Joseph, husband and wife, and Mary was large with child. But the child was not of Joseph, but of God, for the spirit of God had entered into Mary.”

The listeners and even Quanta murmured, “Hau Hau!” and nodded their heads for talk of spirits they could understand.

Dorcas hugged her child and looking upwards saw one whose strength and depth she had not even dreamed. Lover and husband he had been, but now he seemed touched by God as well. He towered so tall that his head reached into the sky, crowned with light, the shadows of his great arms were longer than the dark spreading branches and his voice booming through the forest aisles was like organ music.

“When it came Mary’s time there was no place for them at the inn at Bethlehem nor would any humans give them shelter. So they went to a stable and there in the manger the infant Jesus was born. And about His head there was such a glowing as there is in the Heavens tonight.”

For much of what Jasper was narrating Nyagway had no point of reference and could not wholly understand. He interpreted it in terms of Indian life, shocking his listeners with the revelation of the lack of hospitality and cruelty of the fact that no one would take in these wayfarers and that the woman had to go to give birth where the beasts were gathered. But when it came to the glow in the heavens they were at home and all followed Nyagway’s gesture and looked up into the milky sky behind which apparently were hidden the mysteries of the white man as well as their own. Dorcas gazed into the face of her husband and what she saw was both tender and terrible.