Free Scarlet Plume, Second Edition by Frederick Manfred Page A

your guns.”
    Reverend Codman’s light-gray eyes fluttered open. “Ahh,” he said.
    It was Pounce with a dozen braves. They came stalking toward them down the rise. Pounce had replaced his white man’s clothes with a clout. His nose was painted a deep red and his chin a striped yellow. Daubs of white clay lay in swirls across his bare chest. He carried a long, heavy knob-ended war club. The braves with him were naked and daubed over with war paint too. Some of the braves carried bows and arrows, some guns.
    Angela whispered into the silence, “They’re coming to kill us, aren’t they, Mama?”
    “Now, now.” Judith stroked Angela’s silver-blond hair. “Shh.” Judith could feel her own heart beating in her brain.
    Reverend Codman said quietly, “Don’t shoot. One shot and we’ll all be plunged into eternity. There are too many of them. Instead we must try to persuade them to let us alone until help arrives.”
    Maggie Utterback lowered her gun. “Them fiends! Devils in human shape.”
    Pounce halted a dozen paces away. The young braves lined up on either side of him. All stood haughty, watchful.
    Pounce raised his right hand. “Houw.”
    Reverend Codman looked from painted face to painted face. He said gently, “Have my red brothers forgotten the Good Book so soon?”
    A sly grimace slid across Pounce’s thick lips, then was gone. “We have come to protect our white brother from the bad Indians.” With his war club, Pounce pointed in the direction of Mad Bear’s renegade camp across the lake.
    “Our friend Jesus will not like this.”
    Pounce went on smoothly. “Let the white brother put on the war dress of the Dakotas and we will make him our son. We will protect him. We will fight for him when the time comes.” Pounce’s glance fell on Theodosia.
    “The sun does not rise in the west.”
    Cunning worked Pounce’s lips again for a second. “Let the white man shoot his guns into the ground. That will frighten the bad Indians very much. They will think that the blue soldiers have come. They will run away.”
    Silvers gave Pounce a scornful look. “Does our red brother take us for fools? We will keep our guns loaded and cocked.”
    Pounce pretended grief. “The body of the white man named Christians, it will rot in the sun. Soon the wolves will devour it. His spirit will not be happy. Let one of you come with us and we will bury it as the white man wishes.”
    Mrs. Christians began to wail again.
    Silvers snorted. “The red chief thinks he will pick us off one by one.”
    “I want mum-mum,” little Johnnie said. He reached up a grass-stained chubby hand. “Mama? I want mum-mum.”
    “Shh.” Theodosia reached down and gathered Johnnie in her arms. She hugged him. “Yes, darling, yes, yes.”
    “Backslider!” Judith hissed.
    Reverend Codman nodded. “Yes, sister, I’m afraid we have mistaken the red man’s courtesy for conversion.”
    “Courtesy?” Mavis cried. “When he intended to rape and kill us all along?”
    The settlers grouped themselves like a herd of horses facing a pack of wolves: males on the outside, females next, children in the center. Only Maggie Utterback broke the rule—she lined up with the men.
    Judith thought: “It’s like being caught in a terrible nightmare of some kind.”
    The leather door flap of the council tepee in Whitebone’s village suddenly whipped open, and out ran two dozen armed and painted Yankton warriors. Two Two and other Indian boys hurriedly led up the war ponies. With a leap the warriors were mounted. They came on, directly across the swamp.
    Silvers turned green. The giant Tallak shuddered.
    Judith thought, “We’re all going to die.”
    Joe Utterback whispered, “There’s going to be some awful work now, boys.”
    Maggie Utterback would have none of it. She said loudly, “Joe, trouble with you is, you was born without sand in your craw.”
    Joe fired up at that. “Haw. Woman, I’ll tough it out as long as you any day.”
    “That