“What are you going to do with us?” asked Brother Jacques in his best Iroquois.

“Make slaves of the white man’s wives,” gruffly.  “The squaws of the Senecas long for them.  And shall the Seneca see his favorite wife weep like a mother who has lost her firstborn?”

“Ah!” cried the priest, a light of recognition coming into his eyes.  “So it is you, Corn Planter, whom I baptized Peter, whom I saved from starvation three times come the Winter Maker!  So the word and gratitude of Corn Planter become like walnuts which have no meat?  Beware; these are the daughters of Onontio, and his wrath will be great.”

“It is the little Father,” replied the Seneca.  “It is well.  He shall have food in plenty, and his days shall be long in my village, where he will teach my children the laws of his fathers.  As for Onontio, he sleeps in his stone house while my brothers from the Mohawk valley carry away his Huron children.  The daughters of Onontio shall become slaves.  I have said.”

“I will give my body to the stake,” said Brother Jacques; “my flesh and bones to torture.  Let Onontio’s daughters go.”

“I have seen the little Father with his thumb in the pipe, and he smiles like a brave man.  No.  They are fairer than the blossom of the wild plum, and their hair is like the silk of corn.  They shall be slaves or wives, as they choose.  Make haste,” pushing the priest toward the canoe in which madame and Anne had already taken their places.

Had he been alone he would have resisted, so great was his wrath.  A moment’s vanity placed him and these poor women in this predicament.  He had been warned by a trader that a small band of Iroquois were hanging about, and yet he had been drawn into this!  Yonder was the marquis, who might die . . . !

“Take care, little Father,” warned the Seneca, realizing by the Jesuit’s face the passion which was mounting to his brain.  “It would cause the Corn Planter great sorrow to strike.”

Brother Jacques’s shoulders drooped, and he sat down in the bottom of the canoe.

“They will not harm us for the present,” he said to the women encouragingly.  “And there is hope for us is the fact that these are Senecas.  To reach their villages they will perforce travel the same route as the Onondaga expedition.  And we shall probably pass close to where our friends are.”

“But the boat,” said madame, “Monsieur de Lauson will think that we have been drowned!”

“Jean Pauquet saw me enter the boat with you, and he knows that I am a good sailor.  Monsieur de Lauson will suspect immediately that we have fallen into the hands of savages, and will instantly send us aid.  So keep a good heart and show the savage that you do not fear him.  If you can win his respect he will be courteous to you; and that will be something, for the journey to Seneca is long.”