Page:Barbour--Metipoms Hostage.djvu/112

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98
METIPOM’S HOSTAGE

and their eyes met. The chiefs face was all innocence and candor, but at the back of the dark eyes, like sparks in a dead fire, were glints of guile, and David understood.

“I know only what I have told,” he answered the powwow. “If I have dreamed, so be it. Give me food, for I am faint, and I will return to my home.”

“Great Sachem say yes. Say all English men his brothers. Say when they not deal honestly with him, they still his brothers. Maybe you know English take his son Nausauwah and put him in prison.”

David nodded. “He was suspected of setting fire to an Englishman’s barn. He is to be fairly tried by the court in Boston.”

“Great Sachem say Englishman’s law not Indian’s law. Say how can he know Nausauwah get justice.”

“Tell him that the English always deal justly,” replied David stoutly. “Ask him when they have done otherwise.”

“Great Sachem say English take much lands from Indian and build fences about and Indians no can go in for hunt.”

“The English always pay for the lands. When they are planted, they are no longer for hunting.”