He studied the object he had recovered, in confusion. Tied to the string was a small enameled box. The Mohawk unwrapped the long piece of twine, which judging by the many small knots tied into it had seen heavy use, then tossed the box to Duncan.
It had been an elegant piece when it had been crafted, probably in the last century, but the enameled images of a man and woman picnicking under a tree were chipped, the silver edging nicked and worn. It bore no words, no marks of any kind other than the maker marks on the bottom. He opened it and dumped the damp snuff inside into his hand, smelling it, probing it with a finger. Finding nothing else, he dropped the contents into the river and examined the interior of the box, expecting to find a secret. But there was no hidden pocket, no false bottom, just the old, corroded tin lining.
With the horror now behind them they picked up speed and by late afternoon were coasting into the landing at Shamokin. More than five years had passed since Duncan had visited the town. Then it had been the thriving southern capital of the Iroquois League, second largest settlement in the Pennsylvania lands, a place of energetic trade and favored venue of day-long lacrosse matches.
Now it was a shadow of its former self. The big sutler’s store and largest tavern both lay in ashes. The proud Moravian church Duncan had visited was in ruins, replaced by a more modest log structure with a steeple of rough-hewn planks. The boisterous crowds of traders, trappers, merchants, missionaries, and natives of a dozen tribes had thinned. There were fewer European faces and nearly all the inhabitants, both European and Indian, wore nervous, cautious expressions. As he walked up from the landing, Tanaqua and Analie at his side, he saw that most carried weapons, either in their hands or on their belts.
“The Shamokin I knew was a sanctuary,” he said to the Mohawk, “with laughing children, singing Germans, and Shawnee women who chanted as they dried fish. Half the town would play lacrosse while the other half wagered on them.”
“That was before the uprising,” Tanaqua said. “Before the Pennsylvania governor offered a bounty on Indian scalps.”
“That’s but a rumor.” In the rebellion of the western tribes in 1763 there had been terrible bloodshed along the Pennsylvania frontier, with scalping parties active on both sides.
“No. A Delaware came to our elders with a broadside from a bounty agent in Lancaster. Five pounds for each scalp, payable in cash by the agents.”
Duncan halted. Five pounds was enough to buy a small farm. “Surely not. This is William Penn’s colony, the peaceable kingdom.”
“Penn is long dead. They want our land. From the moment they set foot off their boats they have wanted our land,” Tanaqua added in a matter-of-fact tone, then Analie pulled him toward a stable wall where animal skins were stretched for drying.
Duncan left his companions admiring a huge bear skin and approached the little Moravian church. In the cemetery behind it were several graves marked with crude split plank crosses, all but two bearing names familiar among tribal converts. Abraham Pine. Sally River. James Holdfast. Longhand Alder, he read on the first four. The last two graves, the earth freshly mounded over them, were connected by a long snakeskin, the ends draped over each cross. The black paint of the names still seemed moist. Rachel Rohrbach and Peter Rohrbach. Two precious strips of white ermine were tied above Rachel’s name, with drops of blood on them. A narrow strip of paper had been pinned to Peter’s cross. Duncan found himself on one knee, strangely drawn by the graves.
The paper at Peter’s grave wasn’t the epitaph he expected, but a most peculiar message, composed of carefully drawn images mixed with letters. An evergreen tree, the word go, then a drawing of a toe, followed by a fireplace grate and the letter r, then the letters hap beside a pie and bird nest. “In the ground just this morning,” came a soft voice in a German accent. Duncan rose to face a middle-aged woman of square build and bleak expression, dressed in black with a pewter cross around her neck. “Everyone said it wouldn’t work, a Moravian German marrying a Delaware maid. But they were too far in love to listen. We said stay in town, but they were bent on carving a farm out of the forest, a place apart to raise their children, they said. We don’t even know who did it. Could be some of those western Indians who never surrendered. Or Pennsylvania scalp hunters, black-hearted sons of Satan every one. Peter had hair as black as his darling wife’s.”
She paused to pick up a stone. “Such vermin would redeem his scalp too,” she continued, then turned and flung the stone into the bushes.
Duncan heard a cry of pain and a man stumbled into the open.
“Abziehen! Be gone! I’ll not have you disturbing the sleep of my babes!” the matron shouted, then punctuated her warning with a surprisingly strong German curse.
The man, attired in a fine but disheveled suit of matching tan waistcoat and britches, gazed forlornly at the woman, rubbing his shoulder. He was a few years younger than Duncan, and had the appearance of an English gentleman who had suffered unexpected setbacks. His clothes were torn, his hands deeply scratched. His long brown hair was escaping the ribbon that bound it at his nape. He hesitated, looking at Duncan with a forlorn expression before another thrown stone forced him to flee.
“What did he want, Mother?” Duncan asked.
“Brumbach. I am Mother Brumbach. To take poor Peter’s things. I told him I would not trust them to a stranger. I am sending them to his family in Bethlehem. The Reverend said we should have sent the body but I said I would ne’er let them glimpse the horror. He was a fine, handsome lad and best they remember him as such.”
Duncan hesitated, holding the questions that leapt to his tongue, then stooped to clear away dried leaves that had blown on the graves. He paused, considering the snakeskin, then extended the two spotted feathers from Red Jacob’s pouch and inserted one into the earth at the base of each cross. In the tribal world it was snakes and birds who took news of the dead to the other side.
When he straightened she nodded her approval, and he realized that while someone else had surely brought the snakeskin and fur, she had not removed them. The Moravians understood the deep spirituality of the tribes and their own faith was strong enough not to be offended by a blending of traditions.
“I had the honor of worshipping at the great sanctuary in Bethlehem,” Duncan said, speaking of the Moravians’ mother church in America. “They are not unfamiliar with the horrors of the wilderness.”
The big woman’s face drew tight. “Not like this, junge. Never like this.”
“You mean it wasn’t just another raid on a cabin.”
“I have led people to believe so, for everyone’s sake.”
It was time for frank talk. “My name is Duncan McCallum, from the north. Some days ago I cleaned the body of an Oneida. His arm had been severed. His hand had been planted inside his stomach. His killer was moving south. Yesterday we found another man dead in the river, his face peeled away.”
A deep groan escaped Mother Brumbach’s throat. Her eyes filled with moisture, and she motioned Duncan inside the little church. They sat in a front pew, and she contemplated the flickering of the eternal light on the altar for several long breaths before speaking. “Sometimes when I bake bread I like to take a couple loaves to them. It’s only three miles down along the river and I enjoy the walk along the bank. They were working hard to prepare for the baby that was due next month. Peter had built a wonderful cradle of poplar wood and was carving an angel on the headboard last time I was there. Last time I saw him alive, I mean.” She sighed and wrung her hands in her lap. “I called out when I arrived yesterday afternoon but no one answered. I found them in the cowshed, the blood still wet on the ground. Rachel was tied to a post with a little linen blanket over her head. When I pulled it off I felt the breath of Satan on my back. Her beautiful hair was sliced off to the bone, her cheeks slashed, the side of her head flattened with the blow of a club. The blessed baby had died within her. God help us.”