Pocahontas (15 page)

My brother shakes his head and looks over at Rawhunt.

Rawhunt stabs at the shape he has made in the snow with his stick. Then he takes up the story where my brother had left off.

"As to the others," Rawhunt says, "the other three who went up into the marsh with the
quintans
, your uncle Opechancanough and his Pamaunkees found two of them. They were asleep by a fire, asleep! When the two Tassantassuk woke and saw they were surrounded, they were so frightened that they did not even try to use their thunder weapons. Instead, they tried to run, to run. Your uncle's warriors were so disgusted that they did not even try to take those cowards prisoner. They just shot them with arrows and left them there, left them there."

Rawhunt stops talking and looks down at the snow. It does not make him happy to think of how badly those Coatmen had died. If your enemies do not show real courage, it weakens your own heart. I feel bad, too. Why do the Coatmen have to fight us this way? Why can they not try to live with us in peace, respect us, and behave as honest friends? Then I remember something Rawhunt said. There were three Coatmen in the
quintans.

"Rawhunt," I say, "wait. What happened to the third man?"

Rawhunt lifts his head, and I see the twinkle in his eyes. My brother looks over at him and chuckles. They have been teasing me, testing me to see if I have been listening carefully, by not telling me the whole story.

"Ah," Rawhunt says. "This is where the story becomes interesting, becomes interesting. That third man was their werowance, Little Red-Haired Warrior himself."

"Unh-hunh," my brother adds, smiling broadly. "Unlike the others, he knew how to fight!"

This wyroans Pamaunche I hold to inhabit a rich land of copper and pearl. His country lies into the land of another river, which by relation and description of the savages comes also from the mountains Duirank, but a shorter journey. The copper he had, as also many of his people, was very flexible. I bowed a piece of the thickness of a shilling round my finger as if it had been lead. I found them nice in parting with any. They wear it in their ears, about their necks in long links, and in broad plates on their heads. So we made no great unquiry of it, neither seemed desirous to have it.

The king had a chain of pearl about his neck thrice double, the third part of them as big as peas, which I could not value less worth than 3 of 400li, had the pearl been taken from the muskle as it ought to be.

His kingdom is full of deer; so also is most of all the kingdoms.

He hath as the rest likewise many rich furs.

This place I call "Pamaunche's Palace," howbeit by Nauviraus his words the King of Winauk is possessor herof. The plat of ground is bare without wood some 100 acres,
where are set beans, wheat, peas, tobacco, gourds, pompions, and other things unknown to us in our tongue.

—FROM
A
RELATION OF THE DISCOVERY OF OUR RIVER
FROM
J
AMES
F
ORT INTO THE MAIN, MADE BY
C
APTAIN
C
HRISTOFER
N
EWPORT, AND SINCERELY WRITTEN AND
OBSERVED BY A GENTLEMAN OF THE COLONY

DECEMBER
6
TH
–30
TH
, 1607

U
PON HEARING THAT
loud cry, I supposed that my guide, Nauiraus, had betrayed me. Presently I seized him and bound his arm to mine with my garters, my pistol ready bent to be avenged upon him. Yet he seemed innocent of what was done.

"Fly," Nauiraus said. "Must take flight."

Flight was not an easy thing, for I stood at the edge of a quagmire and the sound of shouting had come from the one path that had led us to this place. So I told my guide, asking how we might otherwise take flight.

But as we went on discoursing, I was struck by an arrow on my right thigh. It did me little harm and I turned to espy two Indians drawing their bows, which I prevented in discharging a French pistol. By the time I had charged again, three or four more Indians had done the like, taking the place of the first who had fallen down and fled. At my next discharge, they also fell and fled. Now my guide I made my barricado, who offered not to strive but allowed me to use him as my buckler. The aim of the salvages was such that not a single arrow struck him, and his bulk was so much greater than mine that he made a fine shield. Twenty or thirty arrows were shot against me, but fell short or stuck in my clothes with no great hurt.

Three or four more times I discharged his pistol ere the
King of Pamaunkee, called Opechancanough, with two hundred men environed me. At his command, each drew their bows and then laid them upon the ground without shot. My guide then treated betwixt them and me conditions of peace.

"This man," Nauiraus said, reaching back to touch my arm and then gesturing upward with his palm, "he werowance, Captain."

At that the King nodded and spoke words, much of which I could not understand.

"King say Coatmen all slain, give him your weapon," Nauiraus explained.

At that I smiled. "Tell him I shall not fire again. I shall go to my boat."

I then began to retire. Minding the salvages more than I did my steps, I stepped fast into the quagmire. Nauiraus, in trying to pull me forth, also did the same, and the two of us began to sink deeper.

Thus surprised, I resolved to try their mercies. My arms I cast from me, till which none had dared approach him.

Having thrown away my arms, the salvages accepted my surrender. They drew me forth from the oozy creek and led me to the fire, where Jehu Robinson lay slain with twenty or thirty arrows in him. Emry I saw not.

Diligently they chafed my benumbed limbs. I demanded they take me to their Captain, who had retired to his pavilion. So they showed me to Opechancanough, King of Pamaunkee. To him I gave a round ivory double compass dial. Much he marveled at the playing of the fly and needle which he could see so plainly and yet not touch because of the glass that covered them. When I demonstrated by that globe-like jewel the roundness of the earth and skies, the sphere of the sun, moon, and stars and how the sun does chase the night round the world
continually, and many other like such matters, they all stood as amazed with admiration.

Notwithstanding, within an hour after that, they tied me to a tree, and as many as could stand about prepared to shoot me, but the King held up the compass in his hand. They all laid down their bows and arrows and in a triumphant manner led me to Orapaks, where I was after their manner kindly feasted and well used.

Their manner in conducting me was thus: drawing themselves all in file, the King in the middest had all their pieces and swords borne before him. I was led after him by three great salvages holding me fast by each arm and on each side six more went in file with their arrows nocked. But upon our arriving at the town (which was only thirty or forty hunting houses made of mats, which they remove as they please, as we our tents), with all the women and children staring to behold me, the soldiers then cast themselves into a ring, dancing in such several postures and singing and yelling out such hellish notes and screeches. All were strangely painted, and every one had his quiver of arrows and at his back a club, on his arm a fox or otter skin. Every man had his head and shoulders painted red with oil and puccoon mingled together, which scarlet-like color made an exceeding handsome show. Each had his bow in his hand and the skin of a bird, with her wings abroad dried, tied upon his head, or a piece of copper, a white shell, a long feather with a small rattle at the tails of their snakes tied to it, or some such like toy.

All this time I and the King stood in the middest guarded, as before it was said, and after three dances the King and his men departed. The others conducted me to a long house, where thirty or forty tall fellows did guard me. Ere long more bread and venison was brought me than would serve twenty men. I
think my stomach at that time was not very good. What I left, my keepers put into baskets. About midnight they set the meat before me again. All this time not one of them would eat a bit with me, till the next morning they brought me as much and more and then did eat the old and reserved me the new. It made me think they would fat me to eat me.

Yet even as I was in this desperate estate, one Maocassater—whom I had met before—came into the long house and gave me his gown to defend me from the cold. This was, I suppose, in requital of some beads and toys I had given him at my first arrival in Virginia.

Long ago, the people forgot to greet Kefgawes, the Sun. Instead of looking up to Sun and giving thanks, they complained that Sun hurt their eyes. So, one day, Sun decided to no longer look down upon our land. The day of the Moon ended, but Sun stayed beyond the edge of the world

When the people woke that morning, there was no light. They became afraid in the darkness, and cried for help. Great Hare heard their cries. He went to Sun and begged him to return.

"
The people do not welcome me," Sun said "I will stay here.
"

Great Hare turned to the Spider for help. "Make a net for me," he said, and Spider did so. Great Hare threw that spider web net over Sun and pulled him back across the sky. As soon as Sun became visible to our people, they began to cry out words of welcome.

Hearing those words, Sun changed his mind. "The people are glad to see me," he said. "As long as they remember to give me thanks each morning, I shall always return.
"

Great Hare pulled the spiderweb net off the Sun. Some strands, though, remained. We see them when Sun shines through clouds. And as long as the people give thanks each dawn, Sun will bring them light.

COHONK
TIME OF LONG NIGHTS
LATE DECEMBER
1607

I
USUALLY AM ABLE
to sleep throughout the night. Even the regular calls made by the guards who walk around my father's great
yihacan
do not wake me. But this night has been different. I hear the soft sounds of those four men who stand alert all through the night outside the big longhouse, one at each corner post. They are not allowed to sleep. So they shuffle their feet, and now and then thump the ground with their spears. Twelve times every night they must sound the call to prove that all is well and safe in each of the four directions.

"
Ya-hoo,
" calls the man who stands at the post in the direction of the dawn.

"
Ya-hoo
," answers the man at the corner post in the Summer Land direction.

"
Ya-hoo,
" now comes from the direction of the sunset.

"
Ya-hoo,
" the Winter Land guard replies.

Then, their circuit completed, they wait again in silence. Should any of them fail to answer the call, it might mean that an enemy had silenced him, and a general alarm would be sounded. Then forty men, the tallest of all the warriors in our villages, who always sleep close by to guard the Mamanatowic, come running with their torches, weapons ready. If they find that the silence of a sentry is simply because he has fallen asleep, that man is then beaten to punish him. It has been a long time since any sentry has fallen asleep at his post, and no enemies have ever attacked our village in the night.

Yet my father does not relax his guard. It is another of the weights he always carries as the Great Chief. I asked him once why we must always be on guard when no one ever dares to attack us.

"My favorite daughter," he said, his face almost smiling, "it is because we are always on guard that we are safe." Then he looked toward the sunrise direction, and the heaviness of sorrow came back into his eyes. "It may not always be this way."

That circle of cads about my father's great
yihacan
has now been sounded ten times. Soon it will be time to go down to the water and give my morning thanks and greeting to the Sun. And I have not slept at ad. I am waiting, as is everyone else in Werowocomoco. I hope that my lack of sleep does not make my face puffy or my eyes red. It is important that I look my best today.

With the dawn my uncle Opechancanough will bring the Coatman captive. The one they caught is no other than my Little Red-Haired Warrior, the only Coatman who knows how to fight. He is so different from ad the others that he is more like a real person, like one of us, than a Tassantassak. My father has hopes for him.

I think of the stories that have come to us in the last twenty-five days since Little Red-Haired Warrior was first taken prisoner in a big fight. His men were as easy to defeat as foolish rabbits, but he acted like a warrior. Even though he was surrounded by two hundred men, he refused to surrender. Only the swamp was able to overcome him, sucking him into it until he had to give up his weapon or be swallowed by the mud. I laughed when I was told about how the earth itself defeated Little Red-Haired Warrior.

Part of it was the story and part of my laughter came from the way Rawhunt acted out the part of Little Red-Haired Warrior, stepping back into the mud and then, with a look of displeasure on his face, sinking deeper and deeper.

Strong as the weapons of the Coatmen may be, our land is stronger. It, too, fights on our side. We have seen how the
numbers of the Coatmen at their walled village keep growing smaller. A few of them have been killed by our arrows, but more of them have been killed by the river or their own stupidity.

After Little Red-Haired Warrior was caught, Opechancanough took him to the big hunting camp at Rasawrack. He made sure that the Coatman was treated as a werowance should be treated. This was not easy, for Little Red-Haired Warrior had killed two men and injured others. There were many who wanted to tie him to a tree and fill him with arrows until he looked like a porcupine. Through it all, Little Red-Haired Warrior behaved well. Now that he was not fighting us, he no longer acted angry. He did not weep or scream or plead for his life as other Coatmen had done when captured.