The Tayac Chicamec paused, overcome with bitter memory, and Ebenezer tactfully observed that he was familiar with the subsequent course of Mattassin's life. At the same time, since the information might have some bearing on his nebulous plan, he professed great curiosity about the other son, Cohunkowprets: surely he too had not been hanged for murdering English Devils?
"They have not hanged him," Chicamec said through Quassapelagh, and at no time thitherto had his malice so contorted every feature. "Their crime against Cohunkowprets is more heinous ten times o'er than their crime against Mattassin. Beautiful, golden son! Him too the Tayac Chicamec dispatched, but one full moon ago, upon an errand of great importance: to go north with Drepacca and make treaties with the man Casteene; him too the gods saw fit to lure from his goal, and in the same wise, despite the sternest counsels of Drepacca. ."
He had previously spoken of the Negro element in the town as one would speak of a blessing by no means unalloyed, and had mentioned his allies' envy of his sons. It now became clear to Ebenezer that Chicamec's partiality to Quassapelagh was not only, as it were, skin deep: it masked a deep distrust of the Africans, and especially of Drepacca, and dated, apparently, from his embassy to Monsieur Casteene. Indeed, the poet went so far as to speculate that Chicamec held Drepacca in some way responsible for Cohunkowprets' defection.
"In short," Quassapelagh went on, "King Drepacca was obliged to leave Cohunkowprets on the mainland near the Little Choptank, with the white-skinned woman he lusted after, and the Tayac Chicamec hath not seen his son these many days."
"A wondrous likeness of misfortune," Ebenezer sympathized, "and a shame in itself! But what is this heinous crime the Tayac speaks of?"
"I had best answer that myself," Quassapelagh replied, "and not rouse farther the Tayac Chicamec's wrath. Rumor hath it that Cohunkowprets hath taken an English name and married an English wife; he lives amongst the English in an English house, speaks their tongue, and wears their clothes. He is no longer an Ahatchwhoop in any wise, but looks upon his people with contempt, and for aught we know may betray us to the English king."
At this point Chicamec, who had held his peace impatiently for some moments, began to speak again, and Quassapelagh was obliged to resume the labors of translation.
"Behold him now, the Tayac Chicamec," he said, "his body enfeebled by the cares of four-score summers, his island peopled with strangers and ringed round by English Devils, his ancient dream of battle in the charge of outland kings; his honor mired and smirched by faithless sons, and his royal line doomed to perish in his person! The brother of Quassapelagh must tell his friends these things if they ask him for what cause they lose their members and go to the torch; the brother of Quassapelagh must seek out the man called Henry Burlingame Three and tell him these things, and tell him farther to flee the land at once — with his sons, if he hath any; for already the Tayac Chicamec hath defied the gods to save him but now every English Devil in the countryside must die!
9: At Least One of the Pregnant Mysteries Is Brought to Bed, With Full Measure of Travail, but Not as Yet Delivered to the Light
Ebenezer had now no doubts as to the main lines of his plan. He spoke at once, before his imagination drowned him in alternatives and fears.
"This errand that the Tayac Chicamec sets me, dear Quassapelagh — is it a condition of my freedom?"
The latter phrase required some moments, and Drepacca's assistance, for translation, and occasioned some further moments of discussion in Indian language. Finally Drepacca ventured, "Nothing is a true condition that cannot be enforced. We agree, however, that if you are in sooth a brother of Quassapelagh, you will not shirk this errand."
Ebenezer steeled his nerve. "If the Tayac Chicamec murthers my three friends, I will carry no message to Henry Burlingame Three, for the reason that I shall die with them here. Tell this to him."
"My brother — " Quassapelagh protested, but Drepacca translated the declaration. Chicamec's eyes flashed anger.
"Howbeit," the poet continued, "if the Tayac Chicamec sees fit to concur with the merciful opinion of his wise and powerful fellow kings and set the four of us free, I pledge him this: I will go to Henry Burlingame Three and tell him the story of his royal birth and the father who saved his life; moreover I will bring him here, to this island, to see the Tayac Chicamec. He knows the tongues of Piscataway and Nanticoke; father and son can converse alone, without interpreters."
All these things filled Quassapelagh and Drepacca with surprise; they translated in fits and starts and exchanged impassive glances. Lest they distort his message through astonishment or apprehension, however, Ebenezer rose to his feet and delivered it at close range, in a clear deliberate voice, to the aged king himself, accompanying the English words with unmistakable emphases and gestures: "I — bring Henry Burlingame Three — here — to Chicamec. Chicamec and Henry Burlingame Three — talk — talk — talk. No Quassapelagh. No Drepacca. Chicamec and Henry Burlingame Three — talk. And just to demonstrate my good faith, sirs: I will tell Henry Burlingame Three to look — look — look for his brother Cohunkowprets. Henry Burlingame Three will find Cohunkowprets and talk — talk — talk, and haply he'll show him the error of his ways. How would that strike you, old fellow? Chicamec here; Cohunkowprets here; Henry Burlingame Three right here!"
Whether he understood the conditions or not, Chicamec grasped enough of the proposal to make him chatter feverishly at Quassapelagh.
"I thought 'twould not displease you," Ebenezer said grimly, and resumed his seat. "But tell him 'tis all four of us or none," he added to Quassapelagh. Now that his bid was made he nearly swooned at the boldness of it. Bertrand and John McEvoy, who had heard the lengthy tales in despair, came alive again, their faces squinted with suspense.
Some debate ensued, by the sound of it not sharply controversial, and at the end Quassapelagh said, "My brother will not lightly be cured of his foolhardiness when he learns it hath succeeded."
"I'Christ! Do you mean we're free?"
"The Tayac Chicamec yearns to behold his long-lost son," Drepacca declared, in the same stern tone used by Quassapelagh, "and albeit he hath disowned his son Cohunkowprets, he counts an errant son as better than no son at all, and so will entertain entreaties for his pardon. The brother of Quassapelagh will be carried by canoe across the straits and given one full moon to make good his pledge; the others will remain here as hostages. If at the end of that time he hath produced neither Cohunkowprets nor Henry Burlingame Three, the hostages will die."