Cate of the Lost Colony - Lisa Klein [97]
“Ladi-cate, there is a legend of the hunter Algon—”
Jones interrupted. “Enough of this formal parley. Cate, ask him in plain English if he knows who attacked us and killed Ananias.”
I had risen halfway from my chair, sensing that Manteo was about to disclose a deep truth I wanted to hear. But at Jones’s words I sat down again. Could they hear the catch in my voice as I asked Manteo what he knew about these enemies?
“They are allies of Wanchese who will not accept me as their weroance.” He paused, then spoke to all of us. “When spring comes they will return. There are enough of them to take this fort.”
I heard the sharp intake of breath and a muttered oath from Ambrose.
“We must strengthen the palisade without delay,” said Graham. “And train every able-bodied person to handle a musket.”
“My people can help you,” Manteo said.
“Can you teach the men to use bows and arrows? The women, too?” Ambrose paced back and forth. “We will trade anything for weapons.”
“You misunderstand,” Manteo said.
Ambrose and Graham ignored him, caught up in their planning.
“How then can your people help us?” I asked Manteo.
He leaned toward me, his dark eyes wide and intense.
“You must come and live with me. With us.”
My heart was pounding. The edges of my sight grew blurred, until Manteo’s face was all I could see. The air in the armory was heavy with heat from the fire and thick with the smells of roasted fish and game and the bear grease from the Indians’ bodies. What did Manteo mean?
“You, Moon Maiden, and the others. You would all be safer,” he was saying.
Feeling dazed, I said, “How can we leave here? This has become our home, despite our troubles here.” I realized he had called me “Moon Maiden” again.
“I must not ignore a message from the god Ahone. Ladi-cate, your destiny as a people lies with us. You must persuade the others.”
Astonished and confused though I was, I did not for a moment consider Manteo deceitful or his mind unsound. I trusted him. Indeed, there was no one in all of Virginia I trusted more. His gaze was direct and intent upon me. His words fell on my ears like rays of moonlight on a field at midnight. I felt reckless with new hope. Our English God and His deputy, Elizabeth, had seemingly forgotten us, but Manteo and his god had not. Sir Walter’s ships could not make it across the ocean to relieve us, but Manteo had managed to reach us in waist-deep snow to offer us the means to survive.
When Ambrose and Jones had silenced the hubbub, I stood up so I could be seen and heard by all and relayed Manteo’s offer. A clamor of voices, mocking laughter, and cries of “Live among savages? Never!” greeted my words.
Then Betty spoke up in a loud, clear voice. “I have lived among them and they are God’s creatures, just as we are.”
“Silence!” roared Ambrose, pressing his hands against his head. But the uproar continued, with voices insisting a supply ship would come, Bailey would return for us, or we could find our own way to Chesapeake.
Manteo sat with his hands on his knees, staring straight ahead. His men looked tense as the colonists argued. He stood up and everyone fell quiet.
“My people will accept you as brothers and sisters, our equals,” he said.
“That would be to debase ourselves,” muttered Ambrose.
This made my temper rise. “I am already kin to many Roanoke, for I was adopted by them,” I said. “How does that debase me?”
“Nay, rather to live among Indians would be a betrayal of our country and our race,” said Jones, looking troubled.
Graham pounded his fist on the table. “Our countrymen have betrayed us! The very ones with whom we shared the voyage and the labor of building this colony. Our best revenge is to stay alive however we can.”
Alice Chapman spoke in a trembling voice. “I have lost my husband. Am I now to lose all my household goods, even my clothes, and dress in animal skins like Eve after the Fall?”
Alice’s plea awakened my sympathy. I had once imagined Virginia to be a paradise and hoped for riches, not the poverty and misery in which we now found ourselves. Moved to speak, I demanded