The Deerslayer (Barnes & Noble Classics) - James Fenimore Cooper [108]
“He joined us last evening, and was in the ark with me for two or three hours before I left it. I’m afraid, Hist”—Hetty could not pronounce the Indian name of her new friend, but having heard Deerslayer give her this familiar appellation, she used it without any of the ceremony of civilized life—“I’m afraid, Hist, he has come after scalps as well as my poor father and Hurry Harry!”
“Why he shouldn’t, ha? Chingachgook red warrior, very red—scalp make his honor—be sure he take him.”
“Then,” said Hetty, earnestly, “he will be as wicked as any other. God will not pardon in a redman what he will not pardon in a white man.
“No true,” returned the Delaware girl, with a warmth that nearly amounted to passion; “no true, I tell you! The Manitou smile and please when he see young warrior come back from the warpath, with two, ten, hundred scalp on a pole! Chingachgook father take scalp, grandfather take scalp—all old chief take scalp; and Chingachgook take as many scalp as he can carry, himself!”
“Then, Hist, his sleep of nights must be terrible to think of! No one can be cruel and hope to be forgiven.”
“No cruel—plenty forgiven,” returned Wah-ta-Wah, stamping her little foot on the stony strand, and shaking her head in a way to show how completely feminine feeling, in one of its aspects, had got the better of feminine feeling in another. “I tell you, Serpent brave; he go home this time with four, yes, two scalp.”
“And is that his errand here? Did he really come all this distance, across mountains and valleys, rivers and lakes, to torment his fellow creatures, and do so wicked a thing?”
This question at once appeased the growing ire of the half offended Indian beauty. It completely got the better of the prejudices of education, and turned all her thoughts to a gentler and more feminine channel. At first, she looked around her suspiciously, as if distrusting eavesdroppers; then she gazed wistfully into the face of her attentive companion; after which this exhibition of girlish coquetry and womanly feeling terminated by her covering her face with both her hands, and laughing in a strain that might well be termed the melody of the woods. Dread of discovery, however, soon put a stop to this naïve exhibition of feeling, and removing her hands, this creature of impulses gazed again wistfully into the face of her companion, as if inquiring how far she might trust a stranger with her secret. Although Hetty had no claim to her sister’s extraordinary beauty, many thought her countenance the most winning of the two. It expressed all the undisguised sincerity of her character, and it was totally free from any of the unpleasant physical accompaniments that so frequently attend mental imbecility It is true that one accustomed to closer observation than common might have detected the proofs of her feebleness of intellect in the language of her sometimes vacant eyes; but they were signs that attracted sympathy by their total want of guile, rather than by any other feeling. The effect on Hist, to use the English and more familiar translation of the name, was favorable; and yielding to an impulse of tenderness she threw her arms around Hetty, and embraced her with an outpouring emotion so natural that it was only equaled by its warmth.
“You good,” whispered the young Indian; “you good, I know; it’s so long since Wah-ta-Wah have a friend—a sister—anybody to speak her heart to! you Hist friend; don’t I say trut’?”
“I never had a friend,” answered Hetty, returning the warm embrace with unfeigned earnestness; “I’ve a sister, but no friend. Judith loves me, and I love Judith; but that’s natural, and as we are taught in the Bible; but I should like to have a friend! I’ll be your friend, with all my heart; for I like your voice, and your smile, and your way of thinking in everything except about