It took time and many days but I found myself in the middle of a blossoming friendship where the roots ran deep and the bonds grew thick. As Alice and I spent more time talking about nothing, it in turn drew Uncas to us and soon we were what anyone would call friends.
Uncas, ever since my broaching of the subject, grew more relaxed around me and showed interest in Alice more openly. I like to think this was because in no way did I judge an infatuation as a threat. We would have had to part ways anyway and yet, as true as this was to my eyes, Uncas kept contact with Alice to a minimum especially when his father and brother were in close proximity. This did confuse me a little because at this stage I truly believed the pair to simply be intrigued by each other. There was nothing wrong with finding a like minded spirit and latching onto it no matter how brief the encounter. But Uncas acted as if he were treading on egg shells and Alice altogether ignore it.
I had brushed aside some of what I had seen because it was innocent. I, however, saw how quickly Uncas made headway and distanced himself from Alice, swapping sides with me even so that I'd be between them. Alice would look briefly distraught but recover within a blink.
I had heard them talk some nights but I dismissed it quickly until one day when I sat down to adjust a moccasin.
Uncas had time and again, reached for Alice and she for him when she stumbled and that was gentlemanly of him. What I had failed to realise was that sometimes they didn't let go. Their smallest fingers remained intertwined and they walked beside me, subtly, hand in hand or rather, finger in finger, as it were.
We were at the back of the group and I barely knew I'd seen it because as soon as I sat down, they parted. The gesture gave me pause and I looked at them curiously.
"Are you alright? You look confused…" Uncas said with a frown, shouldering his musket.
When I didn't respond, he quickly urged me on, "Hurry or they'll leave us."
"They wouldn't dare!" Alice exclaimed, "My sister would know instantly."
She finished proudly, her over-bearing albeit heroic sister was still held in high esteem.
"Yeah but my father and brother won't stop. Next thing you know, I'll be navigating us all to Albany on my own. Nightmare."
"Not entirely on your own, I'm getting better." I defended myself without any real need, my pride still wounded from Chingachgook's constant tests that I was constantly failing. Uncas did not take the bait but he took Alice's,
"Whatever do you mean by nightmare?" she looked genuinely offended and even I was worried.
"If you think so." He said to me before turning to Alice calmly, "It wouldn't be a nightmare."
"No. Just a very bad dream."
"Not even, I didn't mean it."
"I'm not that bad." I cut in.
"You're relatively bad."
By this time Uncas found himself up to his nose in female rapid fire. He was turning from one to the other of us with answers to two different subjects. Alice and I were thriving. I'll give him his dues, though, he did not fluster nor panic.
"Yeah but I'm not that bad."
He just looked at me.
"Nightmare. Honestly."
Uncas turned back to Alice who looked thoroughly displeased and said again, only this time more sternly.
"I didn't mean it."
It amazed me how long it took for him to catch on and by this stage I had finished with my moccasins.
"Surely not." Alice replied.
Uncas looked at me, then back at Alice three times before he saw us cracking and letting loose our grins. He lifted his gaze to the sky and cursed it in Mohican, he had been well duped and Alice and I were the proud instigators of his being so.
"Hurry up." He said to me but did not leave.
It was this way that Alice and I learned of Uncas' first flaw. He didn't take well to being made fun of though fun itself was not nearly out of the equation.
He walked in silence while Alice and I continued to build our friendship. Alice is smart and she has the know-how. She's a sheep by nature but I've gotten the sense that should the need arise, she could fall into the role of Shepherd without a second thought.
Of course I did most of the speaking but in this way I also came to find that Alice learnt about people in a far more rounded fashion and with a deeper empathy. She never forgot the importance of something I had told her a week before in one word. She never missed the tone of my voice nor the waver of my expressions and through this she drew out some stories I thought I'd forgotten.
Alice, as some believe, is reserved and quite close minded when it comes to the ways of the world outside of her English background. I think this is a Vox Populi largely influenced by the opinions of her family. I bare no ill will towards them but it does seem that they hadn't allowed her time grow up on her own with people forming unadulterated opinions.
So, naturally, I found quite the contrary. Alice is cautious and world weary but she walks through life with open palms.
Uncas was very different. He was enigmatic and his thoughts were never on his face. I believe he and Alice had managed to find a mutual understanding. Their little friendship was proving to be quite remarkable.
"I wonder what Papa is doing..." Alice mused aloud. I gave her glance but she was further away than Illinois.
Uncas strode past calling out to Nathaniel in Mohican. Nathaniel dropped back and Uncas took up the path by his father's side.
"You two are just about inseparable these days." He joked, feigning exasperation, "And what have you done to Uncas?"
I glanced back at the white Indian but caught Alice blushing deeply. I ignored it.
"Why, whatever –"
I stopped. Some strange sound had made it to my ears. I glanced forward and hoped that my fear was in my head but ahead of me, Uncas and Chingachgook looked unsettled.
The women seemed unfazed but looking back at Nathaniel, I saw him too, hesitate with sound. Alice turned to say something to me but I hushed her and she obeyed all wide eyed and fearful. Alas, it was not her we had to worry about.
Cora turned abruptly,
"Why have we stopped?"
I've never seen Chingachgook look so dismayed.
Uncas started an all ahead full sprint towards us – at the time I wasn't sure why – but his sudden decision had a price and no sooner had he started than did gunfire go off and a stray Huron ploughed through the undergrowth and straight into the young warrior Chief. Uncas and the Huron tumbled down the hill and out of site with grunts of pain.
Alice let out a shrill cry as Nathaniel shoved her to the ground,
"Stay down!" He called and Cora dropped. Duncan Hayward drew his cutlass again and I my little pistol. Chingachgook bounded down the hill after his son and suddenly we were all in the thick of it.
A war party dashed from out the trees and we were descended upon by hoards of tomahawks. We fired aimlessly because it seemed impossible to miss. I found myself being driven away from the problem at hand which blessed me with opportunity.
A clearing had appeared and it was free of obstacles. We could do it. Everybody runs faster when they're scared.
I looked down for Uncas and Chingachgook, found them to be alright albeit slightly damaged around the head. Cora was staring intently at me, as if having read my thoughts, she waited for instruction. I threw a tomahawk at a Huron who was coming up behind Nathaniel and hit straight on. And low and behold, the opportunity was briefly free of Huron interaction and I called it,
"Courir!"
I had meant to say 'run' but my brain turns to French vichyssoise in moments of fright but everyone seemed to get the idea. I turned on my heel and lead us on. We had broken apart slightly, our little band racing through the trees at different levels of undergrowth but not far enough to lose each other.
I could hear the pants of those around me, the women's rustling petty coats and much to my horror, the shrill cry of Huron in pursuit.
Nathaniel cried out something in Mohican and suddenly Chingachgook was gone. Uncas grabbed Cora's wrist and yanked her away, Hayward and Nathaniel stuck close and by this stage, I understood what was happening.
"Make for the river! Split up!"
Madness but I kept on heading straight, following the sounds of the river.
"Alice, keep up!" I cried, reaching back for her but no sooner had I said that than did she actually overtake me.
We came to an abrupt halt at the river bank, the beauty of the day contrasting the rather hot pursuit of death.
"What do we do now?" Alice asked fearfully.
There was a cave in front of us, I could see and all that needed doing was to swim to it. Fast and with the intention of feigning death and tricking the Huron.
"The cave, Alice, go!"
"I can't swim!"
"There's no time like the present!" and much to her frantic horror and my own surprise, I pushed her in and followed suit. She screamed when she shot up for air, her hair array and plastered to her face.
I tugged her a long with me, the water was actually fairly shallow and the footing easy but if one were to lose it, we were gonners. I was horribly aware of that as Alice tripped and bobbed and almost got swept away herself. Close calls came and went in quick succession. But we made it, by sheer grace or dumb luck – not sure which and I don't care.
We clambered into its depths and pressed ourselves against the wall, soaking wet. The cave was cold and damp as was to be expected but no less pleasant as we shivered in its depths.
"What do we do now?" she asked and I hushed her again, creeping forward to peer through the falls at the tiny hoard of confused Huron now accumulating on the banks.
A couple of them split up and down the banks but a fair few remained where they were. Waiting for us to make a bold move.
I grimaced and glanced back at Alice, unsure of what to do. I had to keep up appearances. I had to maintain the belief that I knew what we were doing but I had no idea.
I remembered Chingachgook telling me I was resourceful and I tried use that as inspiration. But I concluded that we were stuck.
I plopped down next to Alice who sat shaking with cold and no small amount of fear.
"I don't really know." I said finally but she looked less perturbed than I would have expected. I think she probably figured that out prior to my saying so,
"I'm sorry I pushed you in. I wasn't sure you would have done what I asked if I didn't..."
"No need," she answered quietly, "I'm not sure either."
My eyes scanned the interior looking for away out until at last Alice said,
"There's a hole behind me..."
She looked surprised. She shimmied over to allow me to have a look. It wasn't large but it was size enough to squeeze two small women through.
"That's handy." I commented thoughtfully, "I wonder if it has opening."
"Can you not light a fire and follow the smoke to find out?"
I gave her a small smile; ya see? She's smart.
"I don't have dry gun powder. And they might see."
"Through the falls? Surely daylight would hinder fire light."
"Not if you're in the dark. Not taking any chances neither."
She nodded, looking slightly disappointed. I tried to cheer up our situation,
"Can't get any worse. They can't stay there forever."
"Unless they decide to check –"
I jerked my head around towards the falls. The sound of multiple splashes making our hearts beat faster.
"You don't think-"
"Shshshsh!"
I did think, and peering through the falls again, I thought right. Panic very nearly raised its warped head but then I remembered the hole in the wall.
It was dangerous but it was that or take them on with one tomahawk. I'm not that brave...
With regards to the cave, however, I just could have been that stupid.
"Up you go." I said flatly, almost aghast at myself. She certainly was,
"You're joking."
"That or them. Hurry up and make a decision."
It didn't take her long. She positioned herself just so and took a deep, rattling breath and began to climb. I followed not too long after. Obviously we wouldn't get far before they stuck their own means of a fire up the hole to find us. They must have seen the bottom of my foot.
But i had to admit, I was briefly relieved to see the smoke wafting gracefully past us to some unseen freedom. I managed a small smile then Alice coughed. Loud and clear and fitfully,
"Dust in my throat!" she wheezed in between fits.
The Huron were yelling at each other manically below me and I heard what sounded like two warriors making their way after us.
"Alice, keep moving!"
She heaved herself forward,
"Where do I go?"
"Anywhere you can fit!"
I took note of a leaking crack as I crawled past hoping it would mean nothing but you always hope against hope. The Indians knew the Frontiers better than any 2 legged soul. It would be miraculous if they didn't decide to do anything with the opportunity of a leak.
The crack rolled up and up and I was beginning to think they'd missed and then the shuffling behind me went silent. Soft, assertive voices rose instead and Alice stalled.
"I'm-" I heard the sound of effort, "I'm stuck!"
She whispered frantically. It took every fibre in my being not to lose my head.
"Alright..." I tried and failed to think of something, "Alright."
The Hurons below had begun banging the wall experimentally. I had one eye on Alice and one eye on the crack and very steadily growing fear of the worst.
"Marie!"
"OK...deep breaths. What can you move?"
"Nothing!"
"There must be something, an arm? A leg? What's stuck?"
The crack hissed and water started seeping through. We must have been working our way through underneath river. My breath hitched and I heard frantic Huron words being exchanged and a descending scuffle.
"My left arm! I can't move! It's getting wetter! Help!"
Alice's voice was laced with hysteria, wavering and sniffing as I believe tears began to mix with water now running down my front.
"Stop panicking." I said sternly, taking a deep breath of my own, "Can you roll, can you move your body in any other way other than up?"
"I can't-"
"Yes or no."
"No!"
I was stumped.
It was getting deeper, we were lying in the equivalent of an estuary. They must have sealed up the entrance below us. Ah, well, I figured this to be out end and I took breath and my heart instantly slowed and my head was clear.
"What do you think can be done?" I asked calmly. It's amazing what happens to you when you accept your fate. There were worse ways to die. I stifled a groan, I really didn't want to, though. That was the problem.
Miraculously, Alice seemed to have calmed herself too. Her breathing evened out,
"I can feel myself floating."
I was worried she was going to start a death talk but,
"I think if you can push me a little, I might be able to free my arm now."
If she thought that the way then so be it. I was worrying, however, that if it didn't work, she'd get more stuck.
But I did as was suggested and hoisted myself up. Sloshing through the river water to get to her. Funny how laying your hand upon the backside of someone during danger completely obliterates the social intolerance of the deed should it have been done under different circumstances.
"Ready?"
"Yes!"
I pushed and we both strained ourselves under the effort. It failed.
"It will work!" Alice encouraged, the tables turned, "Try again."
I sighed and heaved. This time for longer. Something came loose and Alice shot forward.
I was surprised and face planted the dirty, rock water but I was far too elated. I was mildly aware of a ripping sound and Alice stalled again,
"Was that my dress?"
I couldn't believe how very disbelieving she sounded, in a manner which suggested that tearing her dress was a whole other kettle of fish in comparison to drowning in a cave.
"I don't know," I answered a little flustered, the water creeping higher up my chest, "Alice, Move!"
Thankfully she did and despite the fact that we had no idea where we were going – it felt like freedom was waiting.
It paid off alright, we strangely came out in a stream, probably much further down than we anticipated. We crawled out gasping for air, shivering relentlessly and alive. We collapsed on the river bank and took note of the red sky above. Dusk was settling in beautifully and a red sky at night is a shepherd's delight but we were in for a chilly night.
No Chingachgook, Hawkeye, Cora, Hayward or Uncas.
I sat up and sighed heavily, the problem dawning.
"Where are they?" Alice asked as if having read my thoughts. I glanced at her,
"I don't know," I sniffed and shrugged, "Escaping up a hole in the wall was an unseen part of the plan."
"There was a plan?"
"There's always a plan."
She continued to look at me, waiting for me to explain but I was tired, wet and worried and all I could think of to say was,
"But obviously it didn't take varying escape tactics into account."
"We're lost." She summarised curtly.
"Yup."
