Page:Barbour--Metipoms Hostage.djvu/226

212 “I know not. Stay you close to the wigwams, David, and ask no questions.”

“That is no easy task, Sequanawah, when my people perish.”

“Many will be left, brother. Philip cannot win this war, for the White-Faces are too many against him. In the end he must hide or yield. Yet ere that comes about the forest leaves will be red with blood and many  of your people and mine will seek the Great  Spirit. I go now to have sleep, my brother.”

In spite of Monapikot’s advice, David was resolved to let no opportunity to escape  his captors be wasted, for by keeping his ears  open he had learned that English settlements  lay near by, notably that of Brookfield,  which, he believed, was little more than  twelve miles south of the present encampment. Yet, although his guards that night relaxed their vigilance, so well was the village picketed that any attempt at escape  would have been futile. The next morning strange Indians came, mean and povern-seeming savages to the number of eight. These, he learned, were from the small tribe of Quaboags, dwelling beyond Brookfield. They spent more than an hour in Metipom’s wigwam and then departed southward. Of