I built this community to survive. And I will probably live for at least a few hundred years. I’ve been here for nearly a decade, and not a single wrinkle has appeared on my face. What that means is…
“…”
“…”
“…”
…Unless it is destroyed for some extraordinary reason, this community will also endure for hundreds of years. And the story of a community that was never meant to exist enduring for centuries means, in short, that I am changing history.
“I am against it.”
Every single decision I make will be recorded in history. I couldn’t shake that thought.
“…We cannot accept them.”
Manteo, who had come to see me during dinner, spoke. “Too much hatred has become entangled all at once. No matter how I think about it, I cannot see a way to accept them and prevent conflict!”
“Then,” I said, lifting some lentils with my fork, “can you think of a way to avoid war without accepting them?”
“…That is.”
“They are starving to death. They will do anything to survive. So, have you considered what they might do if we refuse to take them in?”
“…”
“Of course, Manteo, I trust you have thought this through carefully. And despite that, you’ve concluded that it would be better not to accept them. But my thoughts are different.”
“Even if a war breaks out… No.”
“…”
“…My thinking was shortsighted.”
Manteo bowed his head low. I knew exactly what he had been about to say.
—“Even if a war breaks out, we can win.”
Yes. We can win. Our opponents are a coalition of starving tribes who don’t even know how to use metal. What’s more, it would be a defensive war. If we fortify a few key points and deploy our cannons and muskets effectively, we can win ‘easily.’ We can win an overwhelming victory. Which, to put it another way, means we can easily massacre starving refugees.
That was not an option for us.
After the meal, I stepped outside, and this time Hewitt approached me, hesitating. “Mr. Hewitt? What is it?”
“…I have heard the stories of the war waged by the Catawba and Tutelo. I am not sure it is right to accept them.”
“…”
“When I think of how they tortured and tormented the defeated…”
“Mr. Hewitt, at times like these, we must keep a clear head.”
“…I apologize.”
“Remember this. Oitohtan gathered the survivors of the Roanoke colony and tried to plunder the Powhatan Confederacy. Think of what would have happened if that plan had succeeded.”
“That is…”
“We must make a decision for the good of the community. Our emotions cannot be allowed to linger on any one side.”
Besides, conflicts, wars, and raids among these tribes have always been a part of life. Even the inhabitants near Croatoan have lived that way. If we start trying to assign blame, there will be no end to it. Therefore, there was no just cause for their outright expulsion. And when decisions without just cause pile up, the community itself will eventually collapse.
So I accepted them. I had to, for the sake of the Virginia community. Of course… my own personal feelings were heavily involved as well.
“…Thank you. Tr-truly, thank you.”
The man with snake tattoos on both shoulders, weeping before me now, was the Great Chief of the Catawba. Behind him, a flood of Catawba and Tutelo refugees poured in. Their numbers… were roughly greater than the entire population of our existing settlement. And the number of Algonquian natives who had been pushed out by them and had newly arrived also easily exceeded ten thousand.
The Algonquians glared and growled at the Catawba and Tutelo refugees, singing low songs laced with mockery and threats. All the original residents of our settlement whispered amongst themselves. Everyone expected a fight to break out among the newcomers. They expected that at least several hundred would be killed or injured.
…Naturally, I could not let that happen.
“Does the defendant admit to senselessly burying fifteen members of the Chowanoke tribe alive?”
“Wh-what is there to admit or deny? We were at war!”
“They were all under the age of fifteen! You cruel—!”
First, we held trials. We defined so-called ‘war crimes’ and determined whether an act was sufficiently ‘senseless.’ Then we punished those who were found guilty. We avoided the death penalty whenever possible, substituting it with high-intensity forced labor in a secure location.
“Here! Everyone gather over here! This way!”
Next, we began the delicate work of placing the new residents. Simply housing them in separate blocs by tribal confederation would likely only increase the conflict. If they gathered their feelings of anger amongst themselves until it all burst into flame at once, no one would be able to stop it. Instead, we divided them into small tribal units and settled them in the spaces between the English and the other, pre-existing tribes. The idea was that if they were dropped into an unfamiliar environment among disparate peoples, they would be too busy adapting to their new lives to have time to think about revenge.
And in truth, these policies were effective to some extent. In the first month or two after accepting them, there were no armed conflicts. At least, for the time being. But no one felt at ease.
“M-my people… my family was killed…”
No one was optimistic that this situation would last. I could feel the air of the settlement growing heavier on my skin. Whenever a resident of Catawba-Tutelo origin happened to cross paths with someone of Algonquian origin, an extraordinary exchange of glares would freeze the atmosphere of the entire area.
…Even so, I did not regret it. I had to accept them.
***
“Azak, Azak! Wake up! We have to go see to the fields!”
“…”
“W-what? What’s with that look? You suddenly look like a corpse…”
“I had a dream of when my family died.”
“…”
“…”
“…”
At Azak’s words, the hut fell silent in an instant. Azak spoke as if chanting. “I had a dream of when they died. My mother and father, my brothers and sisters, when they died…”
“C-calm down. You…”
“Can you be calm? When the enemy who did this lives just a few steps away?”
“…”
Azak shot to his feet and began rustling around in a corner of the hut. As the others watched to see what he was doing, an unpleasant smell began to waft from his direction. He pulled out a clay jar and held up the black liquid inside.
“This is the kerosene¹ I received as a jar-maker. I’ve been saving it, not using it, every time it was rationed.”
“…You’re not, surely.”
“I’m going to start a fire with this. If I set fire to the home of that bastard’s Great Chief! They’ll all realize something, loud and clear.”
“…”
“…”
“Brothers,” Azak said, his eyes flashing wildly. “Will you… stand watch for me?”
He tucked a knife into his waistband, picked up the jar full of kerosene, and slipped quietly out of the hut. The others, as if mesmerized, followed him. They killed time by loitering around the nearby forest, as if they were just heading out for a hunt. Then, when the sun had set and people were asleep, they made their move. They crept stealthily to the large hut where the Catawba chief lived.
Tak. Tatak!
Someone threw the oil-filled jar along with an ember. A pillar of flame erupted. Everyone was about to leave, suppressing their cheers, when…
“Azak, what are you doing?”
“…What if he escapes?”
Azak closed his eyes for a moment, picturing his mother with an arrow in her throat, then opened them. He hid in a suitable corner, his hand resting on the hilt of his knife. “Then I’ll kill him in the chaos.”
***
When the news reached us, we had just finished our chart work and were having a late dinner.
“Eleanor, which way was the Catawba Great Chief’s house?”
“Out the door, turn l-left, and then straight on… it’s more than a five-minute walk…”
WHOOSH!
I immediately yanked the tablecloth off the long table and soaked it in water. I rolled it up, grabbed it, and tried to get my bearings.
“S-Sir Nemo!”
Without any further hesitation, I bolted from the church building. Outside, a patch of the sky in the distance was stained orange, as if the sun were setting. But it was nine o’clock at night. The sun had set long ago. I didn’t even need to pinpoint the building’s location; I just ran like a madman. No. If the Catawba chief dies here… everything will fall apart.
If this was, by some one-in-a-million chance, an accident, it would still cause problems. But what if it wasn’t an accident? What if it was arson, committed by someone? If someone who hated the Catawba and was filled with rage against them had unleashed that hatred and rage. Then the dominoes of violence and conflict, once started, would fall ceaselessly. Until the tens of thousands belonging to this community took up arms to kill one another. If that happened, everything would be over.
The thought put strength in my legs. A voice whispered in my head that maybe I shouldn’t have accepted them.
…Yes. Maybe I shouldn’t have. Was it immoral? Why would it be immoral? Haven’t I already killed Spaniards with a chainsaw? This is ‘war.’ And if it’s not even a war we started, why should I feel a moral responsibility?
If I had refused them, everything would have been clean. They were the ones who attacked our allies first, after all. They were the villains. As Manteo had been about to say, we could have ‘overwhelmed’ them with force. We could have suppressed these people, armed with little more than slings and stone axes, with our gunpowder weapons and steel swords. And that would have been fine. Because they attacked first. If they got scared and ran somewhere else, we would have been all the more grateful for a troublesome problem resolving itself completely. We could have lived in peace. After driving away all the ‘bad guys.’ After abandoning all those who came to us for help. Just like that.
…
…
…
‘This community started with me handing out instant meals to thirty Englishmen.’ Because I went through the trouble of giving food and drink to people who might have killed me.
—“What? That’s absurd! We cannot allow those cruel people into this land!”
—“That’s right. They are… devils. Devils, I say! Great Chief, I beg you, destroy them! Please, kill them!”
Devils? It’s okay to abandon them because they’re villains? Could I really let it go at that? When they only did what they did to survive?
I remember the Catawba Great Chief weeping as he thanked me. I remember the Catawba people who arrived in this land, hugging me with tears in their eyes. Are they all villains?
Human nature is revealed in extreme situations… A person’s true face is shown when their survival is threatened… I hate those sayings. A person encounters countless moments in their life, and countless emotions and thoughts pass through them. There will be happy moments, depressing moments, and moments filled with rage. In all those moments, a person reveals their true nature.
Of course, at times, a person can be crueler than anything to others. When their own survival is on the line, when the survival of those precious to them is on the line. Can you really say that what they do at such a time is their true nature revealed? Is it truly just to judge and brand a person based on the actions they took when pushed to the most extreme of situations?
I don’t think so. We are not gods. We cannot determine someone’s good or evil.
“F-fire! Good heavens, f-fire!”
“Instead of shouting, get some water! Q-quickly… huh?”
“Great Chief? Great Chief, why are you here… Ah, no! You can’t go in! You can’t!”
That is why we, people, have more urgent things to do than to separate good from evil and brand one another. To help each other with all our might. And to save each other.
Yes. This community was built on that. If we forget that fact, this community will fall. That is why this was the best choice.
The Catawba people, recognizing my face, began to frantically grab hold of me. I shook off their arms and plunged into the flames. The pillars, the walls, the ceiling were all ablaze. Inside, I found the man with the snake tattoos, half-unconscious from smoke inhalation. He was the Great Chief. He was missing a leg, lost, he had told me, in a battle against the Muscogee who had attacked from the south as they were being driven out.
“Ugh, ugh… G-Great… Chief?”
“Take my hand. Quickly!”
A mass of burning embers was about to fall on his head. I quickly swatted it away with my arm. The pain of searing flesh consumed my brain in an instant.
“Kughhh! N-now!”
“Wh-why are you here?”
I wrapped his body in the water-soaked tablecloth and supported him as I walked. The flames blocked the exit, and fiery sparks rained down like ash. But I will go on. The lives of countless people rest on my shoulders, so I will go on.
I will save this community.