Their great war chief, a man of the Turtle Clan—for theirs was a Turtle Clan village—called two runners to him.

“Go,” he said, “see who has sent up that smoke and if that person has come in peace. If not, then kill him.”

Those two men did as their chief asked. When they arrived at the hill overlooking the falls where a single tall tree hung out over the rushing water, they found a stranger sitting and smoking his pipe.

“Come here,” that stranger said in a calm voice. “I mean you no harm. I have something to tell you.”

The two runners approached the man warily. He seemed to have no weapons, but in this time when war and fighting were everywhere, they knew they had to be careful.

“What do you want?” the first runner asked.

“I want to enter your village,” the man who was the Peacemaker said. “I have an important message for your war chief and all your people.”

“Hah,” the second runner said. “Who are you? Why should we not just kill you right here?”

“I am Skennerahowi,” the Peacemaker replied. “Before you kill me, I ask you to tell your war chief I wish to talk with him. If he does not agree, then you can come back and kill me.”

The two runners looked at each other. No one had ever spoken to them that way before, showing neither anger nor fear.

“We will take that message to our war chief,” the first runner said.

“Thank you,” the Peacemaker said. “I will wait here for your return.”

When they got back to the village, the two runners told the great war chief about the calm man they had found sitting on the hill overlooking the falls.

“I have heard of this one from my assistant chiefs. I doubted what he told me. But now I would like to see this brave man,” the war chief said. “Bring him back to our village.”

When the Peacemaker arrived at the village, he found that a place had been made for him to sit in front of the war chief and his two assistants. As soon as the Peacemaker had been seated, the war chief stood up and spoke to all the people gathered around them.

“I think I know who this man is,” he said. “I believe this is the one we heard about who arrived from across the lake bringing a great message. My second war chief has spoken about this man, saying that his message about peace sounded good to him. I could not believe that what he said was true, but now this man has shown up here. So let us listen to him now.”

When the war chief finished speaking, he sat down and the Peacemaker stood up.