“Speaking of rear tit, Lieutenant, you know of any place around where me and the boys might find some?”
The kid’s face flushed—undoubtedly Hannah’s intent—and mumbled, “You might ask Sergeant O’Rourke, sir.” And spurred his horse into a lope back up the trail.
Laughing, Hannah grinned at Molly McDonald and Constance Beckett and rode after the fleeing soldier.
Molly released the brake and slapped the lines. The mules started down the trail. “Well, gal, looks like Fort Kearny will soon be behind you.”
Constance didn’t hear. “‘Pulling tit.’ What an asshole.”
“You’re learning, gal,” Molly called back to her. “You’re learning.”
* * *
Black smoke belched from the hissing engine that had stopped while men pounded spikes to secure the rails. An Irish voice sang out a melody, and the railroad crew worked in unison. The engineer and the fireman stood on the flatcar, loaded with ties and rails. They looked south as the longhorns, cattle, and wagons moved along. Then they turned their heads and stared north.
Story rode back from the crew boss and turned his horse alongside Boone’s. Boone looked north, too. So did Jordan Stubbings.
On a small rise beyond the tracks, more than a dozen Indians sat on their horses. Cowboys and teamsters south of the tracks. Indians north of the tracks. The Irishmen trying to ignore both. Hammers sang out in time with the song.
“Brulé Sioux,” Story told the two drovers.
“What do they want?” Stubbings asked from the other side of the cattle.
“Interpreter said they just want to see how this railroad building works,” Story answered. He pointed to one wearing a bonnet and holding a lance, aboard a striking piebald stallion. “Says that one yonder is Spotted Tail, big man with the tribes.”
“Some of them seem more interested in us.” Boone reached for his canteen. His throat had turned dry.
“We’ll put extra men on night herds till we reach Julesburg and Fort Sedgwick,” Story said. “And I’ll have Lehman pull the wagons into a tight circle. Tonight, every man sleeps with one of those Remington rifles next to him.”
* * *
The Lakota Indians, however, vanished. A few days later, so did the rails and tracklayers, replaced by grading crews, then surveyors, and then the nothingness of the stark plains. Days dragged into weeks, weeks into eternity, but the country never changed. The river might narrow, or widen, and the wind might shift directions. Sometimes clouds appeared in the pale blue horizon. A buffalo, or pronghorn, might lift its head in the distance, and a hawk, raven, or turkey buzzard flew overhead. The land, though, stretched on with an unremitting endlessness.
“I think the Brulés have lost interest,” Connor Lehman told Story at camp one night.
“I do, too,” Story said. “But we’ll keep the wagons circled tightly at camp, we’ll keep more guards on night herd, and we’ll keep the rifles handy.”
“You’ll wear these men out,” Lehman said.
“But I might keep them alive.”
* * *
They passed a westbound train of forty-five wagons—Constance Bennett counted them—with the bullwhackers shielding their faces from the dust. Maybe the boss and others had talked to Story or Hannah, perhaps asked where they were bound, but by the time the last of the wagons came down the trail, they were no longer staring with wonderment, or scratching their beards. Irritation had replaced curiosity.
Once, a stagecoach rolled along on the rutted trail. At first, the driver yelled at the passengers not to lean to the port side to see the spectacle of cattle and wagons. Finally he gave up, pulled hard on the lines, to stop the mules.
“Dumb sons of bitches,” Boone heard the jehu say. “They’d topple Ol’ Nancy over.” The driver pointed his whip. “Where the hell did you come from?”
Boone jerked a thumb behind him. “Hell,” he answered.
The bearded man shook his head and pointed west. “You ain’t out of it yet.”
CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN
They loped to the crest of the small rise north of the Platte.
“Son of a bitch,” Jameson Hannah said as he wheeled his black to a stop.
Story’s bay fought rein and bit, twisting, turning, trying to run south. “Lightning?” he asked.
Smoke filled the sky to the north, but beneath the billowing thickness of white smoke, orange and yellow flames raced across the prairie, as far as Story could see, driven by that damned never-ending wind.
His horse still jumping, Story called out again, “Lightning?” He hadn’t seen a cloud in a week.
“Spotted Tail,” Hannah guessed.
“Get the herd across the river,” Story yelled, and let the bay run, away from the inferno. Now he knew why all that rain back in the spring had worried cattlemen. They were right. The grass grew, rich and thick, but when the rains ended and the sun and wind remembered it was summer, the prairie dried out quickly, turning thick grass into a tinderbox.
“I’ll get the wagons.”
* * *
Wide the Platte River might have been, but the longhorns easily trotted across it. So did the wagons, driven by Bill Petty and José Pablo Tsoyio, and once on the south shore, the cook set the brake, leaped over the side, and gasped. He had seen just the massive clouds of smoke. Now towering flames rushed across the prairie.
He wondered if the river would stop the flames, and José Pablo Tsoyio made the sign of the cross and prayed.
“Señor José. Señor José.” Young Sibrian ran toward him, his nose bleeding, limping, crying, tears cascading down his cheeks. He pointed, and José Pablo Tsoyio could see the hundreds of horses galloping south, southwest, southeast. The wrangler’s young colt, still saddled, took off more westerly, having thrown its rider.
“I could . . . not stop . . . stop them,” Sibrian wailed.
“It is for the best,” José Pablo Tsoyio told Sibrian. “You have work to do here.” He walked to the wagon, reached inside, and found his apron. Handing what had once been pristine white to the young boy, Tsoyio said, “Take this to the river, let the water soak it through. Do not wring it out.” He pointed. “The wind will carry sparks across the big river. Wherever you see smoke, you must beat out the flames. If fire catches here, we are doomed.”
“But the horses . . .”
“Let the horses run. Go. To the river.” He thrust the apron into the boy’s shaking hands. “Go now. And go with God.”
* * *
Hearing his name called, Boone pulled hard on the reins and turned in the saddle.
“Forget the damned cattle. Forget the son-of-a-bitching horses.” Jameson Hannah slid his horse to a stop and jerked his left arm toward the river.
“Shit,” Boone said as he reached for his lariat and spurred his horse into the shallow river.
* * *
Once her wagon made it across the Platte, Constance Beckett wanted to let the mules keep running. They might be able to catch up with all those horses raising dust. Or even some of the steers bolting from the smell of smoke that burned Constance’s eyes. But Molly was yelling something, and Constance saw her friend running back, afoot, toward the river.
“We gotta help them, Constance,” Molly cried out, calling her by her real name and sounding like a woman, not the rough-hewn man she pretended to be. “Come on. For Christ’s sake, come on. Lend a hand.”
She didn’t even remember stopping the wagon or jumping into the mud. The next thing Constance realized she was knee-deep in the Platte River, running back toward the orange and gray horizon, feeling the heat already against her face.
* * *
The Platte River was no barrier to horses, or longhorns, or light wagons. But double-hitched freight wagons sank to their axles in the mud.
The rigs driven by George Overholt and Kyle McPherson made it across easily enough, and those teamsters begin unhitching their teams, while their guards, Patrick Caulfield and Zack Hall, ran back into the muddy water.
* * *
At first, Boone thought he felt the ember burn his face. Can’t be, he told himself as he swung out of the saddle. I’m soaked through with river water and damned sweat. He looked at the lariat in his hands, but while he was learning to throw a loop, he wasn’t sure he could do it now.
The teamster on the wagon, David Mc-something, McKay, yes, McKay, barked something, grabbed one end of Boone’s rope, and disappeared. Boone turned, realized he held the other end of the lariat, and hurried back to his horse. By the time he was in the saddle, making five or so dallies across the horn, he heard McKay screaming, “Pull. Pull.”
Boone needed no encouragement. Neither did his horse. He spurred, feeling the water splashing on him, over him, behind him. George Dow moved on the other side of the big wagons, the lariat behind him straining, taut. The two wagon drivers—the woman who pretended to be Cory Bennett and her foul-mouthed pard—splashed through the river. Cory found a spot behind the lead wagon, began pushing. Tiny as she was, Boone didn’t think she’d help much. His horse snorted. Boone dug the spurs in harder.
* * *
The sun disappeared behind the clouds of smoke, but the heat around them doubled, tripled. Men coughed.
One double-hitched wagon made it across, pulled by oxen from other teams. The wagons driven by Jake Rogers somehow found hard rock underneath the mud, and lurched forward, splashing onto the south side at such speed—for oxen—that Rogers didn’t stop the team for another quarter mile.
But one remained closer to the north bank, and now all Story could see on the south side of the Platte was the savagery of flames and smoke. He kicked free of the stirrups and leaped into the mud. His horse bolted; Story did not care. He ran into the river, barking orders no one could hear. Before him, riders tried to keep their horses pulling, straining, grunting, cursing, praying, sweating.
The rope on the eastern side of the wagon suddenly popped, rifling back toward the freight, slicing into the river that reflected the images of fire and hell. The other end popped the rider, George Dow, in the back of the head, and sent him headfirst into the Platte while his horse rolled over on the side—luckily away from the struggling Dow—found its feet, and bolted out of the river and out of Story’s view.
On the other side, Boone and his gelding worked hard. Story saw the intensity, the madness, in the faces of both man and horse. Then he staggered to the side of the wagon, found a spot he could grip on the rear wagon, just in front of the mule skinner named Bennett, one of the two who could never get into camp before sundown.
He pushed. He cursed. Even thought about praying, as though God would listen to an atheist. He imagined the heat on his back. Suddenly, the wagon moved, freed from the quagmire beneath the water. Cory Bennett fell into the water, pushed up, slipped, went back into the river.
Story forgot about the damned wagon, forgot about everything but Cory Bennett. He moved quickly, grabbed the mule skinners’ left leg, and pulled, pulled, pulled until he fell into the water, and came up spitting, cursing. He saw the wagon moving to the bank, and to his relief, Cory Bennett sat up in the river, spit out water, ran his hands over his face.
Story glanced at the flames, pushed himself to his feet, and forded his way to Bennett, but the skinner’s pard, Mickey McDonald, reached him first. “Them wheels would’ve gone right over you . . .” McDonald looked at Story and nodded. “You’d be dead, or crippled for life.” Bennett coughed, shook his head, and put an arm around McDonald.
But he did manage to look at Story.
“Thank you,” he said, barely audible.
One of the bullwhackers had fished George Dow out of the Platte. They made their way to the south bank.
Story started that way, too. “Thank you,” he heard himself saying. “You boys did all right today.” Five paces later he added, “But we’re not out of this fix yet. Get ready for a long night.”
* * *
The night, Molly McDonald thought, would never end.
The night did not darken until the flames on the other side of the Platte finally had no more fuel to burn. But sparks fluttered into the dry grass for hours, sending cowboys, mule skinners, and bullwhackers with wet blankets, towels, shirts, bedrolls, slapping at the flames and putting them out as quickly as possible.
When morning came, Molly looked at the blackness that covered the plains across the river.
It took them three days to round up what they could of the herd, and a day more to catch the last of the horses from the remuda.
Even after passing the last blackened prairie, they remained on the south side of the river. “Keep the Indians on the other side of the river,” Jameson Hannah explained.
“Like there ain’t no Indians on this side of that river,” Dalton Combs mumbled.
No more prairie fires. No more Brulés. Just the wind . . . and monotony. When they reached where the big Platte forked, they followed the South Platte, still on the southern banks, till eventually crossing to pick up the main trail that led to Julesburg and Fort Sedgwick.
* * *
Late as they were again, sure to summon Story’s ire, Molly McDonald couldn’t figure out why Constance Beckett stopped the wagon so quickly on the outskirts of town. Constance yanked the brake lever, fell to her knees in the driver’s box, leaned over the side, and vomited all over the Julesburg road.
Swearing, Molly barked at the mules, popped the whip, and covered the thirty yards before bringing the wagon to a stop. After leaping over the side, she ran to the side of Constance’s wagon, where her friend had risen to her knees, gripping the wide of the wagon. Her sunburned face had turned ashen, and, unsteadily, she tugged off her bandanna and wiped her lips and face, ignoring Molly’s questions: “Are you all right? . . . What’s the matter? . . . What has happened?”
Molly drew in a deep breath, exhaled, while Constance lowered the kerchief. Turning her head, Constance spit over the front of the wagon before staring glassy-eyed at Molly.
“You . . .” She swallowed. “. . . you said . . . Julesburg had become . . . tame.”
All Molly could think to say was: “Huh?”
After a long sigh, Constance tilted her head toward the other side of the road.
Too short to see over the backs of the mules, Molly walked along the narrow road, past the leaders, and gawked.
The man’s decapitated head, beginning to putrefy, had been stuck atop a post, standing five feet high after being driven into the earth. Molly stepped closer, tilting her head so she could read the sign knocked askew by the wind or the ravens that had pecked out the dead man’s eyes.
Sloppily written, the sign read:
coddnt cheet WERTH a DAM
Slowly, she removed her hat and spit tobacco juice into the grass. “Son of a gun,” she said aloud. “That’s ol’ Mike Tucker.”
“You knew him?” Constance coughed out the words.
“Sure did.”
“I’m . . . sorry.” Constance said after another gagging fit.
Molly turned around, slapped the hat back on her head, and strode toward the wagons. “Don’t be,” she said. “Mike Tucker was a horse’s ass. Wish I could’ve been here to join in on the fun.”
CHAPTER FIFTY-EIGHT
North from Julesburg and Fort Sedgwick to the North Platte River. Then northwest, back on the Platte River Road, again following the ruts left by the emigrants from a decade, two decades ago bound for Oregon and California. Through pale bluffs and small patches of woods. Across trickling streams of water, barely deep enough to wet the hooves of livestock. Following the North Platte to their left, and the rolling, never-ending plains all around them. They moved slowly, yet steadily, letting cattle graze on the thick grass. Wind blew the grass. Wind blew the dust, the grime. Wind blistered their faces, chapped their lips. Wind blew, and blew, and blew.
* * *
Jameson Hannah rode into camp with a pronghorn draped over the back of his saddle, and slung the carcass onto the ground near José Pablo Tsoyio’
s wagon. “Fresh meat,” Hannah said with a grin. “Antelope steaks for supper. Antelope stew for breakfast. You boys can thank me with whiskey once we get to the sutler’s at Fort Laramie.”
That evening, José Pablo Tsoyio served beans, biscuits, and salt pork.
“What the hell, Tsoyio,” Hannah barked when he rode in from checking on the herd. “I bring in a meaty doe, and you serve the same shit we’ve been eating forever.” He pulled his revolver, but kept the barrel pointed at the dirt. “You’ve known me long enough, cookie, that when I tell you to cook pronghorn, you cook pronghorn. And don’t tell me you are drying that meat because my belly is as sick of jerky as it is of your beans.”
José Pablo Tsoyio did not look up, but continued stirring the batter he was setting for the next morning’s breakfast. Softly, without stopping his chores, he said, “If I thought the men wanted worms for supper, I would have cooked your doe.”
A few spurs chimed. The fire crackled. The spoon ground against the bowl. Finally, Boone chuckled, and that set off nervous laughter. Even Jameson Hannah grinned until the bullwhacker named Gordon Beck slapped his thigh and hooted. “Hey, Hannah, did you put a Remington bullet through the worm’s heart—so as to not spoil no meat?”
The revolver started to rise, but Hannah stopped about halfway up. “You think you can do better, go ahead.”
“We passed a buffalo herd about a mile or two back,” Beck said. He lifted the Remington rifle from his side, butting it against the ground.
“Could you hit a buffalo?” Ryan Ward asked.
“Couldn’t miss,” Beck said.
“I tasted buffalo tongue once,” Jordan Stubbings said. “Liked it.”
“How much would you pay for some tongue?” Beck asked.
Stubbings grinned, but Story came out of the bushes, grabbed a plate, and noisily loaded it with beans. “You eat what the cook puts on your plate,” he said. “This isn’t Ebbitt’s place in Washington City.”
“Now—”
Beck didn’t finish. “That herd’s a mile behind us,” Story said. “We’re not taking these wagons and cattle east. And how would you get that buffalo skinned and the meat back to us?”
A Thousand Texas Longhorns Page 30