by Stan Himes
The doctor quickly determined that Pearl was the worse off, saying only, “My, my, my” before ordering that she be put on the single exam table while Clean Through was propped upon a waiting bench. Doc Evert then had Dutch and Ernestine arrange lamps around the exam table and sent Dutch to the boarding house to bring back Widow Sterling, who helped him with nursing emergencies.
When Ernestine was certain that her friends were in good hands and that there was nothing more she could do at the moment, she left to find the telegraph office.
After another day without Brute’s arrival, Sean was now certain that something had gone wrong. As he took the first watch, he did what he had done most of the day—spent his time looking down the trail at where they’d been. There was nothing to be seen, yet disquieting thoughts nagged at him. He tried to shrug them off, telling himself that even if a group of foolish women tried to attack, his gang could pick them off like ducks on a pond. But the unsettling feelings lingered and his concern would rise up strong anytime Brute flashed in his mind.
He hoped Red would return soon.
While Doc Galen was a talker, Doc Evert was a… well, I don’t know if there’s a word for someone who makes little noises to himself as he mulls things over, but that’s about all Ernestine could get from the man as she sat watching him pore over Pearl and Clean Through. “Hmmmm.” “Uh huhhhhh.” “Huhnnnnn.” “Myyyyyyyyy.” “Ahhhhh.” “Tch tch tch.” Occasionally something like “goodness” or “dear me” would crop up, but it was mostly odd sounds of concentration.
Ernestine was worried and feared that she had been too slow in getting them to the doctor. At the same time, his odd sounds gave her comfort. He was clearly a dedicated man who took offense at the mortality of people. She felt confident that Pearl and Clean Through were getting good care.
She stole a look first at Pearl and then at Clean Through, cringing at their bloodless faces and lifeless forms. The doctor’s doing his best, she thought, but they sure look beyond saving by any human. She had prayed for her parents, but they died anyway. Still, she supposed there was no harm in praying again. She bowed her head as she heard the doctor sigh a near-silent “eeeeesshhhhh.”
If someone asked me to name the most remarkable thing that happened during our journey, I’d be hard-pressed to think of anything more fortuitous than the luck we had with our communications. I had no idea, of course, how swiftly my letters had made it home. Telegrams were obviously faster, but they were subject to delays. Everything from cut or broken lines to an operator being gone for dinner to someone like Edward, who had no interest in deliveries, could slow a telegram by days or more. Yet like my letters, everything lined up just right when Ernestine sent her telegrams from Caldwell. The lines between Caldwell and the relay station at the trading post in Fairview were intact, as were the lines between the relay station and Secluded Springs. The operator at the relay station had fallen asleep at his desk and woke up at the first click to take the message. And Edward was working late at the store, trying to catch up on the bookkeeping that he wished Ernestine was there to help with, so he was ready when the messages came through.
So while we were waiting under the dark sky to re-take the herd at morning’s light, Edward had parked his wagon and was pounding on Jonas’s door. “Jonas!” Boom, boom, boom. “Jonas! Open up! News from the drive!” Doc Galen stood right behind him.
Lamplight appeared through the window and a moment later Jonas, in his undershirt and hastily pulled-on pants, feet bare, crutch under his arm, jerked open the door. There was no sleepiness in his bright, wide eyes. His heart was pounding. News of the drive in the middle of the night could be damn good or damn bad, but he feared the latter.
Edward rushed through the door and went straight for the table, pulling out a chair and sitting down with a thud. Doc entered just far enough to stand dead-center in the doorway as Edward held up two papers. “Telegrams from Caldwell.”
“Caldwell?” That didn’t make any sense to Jonas. Could they have taken the wrong trail?
“One from Ernestine. One from Mary.”
“Well?” Jonas said, taking a seat himself while still holding the crutch. “What’s the news?”
“Ernestine has been injured but assures me she’s all right. She insisted I deliver this message from Mary right away.” He stuck out one of the papers toward Jonas.
For Jonas, the moment was too important for any pretense. He pushed the paper back. “I ain’t good with readin’, Edward. Just tell me what it says.”
“Sure, Jonas. Sure.” He unfolded the paper and read. “‘Ambushed, stop. Several wounded but all alive, stop. Katie stolen and herd taken, stop.’” The crutch crackled as Jonas tensed his hand around it. “‘Katie rescued, stop. Plan to re-take herd or die trying, stop. Katie met fine young man, stop. Expect they’ll marry if we live, stop.’” Edward looked up with a touch of moisture in his eyes. “‘Know I love you dearly no matter what. Mary.’”
The fire from the lamplight reflected in Jonas’s eyes. “Do one more thing for me, Edward.”
“Whatever you need.”
Jonas rose and tossed his crutch across the room, slamming it into a wall. “Get me on a horse.”
Jonas charged at the door, but Doc Galen and Edward were ready. Doc crouched slightly in the doorway and grabbed one arm as Edward grabbed the other from behind. With two good legs, Jonas might’ve plowed through, but the two older men held firm.
“You can’t go!” screamed Doc.
“You’d never get there!” Edward added.
Jonas pushed on and gained a few inches, his head now out the door.
“Jonas, listen! Listen!” Jonas stayed wild-eyed at Doc’s words, but for the moment at least he stopped pushing. Doc loosened his grasp, but he stayed ready to clutch hold again. “Even if you could ride hard, it’d take you a week. It’s up to Mary now. The women.” He could see Jonas slowly absorbing the reality. “You put your faith in them. Now keep it. It’s all you can do. All any of us can do.”
Doc and Edward tentatively let go of Jonas. He didn’t run. He didn’t fall. He simply stood there, shoulder slumped, face clouded. Helpless. No, not helpless. Useless.
Chapter 25
Circumstances change. Thus a good plan in the evening can become a poor plan by morning. Our plan was good because it was so simple. We outnumbered the men, so we would rush them with guns blazing and try to take them out before they could fight back. Perhaps I should also point that we weren’t just women, we were smart women capable of learning from our experiences. When the men had attacked us, we tried to shoot back from horseback and didn’t hit a thing. It was only when we were on the ground, steady, that our shots went true. So when I say that we would rush them with guns blazing, I really mean that we would rush into good shooting positions and then take good, reliable shots while the men were still hesitant due to the surprise. Like I said, smart. All of us were in agreement that the fast, unexpected charge was our best hope for success. Even more, we were confident it would succeed. The odds were with us.
But, as I noted, circumstances change.
During the last hour before dawn we moved closer to the gang’s camp, positioning ourselves against a line of trees to the east so that the rising sun would be behind us and in the men’s eyes as we rode in. For the umpteenth time, we checked our weapons. Then we watched hoping to see them rise and gather somewhere away from their horses.
“Looks like two watching the herd,” Sally said, and we all trusted her eyes. “Rest are just starting to stir.”
“Give the word when they start rolling up their blankets,” said Mary. “That’s when we’ll charge. Remember…”—and here’s where Mary again turned out to be a lot like Jonas, telling us stuff she’d already gone over a dozen times—“…rifles get in position and take good, steady shots. Everyone else rush in and blast whoever the rifles don’t get. Then we all go after the riders.”
“Wait! Something’s comin’!”
And that’s
how quickly plans change. As we strained to see in the pre-dawn grayness, we first heard then saw a group of men riding in behind the red-haired man.
“I count five more,” said Sally.
“Me, too,” said Prudence.
Mary slapped her thigh in frustration. “Pull back. Stay quiet.”
Despite being angered that our plan had failed before it began, Mary also knew that we had been lucky. If we had charged just a minute before Sally spotted the oncoming riders, we would have been in a world of hurt. We could rush five men and like our chances, but ten was too many. And all of them had rifles.
That Sean was a pesky fellow. Somehow he’d reasoned that Brute’s absence was cause not to check on Brute, but to send for more men. Apparently there was no shortage of non-working lowlifes in Dodge City. He’d rather divide the profits among more men than risk losing the herd entirely. I always thought that outlaws looked for ways to get bigger shares, but it appeared that Sean didn’t think like most outlaws, and that was bad for us.
We had Mary, and that was bad for them.
“All right,” she said once we had pulled back a short distance. “They outgun us for sure now, but we ain’t done yet.” Trickles of yellow sunshine were weaving through the gray morning sky, providing enough light to see the corners of Mary’s mouth rise. “We have other weapons that I’m sure they ain’t used to fightin’.”
The first of our other weapons was me and Sally, or I should say, our feminine appeal with me as the first representative and Sally as the second. We waited until the men had the herd on the move, then we closed the distance to trail them and scout their positions. Two men, including Red and a fellow with a short-brimmed straw hat, rode drag. They were our first targets.
We watched a good chunk of the day, again letting them move the herd—our herd—for us, and then put our new plan into action as the afternoon sun hung low in the sky.
I removed the rifle from the sheath on my saddle and left it behind with Ruth, keeping only a pistol within easy reach in my boot. I rode in toward Red at the left rear of the herd, unhurried, trying to think of myself as alluring and hoping the thought shone through in my expression. I stopped when he heard my approach and snapped his horse around, facing me. He was startled, then intrigued as I smiled with all the charm I could muster. We were about forty feet apart.
“Excuse me, sir. I’m lost and it’s gonna be cold soon. Do you know a warm place I could spend the night?”
He moved his horse closer to mine, all thoughts of the herd replaced by a lustfulness I found both complimentary and unsettling. “I’m sure I can think of something, little lady.”
I snapped up my pistol and pointed it at him. “On second thought, maybe I ain’t so lost. Now pick up your gun by the handle and drop it.”
He just smiled. “Your pretty hands ain’t none too steady. You’re not really gonna shoot me.”
“I don’t need to,” I said. “They will.”
From directly behind me, having walked in single file behind my horse, Ruth slipped out to the right holding a rifle and Parker slipped out to the left holding a pistol.
I took a moment to glance to the right side of the herd, where Sally had Straw Hat in the same position, backed up by Mary and Katie. Prudence was moving up behind us, the reins of the other horses in her hands.
Red dropped his gun.
“Now turn around, ride straight into the herd, and you just might live.”
Red hesitated.
“I was told to count to ten, then fire,” said Ruth. “I’m already on six.”
Red snapped his reins, spurred his horse and galloped toward the herd. At the right, Straw Hat was speeding into the herd as well. As Mary and the others climbed onto their horses, she shouted, “Now!”
Ruth, Parker, Sally and I fired shots into the air. Our guns didn’t have Ernestine’s volume, but they had enough of the effect to startle the herd, especially with Red and Top Hat racing forward. All of us rushed ahead, yelling and firing our guns to unleash our other special weapon—the herd itself.
The cattle panicked as if they were in on the plan, and since longhorns tend to be jumpy and skittish, maybe they were. The pounding hooves produced a thunderous rumble like the earth was conducting a symphony of nothing but drums, and the clattering of clashing horns added an angry and ominous beat.
The stampede scared us and we knew it was coming. For the men, it had risen and was upon them so fast and so violent that their only reaction was to run in fear. Straw Hat fell from his mount and his aching scream was cut short by the pounding herd. A choking dust cloud billowed and thickened, making it hard to see. There was another scream from another victim, but I couldn’t place its source. The grimy haze both protected and endangered us—it was nearly impossible for any surviving men to see us and shoot, but it was also easy for us to ride right up to them without knowing. Prudence shot one of the riders in the chest after they surprised each other in a small pocket of air. She couldn’t remember what he looked like, only that he was “too close to miss.”
Frightened longhorns don’t scatter. They cluster, slamming into each other in panic and packing tight. They formed a reddish-brown sea rising and falling in swirling waves, a dusty mist hanging in the air. Men caught in their midst had no chance, and we kept on guard not just against the men who were blindly firing their guns but also against any sudden reversals of the herd. I was both excited and terrified to be a part of it, and part of my mind wished that I was off to the side so that I could see how the whole pounding, reverberating, terrorizing, petrifying scene was unfolding.
Finally we gained some glimpses that confirmed the plan was working. Two men could be seen high-tailing it over a ridge, urging their mounts ahead with both spurs and quirts as if their horses were unaware of the cattle train steaming behind them. Whatever Sean had offered them, it wasn’t worth a trampling.
“There’s two runnin’ off west!” I shouted.
“And baby makes three!” Ruth hollered, pointing at Red as he broke free of the herd and rode hard to the east without looking back.
At the front of the charging herd, Sean’s smarts worked against him. He and a second rider had turned one way and then another to escape, but had only managed to corner themselves against a rocky hill. The front point of the herd rumbled past, but the wide remainder was coming up fast and a trampling could not be avoided. The second man, one of the new riders joining the gang that morning after Sean was wise enough to see the need, stopped firing at the herd and turned his gun on Sean.
“You did this! You brought me here!” He pulled the trigger just as a steer gored his horse and knocked the man to a fearsome fate under the running hooves. The shot missed Sean, ricocheting off the stone to clip the back leg of Sean’s frightened horse, spurring it straight into the oncoming herd. In a stroke of luck, the herd parted and the panicking horse went untouched. The flurry of movement, though, had nearly thrown Sean from the saddle and he clung to the saddlehorn and the horse’s mane to keep from falling. The horse moved on, somehow dancing around the rushing the cattle, guided only by fear, bouncing Sean with every jump. His grip faltered, his hand dropping from the saddlehorn and catching on the butt of his rifle in its sheath. He shrieked as the horns from a surging steer raked his back, yet with one hand clutching the horse’s mane, the other grasping the rifle, and one foot twisted inside a stirrup, he managed to stay off the ground until at long last his horse skirted to the side out of harm’s way. With his hand that grasped the mane, he tugged back and spoke to the horse. “Whoa… easy now…” The horse came to a stop at last. Exhausted, weak, blood dripping down his back, Sean fell to the ground, his foot still caught in the stirrup, the rifle in his hand.
Parker rode up to Mary and pointed at the two men who had ridden to the west. “Want me to go after them?”
Mary shook her head. “Doubt they’ll stop ’til they find a saloon in another territory. Let’s try to get the herd under control. Spread the word.”
> Parker raced ahead, waving for Katie and me to go with him. We picked up Ruth along the way and with no men left in sight to shoot, she consented to join us. The herd showed no signs of slowing, but our horses were worthy mounts and in a short while we overtook the cattle. Ruth continued ahead and fired her gun once again while the rest of us rode across the front to stem the charge. Prudence rode in from the other side and joined us. With effort, we turned the front of the herd to one side and then circled it back upon the remaining cattle, milling it into a reddish-brown whirlpool that tightened in upon itself. It felt like hours had passed, but the entirety of the stampede was likely closer to 15 minutes, 20 at the most.
A gunshot grabbed our attention. There was a collective sigh when we noted that the herd didn’t start running again, then a collective gasp as we saw Mary walking her horse up to Sean. The shot that rang out was from Sally’s gun. She stood to the side after having shot the rifle from Sean’s grip, the bullet continuing through his arm and into his stomach. As Mary approached him now, he was a bloodied, sobbing mess, alternating between fury, pain and fear.
“Cut me loose before this wretched creature bolts!” His boot had slid through the stirrup, now gnarled with the dangling reins, and the stirrup was like a coiled snake that wouldn’t let go. He kept one hand pressed on his bleeding gut, pointing the other at Mary with an angry wave. “It’s your fault! You did this!” He moaned in searing pain and his voice became reflective. “Father was right. ‘Wicked are the ways of women’ he always said. Wicked!” The fury boiled in him again. “Wicked women!”