The Indians had wreaked havoc in this abandoned fort. The headboards had been pulled down, the palings ripped off the fence, and what had been a cenotaph built to honor the slain men was now a pile of broken bricks.
The graves of the soldiers who had died here in the fighting of 1866 and 1867 were covered by boulders, and in this moment O’Hara resolved that everyone who read the Chicago Herald would be reminded of these men who had given their lives at this lonely and forgotten outpost.
O’Hara picked up what had been a headboard from a pile where they had been carelessly thrown together. He read aloud: “Number Twelve. Private C. Slagle, Company F. Twenty-Seventh Infantry. Killed May Thirtieth, Eighteen Sixty-Seven.” He tossed the board back onto the pile and looked at Allison. “Thus we honor the nation’s dead,” he said.
Allison was standing motionless, his eyes on the line of graves. Suddenly he wheeled to face O’Hara. “I may have the same future. You, too, O’Hara. It’s not so much that I don’t want to die, though as a matter of fact I don’t. The thing is, there’s something I’ve got to do before I catch a Sioux bullet.”
“What is it?” O’Hara asked. “Maybe I can do it for you if you have bad luck.”
“No, I don’t think you could,” Allison said. “I’m sorry I mentioned it.”
Allison walked away. O’Hara sighed. He had come close to breaking through the wall that Dave Allison had built around himself, but not close enough. He caught up with Allison, who had stopped to stare at the place where the fort had stood, the fort that now was a ruin of old chimneys and stones and weathered beams and rusty iron.
“Hard to picture the way it looked ten years ago,” O’Hara said.
Allison nodded and said nothing. They started back to camp, neither talking. O’Hara, glancing at Allison’s hard-set face, saw that the soldier was not in a mood to talk about anything, least of all about himself.
On the way down the hill to the camp they passed an Indian grave. O’Hara had read about Indian graves, but had never seen one before. It was a buffalo hide tied by thongs, probably leather or buckskin, and held off the ground by cottonwood poles. O’Hara judged it was about six feet high. The body was gone, although who had taken it or why was a mystery.
O’Hara and Allison poked around among some odds and ends scattered on the ground: two blue blankets, one moccasin, a bright colored shawl, and a few other objects. After they left, O’Hara heard men’s voices and glanced back to see several soldiers yanking the cottonwood poles down.
“They’re after firewood,” Allison said. “I don’t think they’re going to bother the Indian’s ghost.”
“No, I guess not.” O’Hara walked in silence for a time, thinking about it. Then he said: “The Indians desecrated the graves of our soldiers who died defending the Bozeman Trail. Ten years later our soldiers desecrate the grave of an Indian who died defending his homeland.”
“You know what Walt Staley would ask?”
“No. What?”
“He’d want to know which was civilized,” Allison said.
“Well, which is?”
“Neither,” Allison answered curtly. “And that includes most of the women, white and red.”
They walked back to camp. At last, O’Hara thought, he had a clue to Allison’s problem. It had something to do with women. But then, most men’s problems had something to do with women.
When they reached Company A, O’Hara said: “Allison, if I can do anything for you …”
“Forget it,” Allison said. “If I live, I’ll do it myself.”
“And if you don’t?”
“It won’t get done,” Allison said, and turned away. O’Hara just stood there for a while, thinking.
“The hell with it,” he said, and went back to the cavalry.
Chapter Twenty
On the night of June 5 the command bivouacked near the site of old Fort Kearney. That evening O’Hara stopped and talked for a time to Allison, who was not familiar with the details of Carrington’s expedition ten years before, or of Red Cloud’s victory and the abandoning of the forts that Carrington and his men had built and defended so courageously.
“I’ve read everything I could find about that campaign,” O’Hara said. “It’s like I told you when we were looking over the ruins of Fort Reno. It’s an old story. They send out half enough men to do a job and starve them to death at that.”
“It’s funny you don’t hear much of Red Cloud any more,” Allison said.
“Oh, he’s a peaceful old bastard now,” O’Hara said. “It’s Sitting Bull you hear about. And Crazy Horse, who’s a real fighting man.” He jerked his head to the north. “Yonder a few miles is where Captain Fetterman and his command were wiped out, a total of eighty-two men. Fetterman was a bull-headed man who wouldn’t obey orders, so he made his own fate.”
O’Hara filled his pipe and stared at the fire. Then he said: “I’ve always admired General Custer, but he’s had a lot of trouble. You wonder about a man like that. He’s daring and dashing and he’ll find and whip the Sioux if anybody does, but sometimes I get a feeling he’s like Fetterman in one way. He makes his own trouble.”
Allison agreed silently. He made his own trouble, too. So did Pete Risdon and Johnny Morgan. So did most people.
The next day the column marched seventeen miles.
The following day, June 7, the private who had accidentally shot himself was buried. Allison found the funeral even more depressing than most funerals. He heard Captain Henry read the burial service from the Book of Common Prayer; he saw a handful of dirt thrown upon the body as the trumpets sounded taps, and the grave was filled and he marched away with his company.
The man had been killed by his own carelessness, Allison supposed, and he was surprised when O’Hara came to visit him, wanting to talk about the incident. There was honor fighting and dying in battle, O’Hara said, but an accident like this was a terrible waste. There was no honor in it.
O’Hara was close to tears as he talked. Allison had never seen him so upset. He suspected that some of O’Hara’s superficial cockiness was not really cockiness, and that his digging into other people’s business was at least partly due to genuine sympathy for another man’s problems. But he had to be honest.
“Maybe it wasn’t an accident,” he said. “Maybe this fellow couldn’t bring himself to fight Indians and this was his way out.”
“You’re crazy,” O’Hara said heatedly. “No sane man would do that.”
“All right,” Allison said. “Maybe he wasn’t sane. Or maybe he didn’t intend to die. He just figured on shooting himself enough to get sent back to Fort Fetterman.”
“Why, why, why?” O’Hara said. “It doesn’t make sense. No soldier would do that.”
“Do you know what will likely happen to you if you’re taken prisoner?” Allison asked. “You’ll lose your hair and your life, of course. But have you thought that before you die, you might lose your balls, too? And maybe have an arrow rammed up your rear to boot? Think about that a while and maybe you’ll shoot yourself in the thigh.”
O’Hara’s face turned so pale that his freckles stood out, bright and sharp. He said: “No, I wouldn’t. I’ll fix it so I’m not taken prisoner.”
He walked away. When Allison turned, he saw that Johnny Morgan had been listening. Johnny’s face was bilious green.
“Forget it, Johnny,” Allison told him. “That might happen to a cavalryman on patrol, but not to us lowly foot soldiers.”
But his assurance didn’t help. Johnny Morgan went without his supper that night.
Chapter
Twenty-One
Walt Staley returned from Fort Fetterman with dispatches and a sack of first-class mail. He ate, he slept, and then Crook sent him back.
Staley had already worked beyond his planned month, but he couldn’t quit now. Not with a big Indian fight in
the offing, and couriers in short supply. Crook planned to surprise the Sioux, but Staley saw that as a futile hope. Indian scouts must have reported all troop movements to Crazy Horse soon after they began. Staley didn’t doubt, either, that small bands of Indians, probably Cheyennes, were still raiding between Forts Fetterman and Laramie. The danger of Tally Barrone’s brothers turning her over to the Cheyennes was as great as it had ever been. Tally was never out of his mind, but he could not quit before Crook tangled with Crazy Horse.
He left after dark, wondering once again if he dared risk seeing Tally. This was a constant temptation, but the answer never changed. For one thing, he could not spare the time. Crook had ridden a short distance with him when he’d left camp, giving him advice that he didn’t need and emphasizing the urgency of getting the dispatches on the wire. He wanted General Sheridan to know exactly where he was, and that he expected to find Crazy Horse’s village west of the Rosebud.
The Crows had not arrived yet and he needed them to scout for him. He would move fast and hard, once they came. And, of course, he wanted the dispatches that would be waiting for him at Fetterman.
Staley rode through the dark hours, guided by the stars. Dawn was showing in the eastern sky when he caught the smell of wood smoke. Gold seekers would not stray this far off the Cheyenne-Black Hills road. Crook was not expecting reinforcements. He must be close to a band of Indians.
Reining up, he studied the ridge to the west. The breeze that had brought the smell to him came from the west, so the camp must be on the other side of the ridge. He put his horse up the slope. He had better find out how big a bunch he was up against, and find out now. Within another hour or so one of the Indians would pick up his trail and the whole bunch would be after him.
Just before he reached the crest, he dismounted and crawled to the top. Lying flat on his belly, he looked down into the valley. The camp was there, all right, a camp for not more than a dozen braves. Three of them were with their horses a short distance from the camp, and just as he slid back, one of the Indian ponies nickered. His buckskin answered and he knew it was time to go.
He swung into the saddle and put his gelding down the slope. When it reached the valley, he looked back. The three braves had topped the ridge and were barreling down after him, whipping their mounts at every jump. He went straight up the opposite ridge. His horse was shod and it could climb faster than the Indian ponies.
The buckskin took him up the ridge and over the top. He stopped, yanked his Winchester from the boot, and returned to the crest. Lying flat, he took aim and fired at the lead horse. The early-morning light was still too thin for accurate shooting, but he scored a lucky hit. He heard the solid thwack of lead striking the animal and then saw him stagger and fall.
The Indians started to shoot, but they had trouble locating him. He knocked over the second horse, but the rider of the third swung into a pocket, out of Staley’s sight. He ran back to his mount, knowing that if he stayed, he’d be fighting a dozen braves instead of three. His job was to carry dispatches to Fort Fetterman, not to fight Indians.
He mounted and rode on down the slope, crossed the valley, and looked back. He saw a single brave on top of the ridge. The Indian showed no indication that he was coming after Staley, but it wasn’t safe to stop yet.
Staley rode down the valley until he reached a branch of Powder River. He rode through the brush along the bank, followed the water for a time, and then reined up at the edge of the stream. He pulled off his saddle, watered the buckskin, then staked him out in the deep grass on the bank.
He felt reasonably secure now, with a screen of brush between him and the sage-covered valley. He ate a cold breakfast and lay back in the grass. For a time he simply relaxed and listened to the wilderness world waking around him—the chatter of magpies building a nest, ducks swooping down to land and splash a few yards downstream, sage cocks busy with the process of mating. Then he fell asleep.
The sun was almost down when he woke. He ate again, watered the buckskin, and as soon as it was dark went on his way. When he reached Fetterman before dawn of the third night, he woke the telegrapher and turned in his dispatches. He slept all day, picked up the dispatches that had arrived for General Crook, took another sack of letters, and headed back.
He returned to the command without incident, finding the expedition camped on Goose Creek in a wide valley. He saw that a party of Shoshones had arrived as well as the Crows. After turning the dispatches and mail sack over to one of Crook’s aides, he ate breakfast. Then he walked across the grass to where a crowd of cavalrymen, packers, and Indians were whooping it up as wildly as a bunch of excited kids at a circus.
When Staley reached a break in the line, he stared at the craziest scene he had ever come upon in his life. Some of the infantrymen were trying to ride mules. Obviously few of the walk-a-heaps had ever been in a saddle before, and the mules had never been ridden.
The whole valley seemed to be full of braying, bucking, kicking mules, and with soldiers hitting the ground and getting up and climbing back into their saddles and getting bucked off again.
Some of the soldiers took bad falls and groaned as they got up. Once in a while a man took a hoof in the pit of the stomach or his side, or had his wind knocked out. Then he was laid up for a while.
Staley felt sorry for Johnny Morgan. Johnny couldn’t stay in leather for more than three jumps of his mule. Pete Risdon wasn’t much better; for once the big man had more than he could handle. But Dave Allison stayed in the saddle, trotting his mule back and forth, as docile and well-behaved as if he were a trained riding horse.
Staley walked over to O’Hara. “What’s this all about, Pat? Bill Cody gonna hire gravel-crunchers for a Wild West show?”
O’Hara laughed. “Buffalo Bill could use them, all right. I’ve seen his show and this one tops it. Say, do you realize mules can kick forward as well as backward? I’ve been watching some of them do it. They’re fast and sneaky …”
“I asked a question,” Staley said.
“Oh, the general decided to mount his infantry,” O’Hara said. “I guess we’ll be heading for action tomorrow.” Suddenly he clutched Staley’s arm. “Hey, that big fellow there … that’s Rice Peters as sure as I’m a foot high.”
Pete Risdon had been bucked off again. He lay motionless for a few seconds, his wind knocked out of him. Then he got to his feet. For just a moment his eyes locked with O’Hara’s. He wheeled and started toward his mule. The mule aimed a couple of kicks at the sky on general principles, trotted off, and stopped thirty feet away. He stood looking at Risdon, daring him to come on for another trial by combat.
“No, that’s Pete Risdon,” Staley said. “He’s the man who was with me and Dave and Johnny the day we …”
“I should have guessed,” O’Hara said excitedly. “Every time I visited Allison this fellow walked off. But that’s who he is. I’ve got to tell the general.”
Staley caught his arm. “Why? What difference does it make whether he’s Pete Risdon or Rice Peters?”
“It makes all the difference in the world,” O’Hara said. “Rice Peters is wanted for murder in Chicago.”
“Don’t tell the general,” Staley said. “He’s going to need every man he’s got. He can’t put Risdon in irons now.”
O’Hara shook his head and jerked free. He started running toward General Crook’s tent. Staley sighed. Nobody could reason with Patrick O’Hara at a time like this. Pete Risdon wasn’t the only man in the command who had a criminal record. Why couldn’t that damned O’Hara let well enough alone?
Later in the morning Crook sent for Staley, but the general said nothing about O’Hara or Pete Risdon. He simply told Staley to go back to Fort Fetterman, starting at first dark. Crook didn’t know exactly where Crazy Horse’s village was, but it couldn’t be far away. Tomorrow would probably bring action—certainly the next day would—and he wanted General Sh
eridan to be advised of his progress.
Staley was tired enough to drop off to sleep at once. General Crook’s aide woke him at sundown. He took the dispatches. He ate a good meal, saddled the buckskin, and started south again.
Chapter
Twenty-Two
The command moved out early in the morning of June 16. The men gulped down a scanty breakfast of black coffee and hardtack, then began the march, taking a north by west course. The cavalry led, then the pack train, with one hundred and seventy-five infantrymen on mules in the rear. The Crows and Shoshones rode on the flanks without any apparent order except that they followed their chiefs.
Allison was one of the few infantrymen who rode comfortably in the saddle. He felt a little stiff, but he had not taken any hard falls; his father had used mules on his farm. But to most of the others, mules were braying, biting, kicking monsters straight out of hell.
Johnny Morgan clenched his teeth against the pain that racked his body with every movement his mule made. Even Pete Risdon could not hold back a groan now and then as his big body swayed in the saddle.
The wagons and ambulances were left behind, along with part of the infantry assigned to protect them. No tents were taken. The men carried four days’ rations in the saddlebags, one blanket, and a hundred rounds of ammunition in belts or pouches. Allison sensed grim expectancy in the air, a certainty that in only a matter of hours they would see Crazy Horse’s village ahead of them and make their fight.
Allison didn’t know for sure how many Indian allies rode with the command, but he guessed about a hundred Shoshones and maybe twice that many Crows. They made a splendid barbaric pageant, with the sun shining sharply on their guns and lances, their war bonnets nodding and bobbing as they rode. Some carried tomahawks made of knives with wooden or horn handles, as murderous a weapon as Allison had ever seen.
Allison noticed that the Crows were lighter-skinned than most Indians. He wondered if the high mountain air in which they lived had anything to do with it. Many of them were tall, and they seemed unusually good-looking even by white men’s standards.
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