How good to sleep inside and out of the cold. How wonderful to go to bed with a full stomach, knowing armed soldiers stood guard. The twins already slept, Klara sucking her thumb and snuggling up to her brother. Ryker thought of poor Johnny lying by Whiskey Creek. He hoped the woman had buried him but suspected that she had not. Johnny had done nothing to any of them, nothing at all to deserve such hatred. Like Papa in the root cellar. Before Ryker could think another thought, he fell asleep, too.
War cries and rifle shots startled him from his rest just as a glimmer of dawn showed through the window glass. Women fluttered and scattered like a flock of hens, closing the shutters, counting their children, praying aloud for the safety of the soldiers and the defeat of the Sioux. Some cried. Others covered their heads with their arms and waited for it to be over.
An old woman covered her head with her apron and wailed. “We’ll all be killed,” she said. “They’re coming. We’ll all die.”
“She’s from the Breckinridge massacre,” Auntie Abigail said in explanation and hurried to the woman’s side. “Now, now, don’t scare the children,” she said. “Soldiers will take care of us. We’re not going to die.”
One woman forced her children to sit in the corner farthest from the windows and covered them with heavy quilts in case of stray bullets. They complained of suffocation, but she paid them no mind. “Better stifled than shot,” she said, finding yet another blanket to throw over them.
Others tipped heavy tables and huddled behind them. All was confusion. No one knew from which direction the Indians might attack.
“Last time they came from Slabtown,” Auntie Abigail said. “Probably will come screeching in from the opposite direction, knowing their heathen ways.”
Elsa howled until Mrs. Kelly came to her rescue. Ryker wanted to protect the twins and Elsa, too, but didn’t know how to do it. It seemed to him the thick walls of the blockhouse were sufficient protection from small-arms fire, the only fire power of the Sioux.
“I’m scared,” Klara said. The look of terror in his sister’s eyes was almost more than he could bear. “Are we really going to die?”
“No,” Ryker said. “We’re safe here.” A flutter of worry stirred his gut, and he hoped he spoke the truth. He pulled her closer to his side and tucked his arm around her in a comforting manner. “The Sioux are no match for the howitzers.” He told her what he had seen from the top of the cottonwood, how the Indians tried many times to enter the fort, but each time they were repelled by the cannons. “The soldiers will protect us. Don’t worry.”
The tall woman held a privacy blanket for those who needed to use a night pot. The smells of human waste, sweat, and gunpowder made the blockhouse air a thick, disagreeable stew. There was nowhere to go, nowhere to hide. They could only hunker down and wait for it to be over.
Mrs. Jacobs began praying the Our Father in German, and soon every voice joined in, only in his or her own language. The comforting words fell on the room, soothing the worriers and strengthening the faint hearted. Deliver us from evil. Oh, God. Let it be so.
A short lull in the shooting made them hopeful the fighting had ended. It didn’t last.
“I’m a killer,” Klara whispered in Ryker’s ear. She flinched as the cannon blasted again. “I hated the Indians for Papa, and what they did to poor Johnny.” The Gatling gun chattered. “I wanted to kill all of them. Even that woman.” She pulled up her knees and hid her face in the folds of the too-large dress. “Mama was wrong. That woman was not a good person. She should have helped Johnny.” Her voice was muffled, and Ryker strained to hear her words. “I hated and killed. Now I’ll burn in hell.”
She lifted her face and looked into Ryker’s eyes. “Won’t I?”
A loud barrage of rifle fire and Gatling guns sounded outside, giving Ryker a moment to consider his answer. Mama knew words to make Klara feel better. He tried to think of what Papa might say. Once, Martin stole Bestemor’s solia, the beautiful pin used to hold her shawl in place. Martin was very young and only wanted to play with it. But he dropped it in the haymow, and they never found it. Papa said then that God is a merciful God, the God of second chances. “All we can do is pick ourselves up and begin again,” he had said.
Just remembering Papa before he grew so bad tempered brought tears to Ryker’s eyes. Papa had not always been mean and strict. He changed after moving out to the prairie, and even more so after Martin signed up. But the real Papa had been different. Captain Vander Horck knew Papa to be a good man, an honest man. Ryker decided to remember Papa the way he used to be.
“Do you think Martin will go to hell for being a soldier?” Ryker said. “He’s fighting to free the slaves.”
“Of course he won’t go to hell,” Klara said. “Not Martin.”
“You’re a soldier, too. Like Martin,” Ryker said. “You fought for your family. You saw how they treated Johnny. That might have happened to Elsa or Sven.” He took a deep breath. “You had no choice. God understands.”
“Are you sure, Ryker?” she said.
Ryker slipped into the Norwegian language of their intimate family. “Love demands action to prevent further harm.” Sounds of fighting grew louder again. “Until we find Mama and Martin, we are all that is left of our family. We must care for each other.”
Klara raised her thumb to her mouth but stopped herself. She tucked her hand under her leg. “I wish Mama would come,” she said.
Elsa finished nursing and toddled over to them. Ryker nodded a thank-you to kind Mrs. Kelly. Elsa burped and clapped her hands. Elsa had grown accustomed to the sound of gunfire. She crawled into Klara’s lap and fell asleep.
Mathilde Jacobs kept watch through a crack between the logs and from time to time would call out news of the battle. She was about Ryker’s age, a pretty girl with dark hair and eyes, and a crooked smile.
“It’s too smoky from the gunpowder to see much,” she said. “Smoke hangs like fog over the parade ground.”
Ryker crawled to her side to see through the crack, too. Just like when he had watched from the cottonwood, gunpowder hung low over the parade ground. It was a wonder anyone could see anything. How easy it would be for the Sioux to sneak in to the compound, as they had done in the previous battle. Ryker remembered how the Indians had hidden in the tall grass surrounding the fort.
The guns blasted, and Ryker heard a strange cracking sound and then the crash of falling timber.
“The Gatling guns are cutting down the trees across the river where the Indians are hiding,” Mathilde said. “Think of the power of those bullets to cut through the tree trunks.”
Good thing the army had not turned the guns in his direction while he had been perched in the cottonwood. The guns quieted, and all was still.
Auntie Abigail brought their dry clothing and held up the quilt for them to change.
“Look,” Sven said. He pointed at Ryker’s ankles. “Your pants are too short. You’ve grown taller this summer.”
“I guess I have,” Ryker said. His voice cracked. He lifted a hand to his face and felt a line of fuzz on his upper lip. He wondered if he were tall enough to see over the prairie grass. He must take over the job of scythe-man now that Papa was gone. There was no one else.
Hannibal entered the blockhouse holding his rifle in hand. His pistol stuck out from his waistband. How tired he looked. He brought word from the captain that the soldiers needed food and water.
The women hurriedly gathered a soup pail, spoons, tin cups, and loaves of bread.
“Did you ever figure out how many days you were out on the prairie?” Hannibal said as he waited for the food. His face was smeared with dirt and gunpowder. Gray lines circled his mouth. “Didn’t Klara keep track?”
“Nine days,” Klara said. “I made a knot every night.”
The days blurred into one bad dream in Ryker’s mind: Papa’s death; the Tingvold massacre; the twins capture and escape with Johnny; finding Elsa on the prairie; Beller’s death; their capture by Good Person
, and Johnny’s death. Then their freezing swim to Fort Abercrombie. Ryker swallowed hard. “Klara feels bad about killing that Indian.”
“Then she’ll be happy to know she only wounded him.” Hannibal grabbed the food and started toward the door. “Sentries saw him limping away.”
Klara’s grin lit up the morning.
CHAPTER 41
* * *
After that, Fort Abercrombie settled into a mind-numbing siege. The Sioux surrounded them, hiding in the grass around the fort, waiting to pounce on anyone so foolish as to show himself.
They didn’t attack, but they didn’t go away. The soldiers grew testy from constant guard duty. Settlers worried about their homesteads, crops left in the field, and missing family members. Klara cared for Elsa, who was always finding trouble.
Ryker was the oldest boy in the blockhouse. Others his age helped stand guard, care for the few remaining horses, and run errands for the soldiers. Every time Ryker volunteered to help in the defense of the fort, he was turned down. Even the smallest tasks with the soldiers were denied him.
Nathan and William Jacobs were younger than Ryker by a full year, and yet they carried and distributed ammunition to the soldiers, brought them their food, and worked in the horse barn.
Working in the barn would have been welcome relief from the women’s work he and Sven were assigned. Their days filled with carrying water, fetching firewood, dumping night pots, emptying slop pails, and helping Auntie Abigail with dirty dishes and laundry.
It wasn’t fair. He said as much to Captain Vander Horck after they had been at the fort for a week. “Why are you making me stay with the women?” Ryker said. “Boys my age are in the army.”
“Son,” Captain Vander Horck said, “I know boys of your age are fighting for Lincoln.” He cleared his throat and fingered the bridge of his nose. “I appreciate your offer, but you must stay out of danger to care for your family.” He straightened his shoulders and started toward the door. “I owe your father that much.”
Ryker glanced over to where the twins played patty-cake with Elsa and little Jane Jacobs. It was true. Without him, his sisters and brothers might end up in an orphanage. Ryker steeled himself to being a house slave for the sake of his family. It wasn’t fair.
The days grew shorter, and the temperatures dipped into autumn. After a week of cold and damp, an Indian summer burst upon them. The weather grew hot and sultry as mid-August rather than late September. Everyone scanned the horizon, hoping for reinforcements to arrive from Fort Snelling.
“Will they ever come to rescue us?” Klara said one morning when Ryker felt grouchy and ill-tempered. “I want to go home.”
Little Jack Jacobs went sleepwalking in the middle of the previous night and was rescued by the sentry before he could run off and get captured by the Sioux. Bawling babies, snoring old ladies, and general misery kept Ryker awake the rest of the night. He wanted to go home, too.
It was hot as a hayfield in the blockhouse, and Ryker made excuses to get away for some fresh air. He found Hannibal pitching hay to the horses. Ryker picked up another pitchfork to give him a hand.
“Wish we could go swimming in the river,” Hannibal said. His wheezy voice made every comment sound like a complaint. “I stink to high heaven.”
Ryker reminded him that at least the soldiers slept in the open where they might catch a breeze. “You should try sleeping with a whole room of mothers and children.” It felt good to complain.
That night a soldier sneaked away for an evening swim while fetching water. A lurking Sioux shot him in the upper back as the solder crawled out of the water. Hannibal was standing guard and helped the wounded man to the blockhouse and Auntie Abigail’s ministrations.
Ryker woke up hearing the commotion.
Auntie Abigail fussed over the young man’s wound, ripping cloth into bandages and sending William Jacobs for cow manure to make a compress. “You know better than to expose yourself that way,” she scolded and yanked the bandage so tightly that he cried out. “What would your mother say?”
“We’re all sick of being forted up,” Hannibal said in the soldier’s defense. “Stand in the open, and you might take a bullet. Dip in the river, and you feel an arrow. What do they want, anyway?”
A baby cried, and Mrs. Jacobs tied a string around Jack’s wrist and hers to prevent him from sleepwalking. Ryker knew what the Sioux wanted. They felt cheated and wanted their land back. Captain Vander Horck said the Sioux were fighting because the treaty payments were late.
“The Sioux want to starve us out, drive us out, and kill all of us,” Auntie Abigail said with a determined crimp in her mouth. “You don’t have to make it any easier for them.”
The next afternoon a northwest wind roared in across the prairie. The hot summer-like air chilled into the sharp sting of autumn. The cookstove belched black smoke into the blockhouse with every downdraft, making Auntie Abigail curse with frustration.
“Pardon my French,” she said to no one in particular. “This stove would make a preacher swear.”
The wind rattled the doors and windows. Women scurried to latch the shutters. Mathilde peeked through a crack in the wall, reporting soldiers chasing their caps and shielding their eyes from blowing sand. The wind snatched the outhouse door out of Mrs. Kelly’s hands and ripped it off its leather hinges, leaving Mrs. Kelly relieving herself in plain sight of anyone walking by.
Auntie Abigail asked Ryker to fetch clothes off the line before the wind carried them away.
“Such a wind,” she said, looking toward the sky. “Have you ever seen the like? A blizzard without snow. Put rocks in your pockets lest you blow clear away.”
The wind snatched a clean petticoat from Ryker’s hands and blew it across the parade grounds toward the river. Ryker ran after it, noticing how the grass bent almost to the ground. The cloth snagged on a stack of firewood. Ryker peeked around the wood pile, strictly against the rules. Brown bodies hid in the bending and blowing grass, taking advantage of the bad weather to attack the fort.
Ryker ran for the nearest sentry. “Indians sneaking up on the east,” he said, trying to catch his breath, embarrassed to be holding a petticoat that waved like a flag of truce in the wind.
The sentry sounded a warning and sent Ryker to fetch Captain Vander Horck. Soldiers rushed to their positions, shirttails and caps flying in the wind, squinting into the blowing dirt. The wind gave no sign of letting up. A few shots sounded as the soldiers shot at Indians exposed by the waving grass.
“Hold your fire,” Captain Vander Horck said as he came out, holding onto his hat with one hand and jacket with the other. “These devils are smart as foxes,” he said with grudging admiration. “They know to use the weather to their advantage.”
He motioned other officers toward him, and they stepped into the empty jail house to confer. Even inside they raised their voices just to be heard above the howling wind. Ryker stood with Hannibal outside the door. Ryker stayed quiet, hoping he would not be noticed. He wanted to be in the thick of it, for once, instead of hiding inside like a baby.
“Wind’s blowing toward Slabtown,” Captain Vander Horck said. A burst of wind muffled their next words. Then their voices became audible again. “We’ll chase them back and clean out their cover at the same time.”
“He’s talking about setting a fire,” Hannibal said.
“Makes sense,” Ryker said. “The wind would blow it right into their faces.” He remembered the fire that raced across the Tingvolds’ fields.
“But two can play at that game,” Hannibal said. “What’s to stop them from setting a fire west of us?”
Ryker sobered. A single firebreak on the west side of the fort wouldn’t do a lot to stop a prairie fire. As if reading his mind, one of the officers voiced the same concern.
Captain Vander Horck said it was worth the risk. It would quell the attack, destroy the cover, and minimize raids in days ahead.
“A lone savage could do a lot of damage if he sneake
d inside the compound.” He ordered a fire just east of the earthworks nearest the Red River.
A barrage of orders sent soldiers scrambling. Hannibal rushed to carry the torch.
The wind blew it out, and Hannibal returned for another light. Then, shielding the small flame with this hand, Hannibal hurried to the earthworks and threw the torch over the top.
The wind did the rest. Flames whooshed in the autumn grasses and roared ahead of the wind, raging toward the river, where it burned itself out. Indians screamed as they clambered to escape the flames.
Soldiers opened fire.
CHAPTER 42
* * *
The days passed into weeks. A hard frost killed the grass surrounding the fort, leaving less cover for hiding Sioux warriors from all directions. Supplies grew short, along with tempers. Elsa learned to drink from a cup. Klara and Sven filled out a little, though they were both too skinny.
Ryker struck up a friendship with Mathilde Jacobs, the girl who kept watch during the battle. Mathilde was kind and steady. At least she had acted that way when he told her about taking food from their homestead during their escape across the prairie. She assured him the Indians would have only stolen anything left behind.
Rumors abounded: help was on its way from Fort Snelling; help was not on its way from Fort Snelling; help had started from Fort Snelling, but the reinforcements were slaughtered by the Sioux; Lincoln had won the war in the South, and help was on its way; Lincoln had lost the war in the South, and the Confederates were coming to take over Fort Abercrombie.
Hannibal confided that Captain Vander Horck did not know if reinforcements were coming to their rescue. “Said all of Minnesota may have fallen, and we’d never know.”
Escape to Fort Abercrombie Page 20