“Hold on, Wes. I didn’t say we gave up yet. I just said we couldn’t pick up his trail. I’ve got a hunch I want to play first.”
“A hunch?” The sergeant was still confused.
Jason tried to explain that he would search for Black Eagle in the country closer around Fetterman, especially south of the river. He intended to use Little Hawk and Cross Bear to help him scout the area. Wes wasn’t convinced. From the way he looked at it, every hour that passed would simply see Black Eagle farther and farther away until he reached the relative safety of Sitting Bull’s people. Then it would be too late to rescue the child.
“Wes, I’m as concerned for the youngun’s safety as you are but what I’m telling you is I’m doing the only thing I know to do to get him back. I know how Black Eagle’s mind works and I don’t think he’s going to get far away from me. The fact is, there wasn’t no trail to find and it makes no sense to just go wandering around all over the territory, hoping you’ll stumble on him. I’ve got some notions on how to find him and that’s the only thing I know to do.” He got back in the saddle again. “The boy’s in no danger as long as Black Eagle thinks he’s the son of Stone Hand. Let’s just hope he don’t find out different.”
“I reckon you’re doing what you think best. I don’t know, but the colonel is sending out patrols to try to cut him off before he reaches the Powder.”
“Couldn’t hurt nothing,” Jason responded as he backed White away from the hitching rail. “I’ve got to see Shorty Boyd. Is Lieutenant Lassiter’s troop back yet?”
“They rode in this morning.”
* * *
Shorty was where Jason expected to find him at that time of day, helping the sutler get rid of some of his drinking whiskey. The little scout threw up his hand when he saw Jason walk through the door. “Come on in, partner. I’m way ahead of you.” When Jason joined him at the bar, he said, “Tell you the truth, I didn’t expect to see you for a spell.”
After Jason related all that had happened since he returned with Little Hawk, Shorty thought the matter over, then asked, “What do you aim to do?”
A hint of a smile crossed Jason’s face. “Well, in the first place, you look a little bit rutty to me. I think you ought to go see that little woman of yours over in the Sioux camp.”
“Huh?”
“Yeah, what’s her name? Blackbird? I think you need to go visit your lady.” Jason went on to explain that he needed information, somewhere to start, and he had a hunch he could find it in the Sioux camp. “You know, Shorty, Black Eagle had to be in that camp for a while before he snatched the boy. Some of those folks know where he’s hiding out now. It would be my guess that he probably got somebody from there to take care of the baby for him, somebody to keep an eye on the youngun while he was free to go and come.”
He had Shorty’s close attention now. “By God, Jason, you may be right!”
Jason continued, “And if I go over there looking for answers, they ain’t gonna give me the price of horse turds. But you’ve been going over there regular. Your lady friend might even know where to find Black Eagle.”
“Well, I’ll shore give her a try.” Shorty hitched up his britches and spit toward the spittoon, his missile wide by a few inches and leaving a brown stain on the floor. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “I reckon I can sacrifice my virtue one more time for such a worthy cause. I’ll go see her tonight.”
* * *
A big yellow moon was resting on the tips of the faraway hills when Shorty rode into the Sioux camp. As was his custom, he brought a slab of side meat and a sack of dried beans as gifts for his lady love. Blackbird lived with her sister and her husband since her own husband had been killed by a Pawnee war party some years before. Most widowed women of Blackbird’s age, which Shorty guessed as somewhere around thirty or thirty-five, remarried. But Blackbird was not a comely woman, having been cursed with an oversized nose and one eye that crossed. As far as Shorty was concerned, her face was of little importance as long as she had the other essential endowments.
He rode through the small gathering of tipis to her sister’s lodge, which was on the easternmost edge of the camp. Across a shallow gully, some thirty yards away, stood four Cheyenne tipis.
“Hiyi, Little Thunder,” Blackbird’s brother-in-law greeted the white scout. Little Thunder was the name the Sioux called Shorty. He got up from his place before the fire and went to shake hands with Shorty.
Hearing the greeting from inside, Blackbird and her sister came out. Her sister smiled at Shorty and graciously accepted the offering of meat and beans. After a warm greeting from Blackbird, Shorty exchanged a few polite words with her family before following Blackbird into the tipi. Her sister and her husband discreetly remained outside by the fire. They were used to Shorty’s visits and did not resent them. He always brought food for them and there were other benefits as well. For one, the brother-in-law did not have to meet Blackbird’s biological needs as long as Shorty was willing to do it. For this, he was extremely grateful, for his sister-in-law was as homely as a buffalo.
The routine seldom varied. Typically, both participants were extremely in need by the time they saw each other again so there were scant few preliminaries. As soon as the tipi’s entrance flap dropped, Shorty’s pants were off and Blackbird’s skirt was up around her waist. There was nothing remotely romantic about the entire encounter. It was more a violent encounter of lunges and thrusts, punctuated by grunts and groans, protests and curses. But when it was over, both parties were satisfied and lay together in a sense of peace and relief.
Blackbird started to get up but Shorty stayed her with his hand on her breast. This puzzled her, for Shorty typically headed for the door once he was finished. His visits to her tipi had nothing to do with love or affection. She understood this. He had a need and so did she. They used each other for the relief that was not readily available to either of them from other sources. In effect, their animalistic tussling and the relief that resulted could be better compared to the lancing of a boil than the culmination of a romantic attraction. For this reason, she was surprised that the little scout was in the mood for conversation. She lay back beside him. At first, he talked of polite things and how much he appreciated the opportunity to come to see her. After a few minutes of this, he broached the subject he was really interested in.
“I heered your Cheyenne neighbors had a visitor a few days ago.”
She didn’t understand at first but soon realized he was referring to Black Eagle, the nephew of Man Who Sings. “This man is bad medicine and I think Man Who Sings will be happy to see him go. We are peaceful Lakotas. We do not make war with the white man.”
“I know you don’t, Honey Pot, but this here buck is gonna cause your people trouble. Is he here in the camp now?”
“No, he hides in the hills on the other side of the river. Maybe he is no longer there, I don’t know.”
“You know where he hides? Could you take me there?”
Blackbird began to show signs of discomfort with the direction of Shorty’s questions. She knew why he was so interested in Black Eagle’s whereabouts. Everyone in the camp knew that Black Eagle had taken the white baby from the sergeant’s house. It was no affair of hers or her people’s. Black Eagle was a Cheyenne and a visitor to his uncle’s tipi. It was their business to take care of. After a moment’s hesitation, she answered, “I don’t know the place, I can tell you nothing more.”
This was disappointing to Shorty but he pressed for more information. “He had to have somebody helping him with that baby. Did what’s-his-name—Man Who Sings—did he send a woman to tend the youngun?”
“I don’t know,” Blackbird replied, impatience in her voice. “Let us speak no more of this. Come, are you hungry? I’ll get you something to eat.”
“Naw, I ain’t hungry.” It was plain to see she wasn’t going to tell him anything more although he had a feeling she could have if she wasn’t afraid to. He pulled his buckskins back up an
d tied them. Outside the tipi, he paused briefly to nod a good evening to Blackbird’s sister and her husband and then he rode back to the fort.
* * *
Jason listened to Shorty’s accounting of the previous evening’s happenings and considered the significance of it. Shorty had at least confirmed what he suspected, Black Eagle had been in the Cheyenne camp and he was holed up in the hills to the south. Blackbird had claimed she didn’t know if someone had gone with Black Eagle to tend the boy, but he would have bet both his horses that someone did.
“Jason!”
Jason looked around to see Thad Anderson striding toward them from the headquarters building. The two scouts waited for him to join them.
“How’s the shoulder?” Jason asked when Thad walked up.
“It’s fine, sore as hell, but I guess I’ll live.” He nodded to Shorty, then turned back to Jason. “We’re going out on a patrol this morning as soon as the men get through drawing rations.”
“Oh? Where we going?” Jason had his own plans. He couldn’t afford to waste time galloping all over creation right at this time.
Thad looked surprised that Jason had to ask. “Why, we’re going out to search for the boy. Three patrols are going out.” He glanced at Shorty. “Lieutenant Lassiter will be looking for you.”
“Where are you going to look for the boy?”
“We’re covering a sector straight north, then across to where Fort Reno used to be on the Powder. If we don’t find the boy, we’ll head back from there.”
Jason was almost relieved to hear it. Shorty had confirmed that Black Eagle was somewhere south of the river and the last thing Jason wanted now was to have two or three troops of cavalry crisscrossing the area, maybe forcing Black Eagle to run. He glanced at Shorty and the look the grizzled little man returned told him he knew what Jason was thinking.
“Thad,” Jason spoke softly. “I ain’t going with you this time. I know where to look for the boy but I have to do it alone. I can’t take a chance on a troop of soldiers scaring Black Eagle off.”
“What?” Thad didn’t understand. “Hell, Jason, I need you with me. Besides, you’re getting paid to scout for B Troop and B Troop has been ordered out on patrol. The colonel won’t take kindly to having you go just wherever you want to.”
“Then I reckon I’ll have to resign ’cause I ain’t riding out with the troop.”
“Whoa!” Thad’s eyes widened in disbelief. “Hold on, Jason, it doesn’t have to come to that.” He looked at the tall scout for a long moment, deciding what he should do. Before he could speak again, Shorty interrupted.
“I reckon that goes fer me too.”
Thad didn’t know what to think. “Damn! You too?” He searched the steady blue eyes of the solemn Indian scout. “You think Black Eagle is still close by, don’t you?”
“I know he is,” Jason replied softly.
Thad shook his head in exasperation. He had a lot of faith in Jason Coles’ hunches but he felt he was wrong on this one. Colonel Fleming and the sergeant-major felt the same way. It didn’t make sense that the renegade would be anywhere but on his way as far away from Fort Fetterman as he could get. The lieutenant might have had a different opinion if Jason had confided that Black Eagle’s presence in the area had been confirmed by Blackbird.
“All right,” Thad said, resigned to the obvious standoff. “Don’t say anything more about resigning. I’ll try to fix it with the colonel for both of you.”
“Appreciate it, Thad,” Jason replied. “You’ll be all right. Little Hawk and Cross Bear will take care of you. They’re both good scouts.”
They stood silent for a moment, watching the young lieutenant walk back toward headquarters. Jason spoke first. “Ain’t you afraid of losing your job?”
“Hell no,” Shorty was quick to reply. “Lieutenant Lassiter ain’t about to let ’em fire me. He’s too scared of his Indian scouts to let me go. Besides, you’re gonna need somebody to help you watch your hair.” He spit at a beetle crawling across the bare ground, the brown stain missing by half a foot. “You know, Jason, that buck you’re after is pretty bad medicine I’m thinkin’, and it ain’t gonna be no easy job getting the jump on him.”
“I reckon.” He put his foot in the stirrup and stepped up on Black. The horse had had a couple of days rest and was eager to go. “The only thing we can do now is scout the territory south of that Injun camp and see if we can pick up a trail. Maybe we’ll get lucky.” He shot a sideways glance at Shorty, the hint of a smile on his face. “I suspect you might have to go calling on Miss Blackbird again if we don’t have any luck. I got a feeling she could save us a lot of time.”
Shorty snorted and spit. “I don’t know if I’ve got a full charge yet. You know, a man my age takes a little time to reload and that was a fair tussle we had last night.”
Jason laughed and nudged Black. Shorty followed as they rode out past the sutler’s store, toward the Indian encampment a few hundred yards away. As they passed the rows of tents where B Troop was in bivouac, Sergeant Aaron Brady sighted them and signaled. They waited while he walked over to talk to them.
“Where you going, Jason? We’ll be pulling out in a half hour.”
Jason explained that he would not be along on this patrol, that Thad would be able to tell him why. Brady was plainly disappointed. He had taken a liking to the quiet scout and he always felt better when Jason was along. “You figure your chances are better tracking that son of a bitch alone, don’t you?” When Jason just smiled, he added, “The rest of us are probably on a wild goose chase then.”
“Hard to say,” Jason replied. “See you later, Aaron.”
CHAPTER XIV
There were more than a few trails leading from the small encampment of Sioux and Cheyenne outside the fort. Some were easily rejected. They were obviously hunting parties. Jason was more interested in trails of single riders and two or three horses. Most of the day was spent following these trails until they doubled back or veered off to the east. When one such trail petered out, he and Shorty would go back and start all over again with another trail. The real possibilities were those trails that led straight to the river. The first two of these did not cross the river but turned to parallel the banks. Jason rejected these. A third trail came straight out of the Cheyenne part of the village and made straight for the river on a line that pointed toward the highest of the hills on the far side.
When they followed it to the river, the trail veered only slightly, as if the rider sought the best place to ford, then led straight into the water. This one had very real possibilities. Jason and Shorty forded the river and picked up the trail again some thirty yards downstream. It led up the sandy bank, through the high brush, and then back toward the hills, seemingly on an angle to intercept the original trail.
“Whoever this was sure seems to know where they want to go,” Jason observed as he and Shorty bent over a faint hoofprint. He stood up and squinted at the largest of the hills in the distance. “And ever since they left camp, they’ve been pointing straight at that line of hills.”
“I’m thinkin’ it could be the one we’re lookin’ fer,” Shorty agreed.
Both men stood and stared off toward the hills. There was a great deal of rolling country between the river and the first line of hills and there were no doubt hundreds of places to hide in the hills. Back in the saddle they slowly followed the trail, a trail that was gradually becoming more and more difficult to follow. It appeared that the rider was now taking some pains to hide her trail—they assumed it to be a woman—she cut back on her own trail twice. Both times the veteran scouts picked it up.
In the middle of the afternoon, the breeze freshened and there was a low rumble of thunder off to the west. “Uh-oh,” Shorty grunted and spit tobacco juice at a lizard that escaped the brown missile by a good two feet. “Looks like we’re gonna get a bath in about thirty minutes when that gets here.”
Jason turned to look at the dark clouds rolling along the course of th
e river. “I’m afraid you’re right, only it’ll be about an hour.”
Shorty spit again. “Thirty minutes,” he insisted. “I been studying these here skies for over forty year. Thirty minutes and our asses will be wetter’n hell.”
“Maybe,” Jason replied, “but we better get on with it.”
By the time they followed the trail to a group of small hills, cut with shallow ravines, the wind had kicked up considerably, spawning dozens of tiny whirlwinds that whipped sand around the horses’ legs. The sky had darkened but there was no rain as yet. Neither man carried a watch, but well over thirty minutes had elapsed before the first huge drops of rain began to spatter on the ground. Suddenly there was a sharp flash of lightning, accompanied almost simultaneously by an earsplitting crash of thunder. Both horses started to bolt but were held in check by their riders. In seconds, they were in a downpour.
“Reckon it’s been thirty minutes,” Jason deadpanned. Both men unrolled their slickers while the rain pelted down like bullets.
“I reckon,” Shorty replied. “This ought not to last too long.”
The storm caught them in the open with no place to seek shelter so they continued on, dogging the trail that was now becoming more and more difficult to find. It led through a ravine that up until a few minutes before had been a dry streambed. Now it was a rushing torrent of water that erased all evidence of hoofprints.
“Well, that about castrates this dog,” Shorty pronounced disgustedly. He stood in the streambed, the water rushing over the fetlocks on his horse’s feet. He looked back at Jason for instructions.
“Nothing to do but wait it out and see if there’s anything left of the trail. Maybe we can pick it up where it comes out of this ravine.” There was nothing else they could do but Jason didn’t hold out much hope for their chances.
Both horses stood motionless in the rushing water while the rain continued to pelt down on them. Jason held his canteen up to catch as much of the fresh rainwater as he could. Following suit, Shorty did the same. The horses drank their fill. It seemed longer but, in actuality, it lasted little more than another fifteen minutes. When it stopped, it was as if some giant hand had simply quit priming a pump. The rain stopped abruptly and the sun appeared once more. The rushing water slowed to a trickle, soon leaving nothing but a damp streambed.
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