The Stalkers

by Terry C. Johnston

  Chapter 35

  “Biggest goddamned mistake I made was giving up my boots,” John Donovan grumbled as he rubbed the soles of his feet, fingertips searching for broken cactus spines. He hawked up great balls of night-spit, hurling them into the muddy wallow they lay beside.

  “We talked each other into it,” A. J. Pliley replied. “Come too far to do a thing about it. We’re going on.”

  “Your feet must be made of rawhide, Pliley,” Donovan cursed, rustling some of the dried weeds. “These damned moccasins we stole off dead Injuns ain’t no better’n wearing holey stockings.”

  “Moccasins the Injuns couldn’t track. But I didn’t count on the rain and snow. Didn’t figure on the moccasins getting soaked. Made it easy for the cactus to push through.”

  “Here, A. J.,” Donovan said, smiling as he watched Pliley gaze off into the distance, wounded. “I’m just belly-aching, don’t you see? Have some jerky.”

  They laid at the edge of their muddy buffalo-wallow for the better part of the day, spelling each other at sleep. Watching the skyline in all directions, but especially to the north. Nursing sips of muddy water from their canteens, for the next water might be ten, as much as thirty, miles off. And eating rotten horsemeat. Watching the sun track the mapless sky.

  “Still say we’re heading too much due south,” Donovan said after the sun had begun to fall from mid-sky. “If I didn’t know better, you’re heading us southwest, A. J.”

  “I am,” he admitted. “Aim for us to find the Federal Road.”

  “And walk it into Wallace?”

  He shook his head, eyes watering under the bright sun that shimmered things distant. “No. If the goddamned stage is still running, by God, we’ll ride.”

  John felt something leap inside him, like hope. “Damn, A. J. Now that’s one fine notion you have there. Say, how you know so much about this country out here?”

  “Done some duty as a scout with the Eighteenth Kansas Cavalry.”

  “Was you in the war?”

  “Second Lieutenant in the Fifteenth Kansas Volunteer Cavalry.”

  “You a Kansas boy?”

  Pliley shook his head, still watching the distance. “No. New York. Happened I was out here when the war broke out. After mustering out, I went to Topeka, for the study of law.” He chuckled quietly. “Worst thing for a man like me to do.”

  “How’s that?”

  “Law keeps a man out of the sun, don’t you see. Work like this, on the other hand—a man gets to see one big piece of country. A job more to my liking.”

  Donovan wagged his head, pulling his face out of the sun. “You are a crazy one, A. J. Liking this sort of thing to being in a fancy law office in Topeka.”

  He smiled. “It is crazy. Maybe being raised in New York is why. But, I like how different I feel being out here. In the wind and the sun. Even the rain and the——”

  It took a moment for Donovan to realize that Pliley had stopped talking. John opened his eyes, seeing his fellow scout tense, then freeze, as he peered off to the north. He looked for himself.

  “How you make it, A. J.?”

  “Twenty. Maybe twenty-five.”

  “They coming this way?”

  He nodded. “They see the tall grass growing round this waller. They coming, for sure.”

  “Ten minutes?”

  “No longer’n that, Donovan.”

  Without a word the men went about checking their guns, preparing to sell their lives as dearly as possible.

  “I figure we can get us about half afore they get in too close.”

  “Then the crazy ones,” Pliley hissed, “they come in to finish us off up close and dirty.”

  The minutes crawled by while the sun broke through the scattered clouds once again. That painted war-party steadfast on its course. Until at less than a quarter-mile a warrior in the center of the line threw up his arm, stopping the rest while he studied the landscape ahead.

  After some wild gesturing, the leader led his group off to the right, heading into the bright sunlight to the northwest.

  Once the war-party had disappeared beyond the rolling swales of grassland, Donovan sank to his belly and let out a long sigh.

  “Lucky for us,” Pliley said, “that big buck didn’t figure there’d be any water here for ’em.”

  Donovan began to laugh. And it felt good. “Lucky for them and us both, A. J.! Them red bastards come here—they’d go away thirsty … and us—we’d be on our way to hell right now!”

  * * *

  A bloody fourth sun raised itself on the island. Sunday. 20 September. The green-bottle flies returned early with the promise of more scorching heat.

  Seamus Donegan wondered how long he could take the despair of waiting, listening to the moans of the wounded, delirious in their sleep. Then he cursed himself, ashamed for blaming them. Their blessed sleep. God-sent deliriums that had somehow dulled their pain for more than three days now.

  Had the renegade Confederate who called himself Smith joined up with the hostiles and pulled out?

  He tried to think on that as the new light of morn crept up behind him like the drawing of a damask window-shade. Maybe he ought to go in search of Smith himself, now that he could not see a single warrior in evidence along the riverbanks. But as he began to crawl over the saddles at the edge of his rifle-pit, Donegan finally spotted the few horsemen dotting the surrounding hilltops. With the new, rose light coming up from the east, the mounted warriors stood out against the pale, dawn sky. No more than a couple dozen vedettes, blanket-wrapped, feathers stirring in the cool breeze. As weak and feverish as he was, Seamus wanted no truck with them.

  He sank back into the pit next to the stench of Liam’s decomposing body.

  “I want to see things for myself!”

  Seamus heard Forsyth’s voice, suddenly loud and strident. Then other voices, quieter, trying to make sense with the major.

  “I’ve given you and Grover an order, Sergeant. Now, lift me.”

  Donegan hurried through the connecting pits, skirting the slumbering men who slept in until the sun’s rising heated the land like a sheet-iron oven.

  “I’ll help, Major.”

  Forsyth turned on Donegan. He smiled weakly. Instantly Seamus felt sorry for the soldier, knowing by all rights that Forsyth was dying. If not from blood-poisoning from that bullet still in his leg, then surely from hunger like the rest of them. Knowing it was nothing more than a matter of time.

  “Get a few more, McCall.” Forsyth turned away, his red eyes bagged with liver-colored fatigue.

  Six each grabbed an edge of the blanket, gently, carefully raising Forsyth from the floor of his rifle-pit so that he could have a look at things for himself.

  “It’s one thing for you to tell your commanding officer the condition of affairs,” Forsyth was jabbering, his dry lips tearing away from his teeth as he spoke. “I want to see that the hostiles have left for myse——”

  Indian repeaters snapped and rattled like the sharp cracking of dry twigs. Lead whistled, keening through their ranks. White and gray puffs of powdersmoke erupted from the riverbank. The scouts in other rifle-pits dove for cover.

  Lane, who had a grip on the lower blanket corner nearest Forsyth’s broken left leg, panicked. Hurling himself down into the pit as the bullets zinged overhead, Lane released the blanket.

  Forsyth slid as the others tried reaching out, grabbing for him. The major struck the ground on that leg shattered by an Indian ball the first day of fighting.

  “Arrrggggh!” he cried in intense pain, swallowing down the rest of it in a grunt.

  The impact with the ground splintered the bone even more, sending shards of purple-red bone ripping through the skin.

  He was cursing at his leg like an English sailor, swearing louder at Lane and giving no thought to those records St. Peter kept at the Gates of Heaven.

  Continuing to ignore the bullets slapping the brush overhead, Grover, McCall, and Donegan dragged Forsyth roughly to the bo
ttom of the pit, where they gently pulled on the leg to relieve the pain, holding the enraged soldier down until he eventually calmed.

  “Damn you, Lane!” Forsyth hissed.

  “I-I’m sorry, Major.” Lane twisted his hands, biting his lip. “Got scared, sir.”

  “Get out of my sight for the rest of the day!”

  Lane scampered down the island as Grover looked at Donegan. The broken leg was one thing, bone-ends splintered through the bloody skin. Yet, from the looks of Forsyth’s right leg, they both knew what had to be done.

  “Major, it ain’t that busted leg what’s gonna trouble you most.”

  He glared at his chief of scouts, finding many eyes studying the swollen right thigh.

  “Sharp’s right. That bullet’s gotta come out.”

  “I can’t,” Forsyth whimpered, then caught himself. “If I lose consciousness … one of you will have to command when I pass out.”

  “Trouble is,” McCall said softly, “the bullet’s in there next to that big artery. Without Doc Mooers … shit—maybe we oughta wait till a real surgeon gets here.”

  “No,” Forsyth answered, his brow beaded, eyes rimmed with pain. He knew. “It’ll take too long. I won’t last. One of you … get my razor. Saddlebag.”

  McCall dragged over the major’s kit, pulling out the memoranda book, a faded chromo of Forsyth’s parents, then found the straight razor in the narrow saddle-wallet, enclosed in a small, hard-leather case. The sergeant presented it to Grover.

  Sharp held his hands up, refusing to take the razor. “I can’t do it.”

  Forsyth gritted his words between his teeth. “You’ve skinned more game and buffalo than any of——”

  “Lotta difference ’tween that and digging round in your leg for a bullet, Major.”

  “Donegan?”

  Seamus swallowed, shaking his head, staring at the puffy white rim around the purple wound. “No, sir. I slip with that razor … I’d kill you for cer——”

  “Gimme the goddamned razor, McCall!” Forsyth snapped. “The whole damned lot of you’re cowards.”

  Seamus felt shamed, although Forsyth had spoken the truth. “When it comes to facing them Cheyenne, I’ll do it to my last breath, Major. But … this could mean killing you. If I’m a coward ‘cause I don’t wanna kill a brave man … one of the best army officers I’ve ever known—then call me a coward. So be it.”

  Forsyth sighed. “All right … all right. Just help me do it. I can’t rightly ask any of you men to chance killing me. But, by damned, you’ll help me dig it out.”

  “What you want from us, Major?” McCall asked.

  “Pull that gum-poncho over here,” he said, pointing. “Stuff it under the leg … there, like that. It’ll catch the blood. Good. Now”—and Forsyth took a long, deep breath—” Grover, you and Donegan hold the leg down. Flat. That’s it. I don’t want it flinching … not while this blade is down in the meat of the leg.”

  He took the razor from its case, pulling the blade from the handle in the morning sunlight where the polished steel glinted brightly. Seamus could already see the major’s eyes welling with the expectation of coming pain.

  “All right, McCall. You and Slinger are next. Both you push your fingers down around that bullet hole … uuunnnhhh!” he exclaimed as they pressed. “Easy … No! Don’t stop, pull the skin apart as I … as I cut.”

  He dragged the razor over the wound one time. Then caught his breath.

  “Hang on, Major,” Donegan whispered.

  “You’re doing fine,” Grover echoed.

  Forsyth let the pain wash over him, then blinked his eyes clear before he made a second pass with the blade, sundering more of the rotting, white flesh. Puss and blood oozed freely. Forsyth scraped the blood away as he choked back his stomach’s attempt to vomit.

  “Take ’er easy,” Grover said. “We got all the time in the world.”

  Forsyth tried a brave smile, more diamonds of sweat dappling his powder-smudged brow. “I suppose so, boys. We haven’t got anyplace to go.”

  While the rest started to chuckle, Forsyth dragged the blade against the parting, yielding flesh. Shlesinger and McCall gently pried back the bloody, infected muscle as the blade worked its way down.

  The major rocked his head back, eyes closed, swallowing down the pain after that deep stroke. When he could talk: “I felt the blade catch … catch on something … It must be the ball.”

  “Careful now, Major,” McCall whispered.

  “You, Billy. Use your fingers now. Pinch up the muscle round the ball.”

  “Sir, I don’t——”

  “Just do it!” he snapped, his eyes red as six-hour coals. His eyes forcing his sergeant to dip his dirty fingers into the bloody meat, gingerly feeling for the bullet.

  “I got it.”

  “Pinch it!” Forsyth hissed, clenching his jaw in excruciating pain. “Pull it up … away from the artery … I’ll cut the last muscle out of the way…”

  The bloodied, white muscle puffed up between McCall’s fingers. With his lips compressed in a thin line of determination, Forsyth steadied his left hand across the thigh like a brace, laying the knife-hand atop the left. Then in one swift movement he dragged the thin-bladed razor across the knotted flesh.

  “You’re lucky, Major,” Donegan whispered as the bullet puffed through the angry, purple muscle.

  “We got it,” Grover said, snagging the flattened lead bullet from the knot of flesh McCall had pinched. He held it before the major’s eyes.

  But Forsyth was already sagging backward, his face gone fish-gut gray, his eyes fluttering closed to blessed unconsciousness.

  “Stop that bleeding with your hand, Sergeant,” Donegan suggested, yanking at what he had left of his shirttail. “Slinger, tear off a piece of your shirt as well. We’ll get it wrapped up afore he comes to.”

  “Damn, but Forsyth’s got grit,” McCall marveled as he pressed his fingers into the lacerated flesh to slow the trickle of bright red blood.

  “That’s for sure,” Grover said. “Major’s craw is plumb full of sand and fighting tallow.”

  “Don’t know of another man would stand to cut on themselves like that,” Donegan said finally as they finished wrapping the leg in a new bandage. He looked up at the eyes of those three men gathered with him, seeing more of the scouts now, those who lay near the rim of the rifle-pit, watching it all with admiration on their weary, blackened faces.

  “Gentlemen,” the tall man from County Kilkenny spoke softly, “with this man leading us … I don’t think there’s a one among you can doubt any longer that we’ll get off this island.”

  “Hear! Hear!” McCall shouted, echoed by most of those who had watched the surgery.

  “By God, Forsyth’s seen us through this far.” Donegan raised his voice, louder and stronger now. “It’s time we see him through the rest of it!”

  * * *

  By dusk of that twentieth day of September spent back in the shadows of their buffalo carcass, Jack Stillwell found his partner sick, and getting no better. Sleeping fitfully, Pierre Trudeau complained of stomach cramps. He lay in the weeds, moaning, for most of the day after the boy had run the rattler off with a well-aimed stream of tobacco juice.

  But Jack knew they could not stay. Hunting parties were out. Looking for them. And besides, chances were good that Major Forsyth had sent other messengers out as well. With evidence that at least two parties had escaped from the island, the warriors would be furious, scouring the prairie for them like owls after field-mice.

  He eventually succeeded in getting Trudeau to his feet, supporting the old man as they stumbled into the deepening darkness.

  Jack glanced from time to time over his shoulder, checking the position of the north star. By the time they reached a small stream, both men were ready to refill their canteens. The water they found brackish, alkaline, not much better than what had seeped into the rifle-pits on the island. At least this water ran cool.

  They both lay on
the bank for the longest time, guzzling, their faces submerged in the creek, watching the sky darken. Ever since his childhood, this time of night had always made young Jack lonely. Even more so now that Trudeau’s belly cramps had returned.

  “Here.” Stillwell held a strip of charred horsemeat to the old man’s lips. “Eat this, Pete.”

  He turned his head aside. “Can’t. Belly…” His voice fell off, moaning. “Belly come up…”

  “Eat. If you throw it up, you’ll stay here and … I’ll go on.”

  His watery, red eyes blinked their gratitude for the youngster’s kindness as he took the strip between his chapped lips. He chewed, choking from time to time, but he got it and another strip down. Then Pete drank some more of the alkali water. Minutes later he rose from his elbows, holding his hand up to Stillwell.

  “Help me up, Jack.”

  “For a while there, I was scared I’d be going on alone.”

  Pete slung his haversack over his shoulder, still clutching Stillwell for support as they hobbled off into the darkness.

  “For a time there, Jack—Pierre afraid you leave him.”

  “I’d do it—to save the rest … back there, Pete,” Jack replied.

  “Yes,” old Trudeau whispered in reply. “We go together now. To save the rest back there.”

  Chapter 36

  “You got more lives than a six-toed cat,” Grover congratulated Forsyth as the major came to later that Sunday, their fourth day on the island.

  Seamus smiled at Forsyth. A faint brightness was returning to his eyes. Not recovered yet, but the major was on the way now with that bullet cut from his leg.

  His improvement that cloudy, drizzly afternoon did much to cheer some of the other wounded. Though blinded in the right eye by an Indian bullet during the first charge on the seventeenth, Howard Morton had wrapped a crude bandage round his head and fought on through the last three days.

  Young Hutch Farley had been struck in the shoulder by a bullet during the first charge, and later that morning his father had suffered his fearful wound. Yet both had quietly put their Spencers to the job at hand, while old man Farley grew worse with each passing day.