Action at Beecher Island: A Novel

by Dee Brown

  Indians were everywhere around them now, mounted and dismounted. Not only were they on the thicketed island but they swarmed like locusts on the surrounding hills, the plain, and in the riverbed. Atop the bluff to the east, squaws with their papooses had gathered to watch the fighting, and above the noise of battle he could hear their weird chanting.

  Out of the riverbed several mounted warriors made a bold attack, trying to overrun the scouts in their pits. Mooers reached for his carbine, took careful aim, and fired. “That rascal won’t trouble us again,” he said, and scarcely had uttered the words when Forsyth heard the sickening slap of metal against bone and saw the surgeon fall forward on the sand. “I’m hit,” Mooers whispered. Forsyth was barely able to bend over to aid him. The wound was in the surgeon’s forehead. He was still conscious but could neither speak nor move.

  Raising his head to make sure the attack had been beaten off, Forsyth was startled to see Lieutenant Beecher standing in his pit, leaning upon his rifle as though it were a crutch. “Beecher! Lie down!” Instead of obeying, the lieutenant staggered across to Forsyth’s pit. His eyes seemed glazed; he turned as if searching for something, then collapsed into the hole beside the surgeon. Blood stained the side of his ripped blouse. “I have my death wound this time, Major,” he said softly.

  “It can’t be as bad as that, Beecher!”

  Sharp Grover had crawled to the side of the pit, and stretched his long arms down to pull off Beecher’s boots. “He always hated to wear boots,” the scout said.

  Beecher began mumbling incoherently. Forsyth clasped his shoulder gently, trying to understand what he was saying. Then, from the surgeon’s bag he took cotton and bandages, and with Grover’s help stanched Beecher’s two wounds as best he could.

  When this was done, Forsyth leaned back against the wall of the pit, breathing heavily. He could not be certain whether the firing was diminishing or whether his hearing along with his other senses was gradually failing. He forced himself to press his elbows against the wet earth, craning his head forward so that he could obtain a clear view of the field.

  A screaming bullet thudded against his hat; he ducked, realizing instantly that the felt brim, doubled back for better vision, had saved his life. His fingers found the swelling on his skull; his head was already aching frightfully.

  For the past several minutes he had been aware that someone was digging in the adjoining pit; then he saw sand crumbling over the unconscious forms of Beecher and Mooers. A hole opened, and he recognized the smudged and perspiring face of Sigmund Schlesinger. “Mr. Grover asked me to connect the pits, sir,” the boy explained, and began lifting wet sand up with his hands to form an embankment.

  Grover squeezed past the boy, balancing his carbine in one hand. “I figger we’re going to be here a while, Major. Might as well make it easier for us to move around without presenting targets of ourselves.” His eyes shifted briefly to the unconscious Beecher.

  “I never expected the hostiles to be so well armed,” Forsyth replied weakly.

  “These are the same Indians that trapped Fetterman at Fort Phil Kearny and Caspar Collins at Platte Bridge,” Grover replied. “They captured plenty of rifles at both places.”

  “And they seem to be well supplied with ammunition.”

  “Yep. Our only hope is they’re running short now.”

  Forsyth had to fight away pain and weariness before he could speak again. “As soon as it’s dark, I’ll ask for volunteers to go for help.”

  “If we can last till dark. Must be eight or nine hundred Cheyenne, Sioux, and Arapaho out there. We haven’t hurt ’em much yet.”

  Forsyth nodded. “Sharp, if I lose consciousness, I want you to take command. You know more about Indian fighting than McCall.” He paused to take a deep breath. “Bring McCall here, so I can tell him.”

  Some time later, in spite of the continuous racket of firing and the distressing sounds of wounded men and dying horses, Forsyth drifted into an uneasy sleep. When he awoke again the sun was burning hot on his face and he felt an overpowering thirst. Using his elbows for support he pulled himself to an erect sitting position. His canteen was empty. From the sun he judged that it was past noon. The scouts were still in their pits, firing occasionally, but the only Indians in sight were scattered bands of mounted warriors who were keeping well out of range.

  Schlesinger appeared in the connecting trench; he was carrying a tin cup in his hands. “Some of us have dug down to water, sir.”

  Forsyth thanked him and drank the tepid liquid slowly. He felt immensely refreshed.

  Mooers began moaning piteously. “See if the surgeon can take a few swallows,” Forsyth said.

  Schlesinger shook his head. “He and the lieutenant are still unconscious, sir.” Beecher’s shoulders were lifting and falling with his hoarse breathing.

  “I must have been gone out of the world myself for two or three hours,” Forsyth said. “Have the hostiles made any more rushes against us?”

  “No, sir, but Mr. Grover says they’ll storm us again. He’s down at the other end with Sergeant McCall.”

  “Has anybody made a count of our casualties?”

  “I heard the sergeant say we’d lost two killed and seventeen are wounded.”

  As Grover had predicted, the Indians made another massive charge. They thundered across the stream bed, but the scouts’ embankments gave ample protection and the hostile assault split apart.

  At the height of the fighting, Forsyth managed to get his carbine balanced on the edge of his pit, lining his sights on a circling horseman who had darted in closer than the others. Suddenly he heard jingling bells, and he wondered if the sound came from that horseman. Just as he was about to squeeze his trigger, the Indian dropped behind his mount. Forsyth shifted his sights to the horse’s shoulder, fired, and the animal stumbled, somersaulting its rider into the brush. Legging bells jingled again, and then were silent.

  His strength gone, Forsyth sank back into the sand pit. He laughed mirthlessly, wondering if he had been lucky enough to bring down Two Crows.

  12

  Two Crows

  September 17,

  Early Afternoon

  TWO CROWS WAS DOWN in the brush, his numbed shoulder beginning to ache from the fall. He removed his legging bells so they would not betray his position and then carefully hid them under a pile of dry reeds. Through the grass he could see his pony, Bay-With-Star-on-Forehead, lying quite still, eyes open but glazed in death. Truly, he thought, these white soldier scouts who had come with the bluecoat chief Forsyth were good shots!

  Behind him he heard a rustling, and turned to discover his Dog Soldier brother, White Horse. “Are you bad wounded?” White Horse asked.

  “It is nothing,” Two Crows replied. “I grieve for my best pony.”

  White Horse held himself in a stooping position so that he would not make a target. “Your brother’s son, White Thunder, has been killed. I took him to the women on the bluff.”

  Two Crows bowed his head. “Now I truly grieve. He was only a boy warrior.”

  “I will help you catch his pony,” White Horse said, “so you can get back into the fighting.”

  Two Crows followed White Horse to where the latter had concealed his own mount. He leaped up behind and they galloped to the high thicket at the north end of the island. In a minute or so they found White Thunder’s mustang. Gripping the lariat twisted around the pony’s belly, Two Crows mounted and rode to join the Dog Soldiers who were reassembling along the east side of the river.

  His eyes scanned the hills to the north. “Has no one seen any sign of Roman Nose?” he called. “I sent Spotted Wolf for him when the sun was there.” He held his hands apart, fingers pointing skyward, to show how far the sun had moved.

  “I do not think Roman Nose will come this day,” Prairie Bear said.

  “Whether he comes or not,” Two Crows replied, “I must make one more charge to avenge White Thunder, the son of my brother. Will the Dog Soldiers follow
me?”

  Along the line of horsemen, a dozen red-streamered lances were lifted, and the eyes of all the warriors were fixed on Two Crows, awaiting his signal. He raised one hand, slapping it down hard on the mustang’s shoulder, and they sprang into motion. “Hi-yi-yi!” Two Crows shouted. He brought his rifle up, firing at a head that showed briefly above a sand pit.

  A second later his pony stumbled and he had to grip the lariat surcingle tightly and bend forward, catching the animal’s mane between his teeth to avoid a spill. The mustang had stepped into one of the water holes that buffalo had used for a wallow; it was having difficulty pulling its legs from the muck. All around him Two Crows could hear bullets singing like bees, and then suddenly White Horse dashed between him and the island, zigzagging his mount expertly, drawing off the fire. At last, the mustang was free of the mud, and Two Crows signaled his brother warriors to withdraw. He was convinced now that the fire of the entrenched white scouts was too heavy for a mounted assault.

  As soon as they were out of range of the bullets, Two Crows called the Dog Soldiers together and they rode to a plum grove where warriors of the other Cheyenne soldier societies were resting in the shade.

  “You are a bunch of old women,” he scolded. “Why do you not come and help the Dog Soldiers wipe out the invaders of our hunting grounds?”

  “We are waiting for Roman Nose to come and lead us,” Good Bear replied firmly. “The white men’s bullets are too many for us to fight them in our old way.”

  Two Crows bent his head in assent. “It is true that Roman Nose has never lost a fight or been hit by a bullet, but his medicine is bad this day. We must keep up the fighting until he is ready to lead us.”

  Good Bear shrugged. “The Sioux, across the river, have stopped fighting.”

  Two Crows turned his head to one side, his face conveying disgust. “Their hearts are tired. Had the Sioux not allowed their foolish young men to raid the enemy’s horses and warn them of attack, they would all be in the country of the dead. Had the Sioux waited until the Cheyenne people came here we could have killed all the white men before they could dig holes like prairie dogs on the island.”

  “The fighting has gone badly,” Good Bear agreed.

  Two Crows dismounted and began tying the mustang’s bridle rope to a plum tree. “There is still a way,” he said. “If the white scouts can dig holes and fight, the Cheyenne can dig holes and fight. We must make them keep firing their bullets until they have none left.”

  He persuaded fifty or more warriors of the other soldier societies to join with the Dog Soldiers, and then he led them on foot across the riverbed to a thicket of red-leaved willows at the north end of the island.

  They crept through the willows until they reached the high grass, and then in a wild wave they rushed up close to the scouts’ breastworks, firing arrows and bullets. When the scouts began returning fire, Two Crows shouted to his followers to fall on their bellies and dig holes in the sand. In a few minutes they had heaped up little shelters for themselves so that they were hidden from the men who were shooting at them only a few yards off.

  Prairie Bear raised his head to shoot, and was killed instantly; then one of the Arapahos who had come with them made the same reckless mistake and was so badly wounded that Two Crows was sure he would die. “Let us fire our arrows over the sand heaps,” he shouted to the others, “so that the white men cannot see us. Already this day they have killed more of us than there are of them.”

  After a while, Good Bear came crawling through the grass like a snake. “There is much excitement among the squaws on the bluff,” he said.

  “Go and see what is happening,” Two Crows told him.

  Good Bear stood up foolishly to run away, but he ran from side to side so that none of the bullets hit him. After a long time he returned, very excited.

  “Roman Nose has come back with Spotted Wolf,” he cried. “He is on top of the hill, sitting and looking at this island here.”

  Two Crows grunted with satisfaction. He passed the word for all the Cheyennes to slip away from their sand holes and assemble below the bluffs. He must go and counsel with Roman Nose.

  13

  Roman Nose

  September 17,

  Late Afternoon

  ROMAN NOSE SAT ON the bluff watching the Cheyennes coming out of the red-leaved willows at the end of the island. Near him were Spotted Wolf and the medicine man, White Bull. They had drawn off to one side with the horses, leaving him alone to counsel with himself.

  He did not like to see warriors of his proud people fighting on foot, but he knew that they had lost many horses and some of their best fighters, and were desperate for victory. Spotted Wolf had told him that the Sioux across the river and the Arapahos had suffered even more than the Cheyennes.

  The western sun was warm against his face and he felt sleepy. He closed his eyes until he could see only a faint amber light, hoping for a vision. After a while he thought he saw many soldiers falling from the sky upside down, but there was snow in the sky and he knew that he was looking backward, seeing the great victory at Fort Phil Kearny in the Moon-When-the-Deer-Shed-Their-Horns. In that fight they had wiped out all of Fetterman’s pony soldiers. There had been other victories, too, at Platte Bridge and Julesburg, and last summer at Fort Wallace they had given the bluecoats a good fight. But in those fights his medicine had been perfect. He could remember how bullets had sung all around him, but none could touch him because of his strong medicine and the protection of White Bull’s magic warbonnet.

  He sighed because he knew now there could be no visions for him on this day. When he opened his eyes he saw White Contrary and Two Crows riding up the slope toward him. “Well, here is Roman Nose,” White Contrary called in his old man’s voice. “Here is the warrior we depend on, sitting on this hill. He is the man that makes it easy for his men in any fight.” White Contrary and Two Crows dismounted and sat down beside Roman Nose. “All the people fighting out there feel that they belong to you,” White Contrary went on, “and they will do all that you tell them, and here you are sitting on this hill.”

  Roman Nose laughed quietly for a moment, and then said to Two Crows: “What the old man speaks is true.”

  “We know you have lost your medicine,” Two Crows replied. “When your food was lifted with an iron tool—”

  “Ay-ee.” Roman Nose blew his breath with a whistling sound through his teeth. “It was White Bull who made the prophecy that bullets of bluecoat soldiers could never touch me when I go into battle with his sacred warbonnet and the power of his medicine. Let us talk with him.”

  White Bull was even older than White Contrary, and when he hobbled over to join the council it was plain that the joints of his bones were stiff and filled with pain.

  “Have not the spirits told you,” Roman Nose asked him harshly, “that I must be protected from the bullets of bluecoat soldiers?”

  “That is true,” the medicine man answered.

  “But those men down there are not bluecoat soldiers. They are scourings of the white settlements—buffalo killers and wagon drivers and traders. They are not soldiers.”

  “They are good shots,” Two Crows warned him. “They have guns that shoot seven times without reloading, and they are dug into the earth like prairie dogs.”

  Roman Nose made a belittling gesture. “They are only a few.” He flicked the fingers of both hands twice and said: “With the Sioux we are twenty to their one.”

  “The Sioux have withdrawn to lick their wounds,” Two Crows said.

  Roman Nose laughed. “Spotted Wolf has told me how the Sioux made a mighty charge right up to the island but their hearts were not strong enough to ride over the enemy.”

  “Yes, we could see them from the bluffs,” Two Crows added quickly. “By the time we could join the fighting, the Sioux had moved into a circling wheel. None of us could get at the enemy.”

  “Our people have not yet learned how to fight the white men in their way. Many times I h
ave talked of this with Crazy Horse, the greatest of the Oglala Sioux. He believes as I do—if our people are to hold our lands we must learn from the bluecoat soldiers to put all our best warriors together and fight all at one time.” He sighed, stood up, and faced the sun, stretching his muscular arms. “Who will go and tell the Sioux that I am here to lead all our peoples in a mighty charge? Tell them I want only their best fighters. Tell them some will die, but I promise that all the enemy invaders will die.”

  “I will go,” Two Crows said, and started toward the mustang.

  With one hand, Roman Nose shielded his eyes against the sun and studied the island. The place where the white scouts were dug in was like a circular ant hill; the dead horses and the men in their sand pits looked very small and insignificant. Upstream the river made a gradual bend, and he decided that around the bend out of view of the enemy he would assemble his followers. When the warriors swept around the bend, massed compactly, the white scouts would tremble in their boots at the sight of such power! Surprise and terror would destroy their will to fight.

  He turned to Spotted Wolf. “Go and tell the leaders of all the soldier societies to assemble around the bend of the river. Tell them we will attack from the south.” He began loosening the rawhide ties of his war bag. “White Bull, we must go and prepare for battle.”

  White Bull arose, grimacing from the pain in his joints. “I shall ride with you in the charge.”

  “You are an old man.”

  “It is necessary that I ride with you. This day you will need all the power I can bring you from the spirits.”

  They mounted and rode behind the bluffs, taking the shortest route to the place of assembly above the bend in the Arickaree. Along the way Roman Nose halted and went into a little arroyo where he began making his preparations for battle. He removed his buckskin shirt and leggings so that he was naked except for his breechclout. From his war bag he took an elk-teeth necklace, a crimson silk sash, and a pair of battle moccasins. After winding the sash carefully around his waist, he covered his face with streaks of red and black war paint. When he had finished painting himself he went to his chestnut horse, whispering encouragements to it as he made secret markings on its shoulder to protect it from harm. He removed the thongs from his lance and fastened to it a red streamer which would help drive away the bad spirits. Last of all, he took the sacred warbonnet from its cylindrical rawhide case and unfolded it carefully. He straightened the numerous eagle feathers, placed it upon his head, and then remounted the chestnut. The feathers trailed behind him in all the colors of the rainbow.