by Tony Masero
‘And how did they look?’ asked O’Brien.
Kilchii compressed his lips, unsure of how to answer, ‘Like children,’ he said with a shrug.
‘No, I mean….’
‘How far away?’ Britt interrupted.
‘This way,’ said Kilchii pointing. ‘Maybe one hour,’ his hand traced a line of the sun’s path.
‘Is there a good place for us?’ Britt asked.
Kilchii thought about it, ‘I think, maybe,’ he said. ‘Too many for fight. Must take like Indian.’
‘What’s that mean?’ asked O’Brien.
‘He means it’s no good going at them straight on, we have to pick them off best we can. Knock down their numbers. Be like raiders, ambush, hit and run.’
‘Shoot!’ said Bellamy. ‘That’s going to hang it out some.’
Governance, who was normally a quiet and tacit man, growled angrily, ‘Why don’t we just go for it and smack them now? The bastards!’ It was obvious he was not thinking straight and had been mightily upset by the little girl’s death.
‘We don’t have the numbers,’ Britt explained patiently.
‘Yes,’ rumbled O’Brien. ‘Get your head out of your ass, Governance. Five to fifteen, the odds are not there.’
‘Well, let’s do something, for heaven’s sake,’ said Governance.
‘Remember the kids,’ warned Britt. ‘That’s what we’re here for. If we start a melee there’s a good chance they’ll be hit in the gunfight. No, Kilchii’s right, let’s go at this easy. Do we have any high ground in advance of their route?’ he asked the Navajo.
Kilchii nodded, ‘There is. One butte, stand alone, they go around.’
‘Then let’s get there and spy out the land.’
Hurriedly they mounted up again and sped off following Kilchii’s lead.
It turned out to be a rough-hewn, twelve hundred foot high pillar of flat-topped caprock with a low tumbledown range abutting and running off to the west. With the Comanche’s travelling in a southerly direction, Britt decided they should place themselves on the east facing slopes of the butte. Beyond was an open flat plain that the Comanche would have to drive their horse herd across, the situation would give Britt and his men a clear overlook of the herd’s passage. It was unfortunate that the sun would be in their eyes but there was little they could do about that.
He sent Governance amongst the rocks to the rear of the butte with their horses, fearing that the unraveled man might get overeager and take it into his head to attack too early. The rest he separated amongst the rocks with enough height to make their situation impregnable. Then they settled down to wait.
Kilchii, held his station amongst the rocks steadily, sitting hunched on his haunches with his carbine held upright between his knees. The others scratched and fumbled, tense and eager to get into the fight. Britt could see how it was the typical difference between Anglos and Indians. The Navajo was as still and unmoving as one of the stones around him, he would remain so until the time came for action. The whites could not maintain their position for long without moving, flapping their hats against the heat or wiping the sweat from their brows.
Below them the air quivered off the plain, sending rivers of heat skywards and whipping small whirls of dust in ghostly spirals.
Britt whistled softly to call his men’s attention to the veil of dust approaching from the north. Slowly out of the dusty mist, shapes became discernable. It was the horse herd being driven at a slow walking pace by the Comanche. They were confident, Britt guessed, borne up by the success of their raid and unknowing that any enemy was close. Once he made the attack, Britt knew all that would change. When the Comanche understood they were being chased they would take every evasive action they were capable of. That was why they had to make this a good killing ground now if they could.
Two men led, with outriders on each side. To the rear came a smaller party and amongst them Britt could make out the different colored clothing of the captives.
He hunched down behind cover as the others did also and slid out his rifle, easing down and retracting the lever to place a shell ready in the chamber. Slowly his barrel traversed as he picked out his target and followed the nearing movement.
Britt had given orders that no shooting was to start until he had fired, that was the signal for their ambush to begin. And he waited, feeling the tension in himself as well as the others. Britt knew he needed the coming party to be close, near enough to be in good range for them to do their deadly work.
The wait seemed interminable and only when Britt could define the features of the lead Indians below did he fire off his first round. Hardly had the sound died than a flurry of gunfire followed. Britt saw two of the outriders fling up their arms and tumble from their ponies, then all was a rush of speeding horsemen and panicked ponies as the herd below took flight.
Britt was on his feet, leveling and tracking his target. He fired and jerked another bullet under the hammer, then fired again. It was hard to spot the Indians now as the running herd churned up more dust and caused a blanketing cloud. He noted one more Comanche take a hit but manage to stay aboard and then, hanging over the pony’s neck, race into the midst of the milling horses and be lost from sight.
The Comanche wisely stayed with the running herd, their figures lost in amongst the surging ponies that moved in a tidal wave away off to the east. The ponies pounded on to fan out and disperse not slowing until they were out of sight. Britt could not tell where the captives were amidst the dusty rush and he called for a ceasefire less one of them was hit.
It was only when the dust had settled did Britt signal that they should descend. Britt told Rawlings to fetch Governance and the horses, and then he toed over one of the dead Comanche. The dead man was clothed as many of his fellows in buckskin pants and a breechclout, and Britt was pleased to see a Springfield rifle lying nearby. It meant that the Indian’s firepower was reduced by at least one gun. The figure was daubed in red and yellow paint the colors running over his bare chest and belly in long downward stokes.
‘Do we go on to Rockfall Station?’ asked O’Brien.
Britt shook his head, ‘Won’t be any point now, they’ll be dead. No, our mission is those kids, so we keep after them.’
‘How about Shane and the chuck wagon?’
‘I reckon the Tumbler place will stay safe, I’ll send Kilchii to go get them.’
‘That’s good as I’ve got a terrible hunger on me. Always happens after a fight.’
‘I counted two down and one wounded, you make it any different?’
O’Brien shook his head negatively, ‘This will be it, I fear,’ he said waving towards the two dead Indians.
‘I had hoped for more.’
‘Ah, well, dear man. Look on the bright side, at least it’s two less to worry about.’
There was the sound of cursing and the heavy thud of a boot going in. Britt turned to see Governance giving vent to his rage on one of the bodies; he was kicking it hard and cussing out the dead Indian calling him all kinds of names.
Nobody moved, they watched with a mixture of dispassion and revulsion but all knew the cause, as the tiny parcel still hung across the back of Rawling’s saddle as a deadly reminder. Then Britt glanced over at Kilchii and noted his rigid body posture and lowered eyebrows. Britt read the signs, even though the dead man was an enemy, it was in Kilchii’s mind that this was an Indian warrior as himself and his distain at the disrespect was evident.
‘Hold on!’ Britt called out. ‘Stop that!’ He went across and pulled Governance away, ‘It’s one thing to kill a man,’ he said. ‘Another to abuse him when he’s down.’
‘These ain’t men,’ spat Governance. ‘These are just baby killers.’
Britt took both the man’s arms in his hands and he looked hard into Governance’s eyes, ‘Listen to me, I know that feeling. I do, I know it, but once you let it get a hold of you it spoils your judgment. You hear me, Governance? You been out here a long time and this kind of th
ing gets to wear you down eventually but you give into that kind of anger and it’ll kill you in the end, believe me. You start making mistakes, you get reckless, you know what I mean, you’ve seen it happen.’
Governance simmered down, breathing heavily, his eyes still fixed on the subject of his attack, he nodded sullenly, ‘I hear you,’ he said and Britt felt the tenseness in his arms relax.
‘We got to see it and know it but we don’t have to be it, you understand me?’ Britt said to him.
Governance tore his eyes away from the dead Indian and looked up at Britt, ‘You’re right. I get it, it’s just…. you know? Sometimes….’
‘Yeah, I understand. You want to get that child buried decent now? We’ll be waiting on Shane so there’s time.’
Governance nodded, ‘I’ll do it.’
He wandered off to collect Samantha Childs’s remains and Britt heard O’Brien arrive quietly at his elbow.
‘You think the dear boy is okay?’ O’Brien whispered in his ear.
Britt watched the departing back and raised a hand to wobble it up and down.
‘Rocky, huh?’ said O’Brien. ‘Well, have no fear, I shall keep a close eye.’
Britt nodded acceptance, ‘All right, boys,’ he said loudly. ‘We’ll sit it out here a spell until Shane and the others catch up. Kilchii, will you go fetch them? Rest of you take it easy. Sergeant, will you see to a couple of pickets for us? The Comanche will have scattered but they’ll have a meeting place arranged in reserve, so best not to think they’re gone in the wind just yet.’
Governance made a fine job of the small grave. He had fashioned a cross from dry brush and laid stones around in a neat perimeter.
All the men gathered to pay their respects and they stood bareheaded around the grave as the wind picked up with the coming cool of evening and blew trails of dust around their legs.
‘I didn’t know this child,’ Governance began, speaking out with a surprising and unusual eloquence from his normal reticence. ‘Never knew her Ma or Pa but I feel their pain for them. She must have been a rare beauty and a treasure for those folks and she sure did not deserve to die in such a horrible manner. Lord, I trust you will take this baby into your care and will carry and protect her dear soul in Your loving arms. Y’all say ‘amen’.’
Which they did and slowly shuffled back to the fire that had been started as the chuck wagon was waited on. From there and crouched down, with his pipe in his mouth, Britt looked across at the lonely marker standing visible in the outer glow of the campfire.
He knew that if he ever passed this way again, that cross will have been long gone and the stones and mound covered by drifting sand. It would be like none of this had ever happened. He wondered sometimes why they bothered, nobody would note a passing in such a desperate place and yet he knew it was not the outer show that mattered, it was more the inner completing and companionship with the departed that counted. It was a moment of poignant sadness for him as it stirred memories of his dead wife and how he had been absent throughout so much of their lives together.
He leaned over and picked up a burning spill from the fire to light his pipe.
‘Chuck wagon coming in!’
He heard one of the picket’s call it out and the moment of regret was swept away as the prospect of something to eat arrived. Such is life – he chuckled to himself – where the belly takes precedence over all else.
Chapter Seven
When the shooting started, Nathan had been tempted to make a run for it. He had a pony under him and the rest of the Indians were busy ducking the attack. It was all confusion and chaos as the pony herd panicked and stampeded.
In the midst of it he thought of the others, of Elizabeth, Oban and Butler. Could he leave them to their fate? It was a flash of momentary thought and swept away as he saw Elizabeth, obviously not too comfortable riding bareback on a speeding pony, as she sped past him.
‘Elizabeth!’ he called, racing after her.
The sounds of shooting followed them and Nathan guessed that some sort of army patrol or posse was behind them and had ambushed the Comanche. It gave him hope and restored his belief that his father had been hard at work in an attempt at rescue.
With such a sense of reassurance he caught up with Elizabeth and leaning across, grabbed the pony’s halter rein and slowed the animal to a steady gallop rather than the frantic race it had been indulging in.
‘No, Nathan,’ she called across, her face wild and staring. ‘I cannot go back.’
‘What do you mean?’ he asked, pulling tighter on the halter rope and slowing their lathered animals down even more.
‘I cannot,’ she said, clutching at the pony’s mane in both tightly clenched fists.
‘Why not?’
‘Let me go. Please, let me go.’
‘What are you saying, Elizabeth? We have a chance now.’
She shook her head desperately, ‘No, no, I am shamed. I cannot. There is nothing back there for me now.’
‘You mean you will settle for a life amongst these savages?’ he asked in disbelief.
‘Better that than the ridicule I will suffer amongst my own. I shall be rejected, Nathan. Spurned as the courtesan of an Indian buck, dirtied and untouchable after their filthy attentions.’
‘Oh, Elizabeth, don’t be so….’
He was about to say more when Kowa, riding low on the pony’s neck raced in and with glaring eyes and a war hatchet in his hand urged them both on. There was no doubt in Nathan’s mind that if they showed any sign of disobedience the Indian would use his weapon and strike them both down. Grudgingly, his mind in a daze at Elizabeth’s refusal to run, he followed the Indian as they trotted on.
It had never occurred to him, given their shared distress that Elizabeth would do anything else but be relieved and glad of freedom. As they rode on he gave her considerations some thought, it was true enough that with the ignorance prevalent amongst the more respected in Anglo society the question would be asked why she had not taken her own life rather than allow herself to be abused in such a way.
He wondered then at his own shortcomings in not carrying out the instructions given him by Captain Benteen. But he knew he could not commit bloody murder in that way and tiresome though she had been in her prim attitude during their ride in the mud wagon it was a long way from deserving any honor-saving bullet for the sake of propriety.
He had noticed that Elizabeth had matured incredibly rapidly after her brutal introduction. She was no longer the proper young miss whose greatest ambition had been to impress and seek esteem through her family’s wealth. Now she was a beaten creature with the vestiges of that past pride held aloft only in her relationship with the under-chief Kowa. It was a foolish allegiance, Nathan believed, he was sure that the callous Kowa would use and shed her as easily as he might an old blanket. To him and others of the Comanche the whites were no more than overthrown intruders with little value beyond that of slave.
It was clear that Kowa knew where he was going and with determined alacrity he led them towards a heap of rocks that stood out plainly on the horizon of the otherwise deserted desert. They duly arrived to find the rest of the war band gathered and amongst them Oban, who sat proudly and somewhat smugly on his pony amongst the warriors. Butler was there also, wide-eyed and silent, held seated on a pony by one of the young braves.
There appeared to be a somewhat disgruntled group facing Esacona and by the looks and shouted words it was apparent that he was being held responsible for the surprise attack and the loss of the scattered horse herd. Kowa leapt down from his pony and strode over to join the debate, angrily pushing back the other warriors and taking a stand beside the lone figure of Esacona.
Nathan helped Elizabeth down as Oban sidled over to join them.
‘What’s going on?’ asked Nathan.
‘Seems like they want to oust Esacona for leading them into the trap. I think they’re right too.’
Nathan frowned, Oban’s ready leaning towards the
Indians was definitely altering his frame of mind away from the attitudes of his own people. Already the boy had stripped off his shirt and rode bare breasted as if he were one of the warriors.
‘You do, do you?’ asked Nathan.
‘Why not? It is his responsibility as leader and he should bear the blame.’
‘Getting to be a regular little Comanche, aren’t you?’
‘We have to make the best of this, Nathan,’ Oban spat back irritably.
‘Appears to me you have already gone over,’ Nathan came back at him as he helped seat Elizabeth down on a rock.
‘Oban’s right,’ Elizabeth agreed, wrapping her blanket more firmly around herself. ‘We have to fit in if we are to stay alive.’
‘Do as you will,’ Nathan answered shortly, hiding his embarrassment at their easy surrender by taking up this pony’s halter and leading it over to the trap line set up for the other ponies.
The shouting amongst the band had reached fever pitch and it seemed like a brawl was about to begin between Kowa and the other more aggressive amongst the warriors. Esacona said little, content to stand watching as Kowa handled his fight for him.
Then he suddenly stepped forward and with a wide sweep of an arm called them to silence.
He spoke steadily and severely, his tone one of both reprimand and cajole. He drew his knife and in one motion cut a weal across his left arm, allowing the blood to flow. He held up the arm so all could see and the blood from the wound ran down his arm in a dark stream. Then with a slap of his chest, Esacona shouted loudly and the entire band stepped back a pace and remained cowed as the glowering chief stood before them.
For Nathan it was remarkable demonstration of leadership. Even though he did not understand the words spoken, he could grasp enough to see that Esacona had accepted responsibility for their defeat and wounded himself in recompense. But he was still their leader and with a raw power that emitted from some inner source he brought the warriors to heel merely by the presence of his personality. Despite himself, Nathan had to admit that it was a man of character that stood before them and not just a dirty and ignorant wild savage, as most of white society would have him.