The Removes

by Tatjana Soli

  Thinking he had gotten a too-good offer, Turkey Feather took off before Custer could change his mind.

  The Missouri in that part of the territory was winding, the riverbeds filled with quicksand, bogging the horses, who pitched the soldiers into the water when they attempted to ford it. To the great hilarity of the entire regiment, Tom was among the first to receive such baptism. Cliffs rose up on each side of them; nightmarish, dead-end ravines spread below. They got lost with disturbing frequency.

  * * *

  THE CROW SCOUTS talked about the verities of life on the high plains—how the sun and the grass and the wind and the buffalo would be there for all time. Custer held his tongue. The holy emptiness, the star-glutted night sky, the brittle air were experiences soon to be gone. Life for the Indian would be made impossible, between the railroads and the encroachment of settlers. The cavalry, too, would soon be endangered. Without the tribes, they were unneeded, reduced to a police force, something he could not accept. This freedom would soon be a thing of memory.

  The frontier was closing. This was his last big chance. Crook got himself promoted to brigadier general in the regular army with his successes fighting the Apache. Mackenzie, too, amassed citations in this netherworld. So did Miles. So would he. It seemed possible that the Indians might elude them once again on this expedition as they had on past ones, but his melancholy was not based on that possibility. Whether they succumbed this time or another, their end and his own were already written in the stars.

  He’d been quite sanguine at West Point about the Indian’s right to exist in his traditional way of life on the land of his birth, but it was always easy for people far away to dismiss the fates of those whom they will never meet face to face. Let them come and look, travel, eat and sleep in their company, endure hardship together. He was being too optimistic by half. Studying the histories of the world, not even brotherhood was enough to safeguard people who had what others coveted. Custer considered quite a few Indians as friends, and he had trusted many more with his life. They had no chance.

  The scouts camped near Custer’s tent. Regularly he visited at suppertime when they would cook the meat they had hunted that day. He let Golden Buffalo pick his favorite cut and prepare it. He enjoyed eating and talking to the scouts, took pleasure in the pranks between the warriors that reminded him of his brothers. Like a mother hen, he urged them to eat.

  —If you are full, you will be strong for the fight.

  He would stay by the fire peacefully until he fell asleep then get up to stumble back to his lodge.

  * * *

  ONE NIGHT WELL INTO THE EXPEDITION a young man came to Custer’s tent to carry away papers. The youth hesitated.

  —That will be all.

  When the young man remained, Custer turned to study his face: high-slatted cheeks, a common mien. He flushed.

  —You were the boy at the Washita. You’d taken an arrow to the face.

  —Was, sir. I’ve been away a bit but rejoined the Seventh to serve under you again.

  —The bugler …

  —Thank you for remembering.

  Custer felt the blood in his veins run cold. Hadn’t the boy joined the legions of specters haunting him? How could he have died and be in the flesh now?

  —Good night, boy.

  His concentration fled him. Custer had lost track of time. Eight years had passed, time enough for boys to grow into men. What had he grown into?

  The rest of the night was spent sleepless. Never had he heard of a ghost returning to the land of the living. Surely it portended ill.

  He kept Terry’s orders in his jacket pocket, having read them over so many times he could recite them.

  It is, of course, impossible to give any definite instructions in regard to this movement, and were it not impossible to do so, the Department Commander places too much confidence in your zeal, energy and ability to wish to impose upon you precise orders which might hamper your action when nearly in contact with the enemy.

  —GENERAL TERRY, JUNE 1876, INSTRUCTIONS TO GENERAL G. A. CUSTER

  Everyone in the military, and especially the cavalry, knew such orders meant do anything you will but make sure you win.

  He bid Terry and Gibbon goodbye and headed out to scout the Rosebud and meet them at the Little Bighorn. His objective was to find Indian camps and drive them into Gibbon’s forces. Gibbon and everyone else believed Custer would attack on his own to win all the accolades for himself.

  —Now Custer, don’t be greedy, but wait for us, Gibbon chided.

  —No, I will not.

  With that, Custer rode away laughing.

  * * *

  AT THE MOUTH of the Tongue River, a skull nested in the campfire’s charred remains. Nearby they found part of a cavalryman’s uniform. Custer picked up the stiffened fabric, noted the yellow piping on the tunic and the “C” on the overcoat buttons. Sticks lay nearby stained with brownish blood.

  He stared into the ashes without a word. At least for this one, life’s troubles were over. What had this poor soul found on the other side? Even if it was cherubs and harps, did it make what happened to him on this side more bearable? Custer shook himself, tried to knock the nonsense from his head. The trembling in his hand had stopped. The stopping scared him more than the quaking flesh that he’d endured all these years. He had the sensation of riding a great swell that he had no ability to control. He had been riding it his whole life. What had changed was that now he feared where it would land him.

  The weight of this nameless soldier would join the others who haunted him. Not fair. I had nothing to do with this one. Custer was a soldier, and it would be an untruth that he had not thought of his own death in the intervening years since West Point. Any soldier who denied doing such was either fool or liar. But the long line of attendant ghost men for whose death he was responsible had become familiars and made him a kind of philosopher:… Death, necessary end / Will come when it will come.

  All his philosophizing ended when Reno’s scouts going up the Rosebud reported the remains of a month-old deserted village of 380 lodges. If the end was indeed written, why should he not be its author?

  They came to a deserted campground, the scouts reporting signs of it having been the site of a Sun Dance circle. Golden Buffalo showed Custer evidence of the Sioux medicine—sand arranged and smoothed, pictures drawn on it. The Dakota scouts studied the pictures for long minutes and spoke among themselves.

  —What? What do you see?

  —The Lakota know the army is coming. They are prepared.

  Custer refused to believe this superstition, but knew the scouts were telling the truth in their roundabout manner: the Sioux had been warned somehow.

  —The Lakota believe it is better to die on the battlefield than live to be old.

  —We can help them with that.

  The camp had been abandoned hastily. In one of the sweat lodges still standing there was a long ridge of sand. On it were figures indicated by hoofprints, army on one side, Sioux on the other. Between were stick figures depicting dead white men lying with their heads toward the Sioux.

  —Their medicine is too strong. We will be defeated by them.

  —Ridiculous, Custer said, but he feared the opposite.

  On nearby sandstone they found a drawing of two buffalo fighting.

  —This means the Great Spirit has given the Sioux victory. The scouts are afraid. They say it means do not follow the Lakota into the Bighorn country, or they will destroy you.

  Custer chewed his lip.

  —I’ll pass that on to General Terry. See how that fares.

  * * *

  A FEW DAYS LATER where the Tongue joined the Yellowstone River, they came across an Indian burial ground. Mummy-like wrapped corpses lay on scaffolds. It gave the men the shivers for a minute until Custer, Tom, and some officers decided to go on a macabre treasure hunt, collecting beaded moccasins, rawhide bags, horn spoons, shields, bows, and arrows.

  If the Lakota medicine was
strong he would create some of his own. It turned into a ghoulish party, the men unwinding the blankets to look at the corpses—an infant with his limbs folded like a furled flower, his face painted red for the afterworld; a warrior’s scaffold painted red and black, denoting he had been especially brave. Custer thought it not a bad way to honor the dead but then allowed his men to pull down the body and help themselves to the funeral trousseau. So weighed down were they with “loot” that from a distance one couldn’t distinguish them from Indians. Afterward they dumped the corpse in the river, but not before nicking off some flesh for baiting fishhooks.

  The men’s mood had turned savage. Custer noticed that Tom was especially brutal, the lines of his once boyish face turned hard and without mercy. The scar on his chin that had been an anomaly had now become an essential marker of character. What had become of the shy farm boy who gleefully captured enemy flags? What had happened to them both?

  Some of the older officers moved off, disgusted by their hijinx. Benteen even complained that they had cursed themselves and the whole mission. Ninnies, one and all, as far as Custer was concerned. The scouts, though, moved off, mumbling of bad medicine.

  The curse took effect immediately.

  A mood, unspeakable, hovered over the expedition, and a sense of gloom pervaded the men. They mumbled of bad dreams and made out wills. Base alliances were struck to avoid torture by the enemy. None smelled victory, they stank of fear, yet Custer refused to bow to it. How could he? He went out ahead of the cavalry with Tom and Bos to let off steam.

  When Bos stopped to fix his horse’s foot, Tom and he decided to play a prank. They disappeared behind a bluff. As they waited, Tom took up a piece of long grass and chewed it.

  —It’s been a good run, brother.

  Custer bowed his head.

  —It has.

  They waited companionably until Bos had the horse’s hoof on his knee then shot off their guns right over his head. Boston’s face! Eyes bulging, his skin aflame, he leaped on his horse and took off at a gallop. They had to hurry, spurring their horses to catch him up before he falsely alerted the whole column and stirred panic. The troops were mystified by the Custers’ unseemly high spirits. For days after, each time either Tom or he looked at Bos they burst out laughing.

  A fresh Sioux trail was found. It bore the feeling of the inevitable.

  The leader of the scouts talked to his men, and Golden Buffalo listened and knew this was the beginning of his prophecy.

  —Men, ride fast and hard into their camp. Take their horses to make them weak. Boys, I will not lie to you. It will be a day of hard fighting, but if you live through it you will emerge as men, as warriors. Keep your courage.

  Custer went to the scouts and wanted them to sing the death song for the coming battle. When they skipped over any particular of the ritual, he reminded them and waited until they had done it complete. When it was over, he was well satisfied.

  Afterward they sat around the fire to eat.

  —What do you think of the report of large camps of Sioux?

  Golden Buffalo sprang to his feet and did a dance as if possessed around the fire, his feet quick and dodging, his head and body twisting and turning as if against the blows of an enemy.

  —This is how the Indian will fight. They will not stand still in lines to shoot. The Sioux brag hunting soldiers is as easy as hunting buffalo calves when they do this.

  Custer nodded, amused.

  —It is not how the white man has learned to fight. I know the Indian way. Your people are like the coyote, you know how to hide, to creep up and take by surprise. You are born part horse.

  The scouts were well pleased at the compliment.

  Now the officers joined them by the fire.

  —I have orders for you scouts. I say it in front of my men so no one can say they misunderstood. You have done well finding the Lakota for me. All that is left is for you to take away their horses. Then your job is done. I want you scouts to be careful. In the heat of battle, soldiers might mistake you for the enemy. When I win victory, you will be well taken care of by me.

  Everyone was silent around the fire. Custer looked up again as if from a painful thought. He spread out his arms to everyone.

  —Many of the faces here are known and loved by me. We have traveled together on other expeditions over the years. Seeing you again makes my heart glad.

  * * *

  GHOSTS GATHERED AROUND CUSTER, including the last ones from the recent burial ground. The warrior from the red-and-black scaffold joined. The red-painted infant. This cannot be blamed on me. Yet he saw how that could be argued. A kind of reversal was happening—instead of death growing less powerful, it had outgrown the living. The dead men, far from being anonymous, grew more demanding each time they presented themselves, and Custer grew more deferential. He was being pressed into responsibility for each life cut short. Would his own life be asked for as final payment? If so, would it be enough? He felt himself already consigned to the past.

  He bowed his head.

  The world as far as he could see was mainly faithless and unjust. If it had been in his power to change it, he gladly would have. It was all he could do to try and not be at its mercy.

  Bloody Knife was mounted next to him as they surveyed the valley below, the silvered windings of the Tongue and Bighorn rivers.

  —We will win. It will be victory enough to last both of us our lifetimes, Custer said.

  Bloody Knife did not look him in the face but instead pointed.

  —See that sun in the sky? If you say it will not move, I cannot dispute you.

  Bloody Knife slapped his hand down hard on his thigh and rode away.

  —You will see, Custer called to his retreating back.

  All eyes, of both the dead and the living, were now upon him, expecting … demanding … victory, which if achieved would be begrudged. If he was unsuccessful, the papers would crow that he’d grown soft. Even his favorite scouts had lost the stomach for the coming confrontation, and they were right more often than not. A bad omen. Some made to turn around, their job to find the camp done. Others, who insisted on staying by his side, in unfathomable loyalty, said if they followed him into the Bighorn Valley, they would not return alive … Death, necessary end / Will come when it will come.

  As he walked through camp he saw Golden Buffalo standing alone and went to him.

  —What do you think of the coming battle, my friend?

  —It is a fool’s errand.

  Golden Buffalo met Custer’s eyes, knowing the disrespect of his words. The general chuckled.

  —No doubt. And I am just that fool.

  He walked back through the crowded darkness to his tent. He was bone tired. Instead of dinner he ate only a piece of bread dipped in honey. It tasted as sweet as a woman’s lips.

  GOLDEN BUFFALO

  When hi’es’tzie walked away, Golden Buffalo saw in his steps a defeated man although he himself did not yet know it. He would lead the blue soldiers to their death. The prophecy now revealed the last bit of itself. With the buffalo gone, his people were conquered and would not be able to rise up again. He, Golden Buffalo, had named himself after something that no longer existed.

  After this nothing more would happen.

  He wished to be like the old men riding off to final battle. Hi’es’tzie was no worse than another, and so Golden Buffalo would follow him down into the valley from which there was no return. There would be no one to shout his feats of bravery, no seed to carry his name. He did not belong to the world of the future.

  LIBBIE

  The days before official word was received passed as if in a dream. The atmosphere was like in a hospital where things are going badly for the patient. People avoided Libbie’s eye. Dispatches had come in and Indian scouts had taken off like lightning to reach the expedition. After they left, the women were told for the first time about Crook’s defeat and how those same victorious warriors had gone on to join Sitting Bull against the army in
the valley of the Little Bighorn. Their troops, it was feared, would be overwhelmed by numbers if not warned. The scouts arrived too late.

  Each day the fort was subjected to attacks by hostiles, which the guards repulsed. The women were made hostages in their house. They banded together and tried to take comfort in one another’s company, but there was a feeling of dread over the whole place.

  Without telegraph lines or steamboats, the Indians had a far more supple, organic way of obtaining information of events, and knew about the massacre long before official word came. Days before the news, an Indian scout had come and talked of Autie being dead, along with his whole company, but these words struck them as fantastical. Libbie watched the scout, saw his extreme grief in describing the rout, and knew it was true.

  Then on July 5 the steamer Far West came, bearing the wounded and the terrible, terrible news.

  It was the middle of a very hot summer night. The moon pooled like mercury over the land, beautiful and menacing. Knocking could be heard at the back door and then loud voices, the clap of boots along the thin wooden boards. Libbie’s first, sleep-filled thought was that Autie must have come home early. Drowsy, she heard the front door open, admitting more people. Then she knew.

  Her hands shook as she fumbled with buttons until finally Eliza had to dress her as if she were a small, distraught child. In the parlor men as pale as wax read the words aloud. She wept, knowing that this was simply the beginning of endless tears, unending grief. The real pain would start soon, but she reminded herself she was Mrs. General Custer. As post commander’s wife, her last duty now was to go with the men and inform the other widows. Despite the heat she wrapped a shawl around herself to stop her shaking.

  It was not until she was outside that she realized her feet were bare.

  * * *

  THE WHOLE COUNTRY AS ONE focused on the national tragedy. The telegraph labored between Bismarck and Fargo and St. Paul and then on eastward: ALL THE CUSTERS KILLED. Not only her Autie, but his brothers Tom and Boston, his nephew Autie Reed, his brother-in-law Jimmi Calhoun. Not a single survivor in his force, 260 killed. It was a disaster hard to comprehend. Headlines ran in The New York Herald, The New York Times, and the Philadelphia papers. No one could believe the truth. At first rumor, even Sherman and Sheridan had insisted it must be false. The entire country was stunned. Her own shock was so great it seemed entirely natural that the world shared her state of mourning. But the sanctity of her bereavement did not last long. Criticism started almost as soon as the condolences had ended. She had to become a fighter to defend Autie even after he was gone. Although in life he had not held a grudge, she would not forgive his enemies now.