No Good Like It Is

  Ridges shrugged, then brightened. “I will say I was shot by a large African warrior. A Mandinka.”

  Big William smiled and said, “Sounds better than ‘nigger,’ don’t it?”

  Even Jimmy Melton laughed. As it died down, Marie-Louise offered another startling revelation. “Honey, she part Cherokee too.”

  It seemed that old Pop Weathers’ Indian mother, one Mary Weathers, had been taken as a young woman in a raid on a Cherokee village around the turn of the century. Impregnated by one of her captors, she escaped and made it back to her tribe. The young half-breed bastard, Bob Weathers, was a misfit, though, and drifted west to Mississippi. He led a miserable life, so he told Marie-Louise, until he found her.

  “Then he died, trying to save my baby, Honey-Marie, from those terrible Yankees.”

  “Then he died an honorable man,” said Jimmy Ridges. “A Cherokee.”

  “Yassur,” said Big William.

  “Is true,” added Honey. “But Mama, why you don’t tole me before?”

  “Some people in Mississippi, they still remember the fighting of Indians. Old Weathers, he din’t tell nobody but me, so I keep to my own self. But now, I think is good for all to know.” She solemnly nodded toward the Cherokees now approaching the shore with Dobey.

  ***

  “I am good,” shouted Jimmy Ridges. “But how are you, Colonel?”

  “I don’t hurt much, Little Brother. We will take ropes and horses and pull the boat to shore, let people off, look after your arm. You’re no longer hostage. I have given these people free passage.” Dobey signaled his agreement.

  Melton said, “I thought the other one was your brother. The captain.”

  “The captain is my real brother. The colonel is just speaking, uh…”

  “Indian talk?”

  “Cherokee talk.”

  “Sorry,” muttered Melton. “I’ll do better.” Turning up to the wheelhouse, he shouted, “Captain Stafford—you better show us where to tie those ropes. Bear, you and Buck and this blind-assed Mandinka go help ‘em. Ladies, better pack up. And wake up that drunk dentist.” Big William grinned, saluted, and left.

  “I’m quite awake, sir. Though somewhat confused.” A half dressed Dr. John stood in a doorway, knife in his left hand, and an ivory-handled Colt Police Model in the other.

  Four hours later, the wagons and livestock were ashore and connected, the hapless second mate buried, and Captain ‘Boots’ Stafford was ready to re-board his vessel and head back to Fort Smith. Dobey gave him ten dollars for the mate’s family, and they were shaking hands, when he looked over Dobey’s shoulder and whispered, “Saints preserve us.”

  Dobey turned. Hundreds of armed, gray-clad Cherokees lined the river embankment, while dozens rode slowly down onto the sandy beach following an impressive figure in the uniform of a Confederate general. Dobey’s heart pounded like a drum, and the hair on his arm stiffened.

  Melton said to no one in particular, “I got a chill. He some kind of a king or something?”

  “That’s my real uncle,” said Jimmy Ridges.

  Chapter Thirty-eight

  “This gives you free passage, from my men. I cannot speak for the bandit people north of the river.” General Stand Watie folded the paper and handed it to Captain Stafford. “I cannot tell you what to do, but I would not fly that flag in this region. Not yet. Maybe not ever.”

  Captain Stafford thanked him, saluted, shook hands around, and fifteen minutes later, the Blue Cat steamed east, defiantly flying the American flag.

  “Brave man,” said the general. “Maybe not too smart.”

  “He won’t no Yankee, General. He is just an American again now, as I guess we all are.” Dobey sounded resigned to it.

  Watie turned to stare at him, then sat on the ground abruptly, tossed his hat aside and called for tea.

  “You rather have coffee, General?” asked Melton.

  “I would almost forgive you for killing my men, if you had real coffee.” Watie looked dubious.

  “Gimme five minutes at that fire. Y’all go on and talk.”

  The general signaled Dobey and Colonel Creek to sit too. “I should not joke about my dead men. This is bad business, and my men are not happy. It is good you buried the one English in front of them, and that my nephew saw the other wounded English on the boat.” He paused. “But it is bad that you killed three of us, and hurt so many. And we lost horses. But you helped my nephew, even though you shot him. And one of you is Cherokee. We need to smoke on this.”

  As they lit up, a blood-spattered Dr. Thomason joined them and, without invitation, poured some coffee and sat. “Your medical team is quite good, Sir. I assisted in removing two cleverly placed bullets, and did one unusual suture.” He stared hard at Melton. “I might have finished sooner, had someone not denied me a stabilizing brandy. I trust that I may have one now?”

  “No one except condemned men drink in my camps,” said General Watie.

  “Too late anyhow,” added Captain Ridges, as he joined them. He tossed a small, empty bottle to Melton. “He poured some on the wounds, and some in himself.”

  “Well, I’m certainly condemned. Abducted by a whore, confined on a boat with no decent bar, and about to be murdered by Indians for drinking in the afternoon. Certainly I qualify for a large glass now.” He struggled to his feet and shouted, “It is a good time to die!”

  Several nearby Cherokees, members of Watie’s staff, nervously fingered their weapons and laughed, but the General said firmly, “Sit down, you old fool, and drink coffee.”

  As the dentist sat, huffing, Jimmy Melton asked, “What’s a ‘soocher’?”

  “It is the sewing of a wound, Sergeant. It is an act I must frequently perform, in my primary duties as a dental surgeon. Frontiersmen seem to feel that they must knock each other’s teeth out, almost as a daily ritual.”

  Jimmy turned to Dobey and laughed, “Hell, he just means stitching.”

  “Just a minute, there,” inserted General Watie. “Did you say you’re a dental doctor?”

  “Charles John Thomason, at your service, Sir.”

  “Well, Doctor Thomason, you just look at my jaws here, and mayhaps you will see part of why I am so peevish.”

  As it turned out, Watie had an impacted molar. One hour later, the dazed general gazed at it in his palm. He croaked a dubious thanks, and asked when he could remove the hatchet from the top of his head. The dentist gave him a powder for the pain, and sarcastically suggested that he not take alcohol with it.

  ***

  Even as the dentist worked on the General, Junebug was filling in the women on the good Doctor John, with information pieced together from sober conversations and drunken ravings. Well educated, from a good family on the South Carolina coast, he had a successful dental practice by 1850. He also enjoyed gambling and women with little care about their marital state. As a result, he was called out several times. Hit twice, he still limped slightly, but was the clear winner of each duel.

  He only killed three men. “Well,” he’d say, “a goodly number more than that

  before I learned of disinfectants, but only three with pistols”. Two of them richly deserved their ends, but the third was Doctor John’s ruin. He was an eighteen-year-old with a gambling and drinking problem, the oldest son of a very wealthy planter. He was also the younger brother of the only woman to really interest the rowdy dentist, who decided to help the family and teach the boy a lesson, with pistols at dawn.

  The boy felt that the dentist was beneath his sister, and meant to kill him. Chucky Jack, as Dr. John was then called, only meant to scare the boy, but hit him in the stomach. When he died, two agonizing days later, Dr. John’s first career was finished, despite the fact that the dead boy’s ball had broken Thomason’s rib. “He moved,” Dr. John would wail. “If only he hadn’t tried to dodge. I meant only to break his damned arm.”

  ***

  As the general’s pain dissipated, he became more forgiving. At that point, Jimmy R
idges approached and suggested that the Texans be given an escort, at least past Black Kettle’s Cheyennes, or maybe on to their destination. In either case, he felt he would be the ideal leader for the escort, as he was a wounded veteran and General/Chief Watie’s nephew. That latter fact was important, as no one in the Territories wanted to antagonize Stand Watie.

  The general said he would smoke that over, and as it had grown late, he discontinued the conference until the next morning. When Dobey offered himself and his men for guard duty, Watie smiled approval of the offer, but declined.

  ***

  When the women relayed the new information on Dr. John to Dobey and Jimmy Melton later, Jimmy’s initial reaction was simply, “What kind of name is Chucky Jack?” Dobey explained that Colonel Charles John Sevier, a Patriot hero in the victory over the British at Kings Mountain, South Carolina, was called Chucky Jack. He was a profane scrapper.

  Jimmy grunted. “I don’t know about that. But if that skinny old man was winning gunfights fifteen years ago, maybe he’s scrappy enough hisself to beat this likker thing.”

  ***

  Unknown to Jimmy, Junebug had decided to help the scrappy old dentist herself. Explaining her problem to sympathetic Cherokee “medicine men,” she obtained a powder that could be mixed with food to make alcohol repulsive. Dr. John owned a fair supply of a salve to deaden gums, a salve he could re-order. She traded enough of it to secure a goodly portion of the new powder, and put some in his soup that very same night.

  The dentist startled everyone the next morning by showing up for the coffee gathering around the fire. He looked like death, warmed over.

  “You all right, Doc, Honey?” Junebug asked sweetly.

  “I have not slept. I am unable to hold down my liquor, despite my very best efforts. The moment I swallow, I have this gag reflex. It must be some vile illness I’ve contracted from these heathens. Perhaps I’ll try coffee.”

  “Aw, Doc—I’m so sorry you feel bad. Try some of these johnnycakes. Them Indians give us some honey to go on ‘em. Maybe it’ll coat your stomach.”

  When small sips and nibbles stayed down, Junebug suggested he try to leave the liquor alone til the illness passed.

  ***

  As the officers waited for the General to restart the meeting, Jimmy Ridges and Bear talked.

  “So, you Captain Walls’ chief scout?”

  Bear nodded. “Sort of. Maybe his only scout.”

  “Your sister is Cherokee, but you are not. You Mandinka too?”

  “Mebbe. I don’t know what my tribe was. What’s a headquarters company?”

  “Scouts, mostly. My brother, the captain there, he’s chief scout. General calls him the intelligence officer. But the company is also home for the colonel, the cooks, supply peoples, horse breakers and herders, messengers, medical peoples, like that. I have a section of scouts. Twenty of ‘em.”

  ***

  General Watie soon called for the conference to resume, and was pleased when the Texans brought a pot of coffee. When it was shared around, Dobey asked if he could speak first.

  “I’ve thought on this, and I have a proposal. We have some captured Yankee dollars, and we want to offer a wrongful death payment of twenty-five dollars to each of the dead men’s families, and give five dollars to each wounded soldier.”

  The general nodded, his brow deeply furrowed. “Some men are wounded worse than others. My nephew there, Jimmy Ridges, and Colonel Creek, for them maybe five dollars is good. But one man’s leg is broke, and another had his eye shot out.”

  “Maybe ten dollars for the worse wounds?” Dobey paused. “And maybe another ten to the men who lost horses?”

  “Captain Walls, I think you are a fair man. Since most of the wounded also lost their horses, I think this will make them feel better. Colonel Creek, how does this plan sound to you?”

  Creek smiled. “Be the first time I got paid to get shot. My men will understand, and will no longer grumble. It is good.”

  “Captain Ridges?”

  “Hell, Uncle, we shot them first. They thought we was Kiowas or something, wearing captured uniforms. Yes, it is good. More than fair. If these won’t captured dollars, I’d say we should not take them, but seeing as they is, well,…”

  General Watie smiled and nodded again. “I am glad my officers think like I do. Perhaps I have taught something after all.” Turning to Dobey, he said, “It is done, then. Give the dollars to Captain Ridges. Two of the dead men were brothers, the only members of their family to live through a Comanche raid. They were not married. We’ll give their money to the family of the other dead man, as he had five children.”

  The other Cherokees murmured approval. Captain Ridges said, “When my wife hears of this, she may ask these Texans to kill me. Seventy-five dollars is a lot. But it is good.”

  Watie continued. “I have also decided to send a company, led by the new lieutenant, Jimmy Ridges, to go with you past Black Kettle’s hunting grounds along the Washita. Some of his Cheyenne need watching, and there might be Yankee raiders from north of the Canadian who don’t know the war is over. He will do some scouting for us that way, in case we are forced from our home grounds here.”

  “General, I am speechless. I was going to ask for a guide; this is more than we could expect. I have something for you, though.” Dobey stood and signaled to Sergeant Melton, who waited twenty yards away. Melton approached, saluted the General, then handed a Spencer and a shot-tube to Dobey.

  It was Dobey’s old one, the one Buck had used on the boat. Dobey took it, and instructed Melton to go with Captain Ridges and pay him the agreed sum.

  As Captain Ridges and Melton left, Dobey turned back to the General, and handed him the Spencer and spare ammunition. “I carried this, fought with it, for near on a year. I want you to have it, for your fair treatment of us.”

  The General stood, accepted it, and held it up for his staff to see, and got a hearty cheer in return. Unable to speak, he gripped Dobey’s shoulder for a second, then turned and walked away.

  ***

  They rode west along the south bank of the Canadian at noon. The newly promoted Jimmy Ridges rode beside Dobey, his fifty Cherokee troopers riding ahead and on the flanks.

  “That Spencer looks mighty familiar,” said Dobey.

  “Yes,” smiled Jimmy Ridges. “My uncle gave it to me. Said it was meant to be in the hands of a fighter, not a tired old general. I hope you will show me how it works.”

  “Nice to have you and your men with us. Maybe you won’t have to use it.”

  Jimmy Melton just snorted.

  ***

  Bear and Buck rode on the opposite side of the wagons from Dobey, Melton, and Ridges. Buck had Jimmy Melton’s old Sharps carbine across his pommel.

  “You mad about giving up that Spencer?”

  “Naw. That Indian’s got more experience than me, and the captain said we was on thin ice back there. If’n it helped get us this cavalry escort, Hell, I’m happy to let it go. `Sides, Sergeant Melton says this Sharps is more powerful and served him well. Pretty fast, too.”

  Bear grunted. “That Boss, he knows guns.” They rode a while. “Since I got this repeater, I’ma loan you one of my revolvers. Till you get you one. And I’ma ask that Jimmy Ridges can I ride some scout with his men, see can I learn how they read signs out here. Want to go?”

  Buck Watson was astounded at the offer. Surprised that Bear would give up one of his Remingtons, but mainly aware of the implied acceptance of him as worthy of an important and dangerous task. “Hell yes. Yes I would. You think Boss will approve?”

  “Let’s ast him.”

  Chapter Thirty-nine

  The pine forests and lakes of Arkansas gradually gave way to the scrub oaks and rocky gulleys of the Indian Territory as they plodded towards the grasslands. Possums became armadillos. As they moved westward, the men talked.

  “She knows about the money yet?” Dobey asked, after making sure no one was within earshot.

  “She
knows,” said Jimmy Melton. “Made her promise not to talk, though, not even to Honey. How ‘bout Honey?”

  “Oh, yeah. I did the same. Hard to keep that secret, when you’re, ah, spending so much time with ‘em. Think they’ll keep it quiet?”

  “Yeah, Cap’n, I do. I trust ‘em.” He picked his teeth with a straw for a minute, then continued, “You thought this out, beyond us getting to Canadian Fort? I mean, about us and them?”

  Dobey took a deep breath. “Jimmy, I’m hooked. I mean to marry her. Told her already. Guess you know I ain’t told her mother. Or Bear. Don’t know how that’ll go. How ‘bout you?”

  “Hell, Cap’n, we’s already hitched, far as we’re concerned. Ain’t no chance of no church wedding for us nohow, even was they a church somewhere’s out here. And don’t worry about Bear, or Marie-Louise. They both likes you.” He laughed, “Shoot, the trouble would be if you don’t marry her.”

  “Good to hear. Well, beyond that, I thought we see about setting up with my stepfather, mother and brother, if they’re still there. See if we can turn into storekeepers ourselves. Hoped you’d throw in with us.”

  “I’d like that. So would Marie-Louise. Who we be selling to, exactly?”

  “Well, buffalo hunters. Lead, powder, knives, guns. Maybe some liquor. And food. Horses to the army. Take hides in trade, truck them down to Amarillo, or wherever there’s a train.”

  “Jimmy Ridges says his men tell him there’s all kind of longhorns running loose south of there. Might run some of them to the army, too.”