Dying Thunder

by Terry C. Johnston

  A’times he felt just like that. Without much left at the bottom of his soul. What did he have to show for all these years in Amerikay? he asked himself. Here he sat in a dingy sod hovel hard by the Arkansas River, among hard men more resolute than he in grabbing at their dreams.

  He had tried, Seamus commiserated with himself. Lord knows, he had tried. But here he sat, drinking bad whiskey, waiting out his chance to go chasing after some dreamed-of fortune.

  “You should be working for your daily bread, Seamus,” he whispered into the glass, then flicked his tongue at that last drop of red whiskey slowly coursing its way toward his lips.

  “And I’ve found work for us.”

  Startled at the surprise of the familiar voice, Seamus jerked around as Jack Stillwell seated himself at the tiny table beside the Irishman. Stillwell was every bit as curly-headed as he had been that day more than five years ago when he had signed on as the youngest of those who would ride out into Cheyenne country with Major George A. Forsyth’s fifty scouts.* He had proved himself a genuine hero, slipping away from the Arickaree under cover of darkness and crossing more than a hundred miles of high plains wilderness to carry word of the survivors’ plight on that bloody island where the warriors of Roman Nose had the white men huddled behind the bloating carcasses of their dead horses and mules.

  “Don’t tell me—you’re guiding more government men, is it, Jack?”

  Stillwell smiled, his eyes merry. “Be some time before I’ll get myself talked into guiding for the likes of those treasure-hungry bastards, Pierce and Graves.”*

  “Makes no matter what it is, Jack—count me out. I’ve my own business to attend to. And attend to it at last I will,” Seamus replied, pouring himself another brimming glass of whiskey.

  “Count you out? Before you’ve heard me out?”

  “All I know is that in the last few months of traveling with you, I’ve nearly been roasted to death in a prairie fire, then nearly froze to death in the first bleeming blizzard of the season. It’s time I relax a bit.” He hoisted his glass to Stillwell. “And relax is just what I intend on doing.”

  Stillwell watched the Irishman bring the glass to his lips. “Scouting: just what you was cut out to do from the start.”

  He dragged his big, scarred hand across his lips, swiping the droplets from his shaggy mustache that hung over the groomed Vandyke beard. “Drinking whiskey and slipping my hand inside a woman’s perfumed blouse sounds more to me liking, Jack.”

  “Scouting’s in your blood. Liam was one of the best—” Jack stopped mid-sentence.

  He could tell Stillwell had realized his transgression. “It’s all right.” Seamus topped off the glass and raised it. “Here’s to the memory of me uncle Liam—a finer man never guided the U.S. Army across this trackless wilderness.”

  “You’re blood of his blood, and always will be, Seamus. Chances are, you’ll be even better than Liam ever was.”

  “If scouting was something I wanted to do with the rest of me life.”

  Stillwell leaned back in his chair and sighed. “Whiskey and women. That’s it? For the rest of your life?”

  “What you’re offering isn’t anywhere near as much fun, is it, Jack?”

  He plopped his elbows down on the table as he leaned forward. “Working for Colonel Miles.”

  Seamus eyed him thoughtfully for but a moment. “He’s up at Larned, is he not?”

  Jack’s head bobbed. “With about half his regiment. The Fifth Infantry. Miles is beginning to call in most of the rest from the other posts where they’ve been on duty.”

  With a squint he asked, “Another campaign?”

  After glancing around and leaning forward, Stillwell replied, “Too much happened for the army to let go unanswered. From reports of the Cheyenne raiding into Kansas, on down to Texas where the Kiowa and Comanche have been striking here and there.”

  “Can’t say as I blame them, Jack. What with the white horse thieves waltzing right in and rustling Indian stock from under the noses of the army and agents both. I’d get riled too. Reuben and the rest down at Sill got their hands full this time: keeping the whites away from the Indians and keeping the Indians from striking back at the whites. Thank you, but no, Jack.”

  “I figure it will be the army’s loss, not having the likes of Seamus Donegan riding out come the spring campaign.”

  “They’re going after the bands for sure?”

  “The smart money has it that it’s only time before the Comanche and the rest are crushed once and for all.”

  He nodded. “Aye, only a matter of time, isn’t it?”

  Seamus remembered the last few weeks he and Jack had taken traveling north from Fort Richardson, when he had finally torn himself from Samantha Pike and Sharp Grover and made his excuses about leaving, made up what he thought would be lies about returning to Jacksboro when this business on the Canadian was done and over with.

  But the more he thought about Samantha, how her kiss had been like a lick of flame sucking into a piece of over-dry tender that first night in Grover’s pole-and-shake barn. Just looking at her, remembering the shape of the shadow her naked body cut in the moonlight, was enough to put drool on a dead man.

  But he had convinced himself it was best to leave that woman who could raise more hell in him than any number of average blanketings he had enjoyed. Or so he told himself all the way north from Texas, crossing the Red River to Fort Sill. From there on he had sensed something almost tangible, something of an uneasy feeling to the crisp winter air that nudged the leafless branches of the blackjack oaks and alders along the water courses. More than winter itself had given the land the odor of things dead and dying.

  “The wrinkled old medicine doctors been thumping their drums and whirling their rattles,” Reuben Waller had explained one winter evening during their brief layover at Sill. “Those old men in the council lodges been praying for the game to come back while the young men try to dance back the buffalo.” The Negro sergeant had wagged his head morosely. “They’re down to eating their ponies.”

  “What ponies don’t get stolen by the likes of those bad characters you tracked all the way to New Mexico, Reuben,” Donegan had replied in the Fort Sill mess hall where they shared many a cup of black, potent army coffee.

  While the white horse thieves emptied the tribal pastures of horses, and the harsh winter worked its evil to empty the bellies of the reservation bands. The Kiowa and Comanche and Cheyenne hearts were being sucked dry as a milkweed pod of all hope. All hope, that is, save for leaving the white man’s reservations and returning to the old way of life on the buffalo ground.

  If the agents weren’t admitting it, then at least the army was openly talking about the fact that this growing despair one day would likely bloom into outright frenzy. And Colonel Black Jack Davidson’s Tenth Cavalry would be right at the heart of whatever would come to rock these southern plains. Time and time only would tell when this land would tear itself apart.

  “So it’s still the gold you’re after, Irishman.”

  Donegan’s gray eyes quickly flashed their warning at Stillwell. “You promised you’d still your tongue about it when you said you wanted no part of this treasure hunt.”

  Jack grinned. “I did. And I got out because I got to thinking how crazy a tale it was. You really believe you’ll find a fortune in Spanish gold out there?” He pointed west, toward the Staked Plain. That fabled Llano Estacado of Coronado’s conquistadors.

  “Time was, I thought you believed in it too, Jack.”

  “Perhaps I still do,” he sighed. “But, I’ll not die chasing that gold like a madman.”

  “A madman am I now?” He snorted and drained his glass with a quick toss.

  “Easy money, eh, Seamus?”

  “By the saints! Been nothing easy about it, Jack.”

  “But scouting—”

  “Scouting’s easy work? You’re bloody well daft!”

  Stillwell pushed back from the table a bit. “You’l
l not ride with me to Larned to see what Colonel Miles has on his mind?”

  “Not while there’s the chance that there’s a fortune to be found out there, Jack. Gold is what brought me to this bleeming wilderness to begin with eight winters gone now. And gold is what I pray I’ll still find.”

  Stillwell stood. “You eaten today?”

  Donegan finally shook his head, staring into his glass.

  “C’mon. Least I can do is buy you supper.”

  “I’ll stay here. Thank you anyway.”

  Slipping his hand beneath the Irishman’s arm, Stillwell said, “We’re eating over at Louis Abragon’s place tonight.”

  A sudden heat crossed his cheeks as a fire leapt to his heart. “The Mexican’s back?”

  “Heard he came in this afternoon from Leavenworth. Brought him back some new girls.”

  Donegan stood with a clatter of chair legs on the uneven floor planks. “Supper, and by glory some new soft faces to look upon. What in blazes are we waiting for, Jack?”

  3

  Moon of First Eggs, 1874

  The new grass was raising its head across the hillsides as far as a man could see. For more than three moons now Lone Wolf had stared into the distance, looking south and west. Where lay the bodies of his son and nephew.

  He could wait no longer.

  Their ponies had grown strong enough to make this journey. Tonight would be the dark of the moon. He would ride south with the young men, elude the patrols along the river and cross into Tehas to recover the bodies.

  His wives did not want him to go. Grief was strong enough to keep other men at home. But not Lone Wolf. His normally grave face had been chiseled even more deeply now with the scars of mourning, every bit as deeply as were the fresh scars that tracked his arms, scored his legs. His once long hair, the pride of a Kiowa warrior, now hung in ugly tatters. Hair he had hacked off then burned in the same fire that had consumed his lodge and most everything he had owned.

  Lone Wolf would complete this vow he had made to the Grandfather Above. First to recover the bodies. Then to exact revenge on the white man for the murders.

  They were but boys, he thought now as the cool breeze of evening brought with it the smells of blossoms along the creek bottom. The yellowleg soldiers had murdered exuberant boys gone on a raid to Mexico. Nothing short of murder.

  For sure the Comanche and Kiowa war party had stolen some Mexican horses, killed some Mexican herders, and were bringing north some Mexican prisoners—but what business was that of Three-Finger Kinzie’s white soldiers anyway?

  Better that the army use their guns to keep the hide hunters away from the buffalo ground.

  With the coming of each winter, Lone Wolf had watched in growing alarm the gradual disappearance of the great herds that had once blanketed the southern plains. Come now the crying of the children with empty bellies, and the long faces on the old ones who had too little to eat, the going of the buffalo was no longer only a matter of starvation. The white man was stamping out the Indian’s spiritual existence.

  Rising up when and where they could, the bands gathered around Lone Wolf struck back. In February they had attacked some white surveyors northwest of the Anadarko Agency, killing one and driving the rest back to the agent’s buildings. A month later some young warriors boldly fired into a squad of buffalo soldiers near Fort Sill itself. The brunettes returned the fire and chased the warriors until they scattered and disappeared. But several trails of blood were found on the ground, along with a Kiowa war bonnet. And ever since the first leafing of the trees this spring, snipers had been firing into the Camp Augur stockade of buffalo soldiers at the Red River, from as close as eighty paces. Tensions were clearly growing.

  It would soon be time to strike with more muscle. But first Lone Wolf had to recover the bodies.

  As was the Kiowa custom in such matters, Lone Wolf asked another chief to lead the expedition. Mamay-day-te agreed, for he had been a close childhood friend of Tauankia, Lone Wolf’s son, and as well a member of the on-de, the highest caste among the Kiowa. There was no question in his agreeing, especially in light of the fact that he had been one of the leaders of the raid returning from Mexico when the warriors were killed. Another survivor of the fight with the yellowlegs, Long Horn, declared that he knew where the bodies had been abandoned—he volunteered to guide the Kiowa south into Tehas.

  Beneath the black of the moonless night they led their ponies away from the Cache Creek campsite, stopping to climb aboard the animals only when they were a handful of miles from the agency. With nothing more than starlight, memory of the terrain, and their prayers, the two dozen warriors pointed their noses south to the land of the Tehannos, where the Kiowa were forbidden to go.

  Seeking cover when the sun rose each day, emerging from hiding only when twilight darkened the land, the Kiowa took three nights to reach the Red River. Crossing the following night to avoid the patrols of buffalo soldiers, the warriors crossed into the land that would bring them sure death were they spotted by the yellowlegs. It was here that Long Horn pointed their noses west by southwest, moving out of the lush country for the more open landscape as the horsemen climbed ever on toward the Staked Plain. The warming days passed endlessly as they waited out the crossing of the sun. Each night’s travel seemed all too short while Long Horn led them beneath the dark sky, taking his bearings from nothing more than the glittering clusters of stars overhead.

  Two suns past the White River, the guide led them into a shallow canyon where he informed the warriors they would await sunrise, and sleep out the day.

  “How far now?” Lone Wolf asked the question he had given voice to every morning of their journey.

  “We will be there tonight,” answered Long Horn.

  He had not expected the answer. So close now to the body of his son. The body of his nephew. Lone Wolf looked at Red Otter, his brother. The warrior nodded.

  “Those of you who came to recover the bones of our relatives, do not climb down from your ponies,” Lone Wolf told them.

  With a hushed silence heavy like the still air trapped in that narrow ravine, the two dozen gathered close, ponies snorting.

  “We go on, Mamay-day-te. Do you agree?” Red Otter asked, turning to the expedition leader.

  The young warrior looked first at the two grieving fathers, then glanced quickly over the rest, assessing their will. Finally he nodded. “We go on. Long Horn, take us to the hillside where we left the bodies of our friends.”

  A warm spring sun hung nearly at mid-sky when Long Horn reined up and pointed a finger into the distance. He traced the path of the brush that rimmed the narrow thread of a creek leading into the timbered hills.

  “There. You will find the bodies of your sons,” said the guide.

  Lone Wolf looked at his brother. Then he turned to the rest halted behind them. “You can stay, or you can come. It matters not. Red Otter and I will not be long in gathering the bones of our loved ones.”

  He did not have to look behind him as he tapped heels to his pony’s ribs to know the rest were following in respectful silence. Red Otter halted at his side among the stunted piñon. Their moccasins touched the ground together as some of the animals snorted, the stench of death still strong on the breeze.

  It was heavy in his nostrils as he knelt beside what was left of the first body.

  What had not been brutalized by the winter storms and spring rains had been discovered by predators. Little flesh remained on the bones picked over by the four-leggeds and the flies-above. Nonetheless, the stench of death’s own decay hung over this place, and would forever remain in his nostrils.

  “This is my son,” Red Otter said quietly as he lifted a shred of leather legging from the new grass, a bit of colorful quillwork adorning that scrap of clothing.

  With a sigh, Lone Wolf rose shakily as Red Otter fell to his knees and began his wailing. He moved off a few yards, his eyes searching. Then he spotted something white sticking up from the green of the new grass and
those rainbow colors of an array of prairie flowers draping the hillside.

  It was a bone. A long, heavy leg bone looking so profane and out of place here among the new life of the prairie. And near it the shreds of clothing that showed it was Tauankia’s moccasin. Among the scattering of bones, Lone Wolf collapsed to his knees, beginning to wail and keen, his voice sharp against the midday air. Down the slope, Red Otter’s grief was growing as well.

  Lone Wolf crawled clumsily on his hands and knees, scooping bones and bits of torn clothing from the sandy soil and new grass, clutching the remains of what had been his firstborn son in the crook of one arm, the tears flowing freely.

  Mamay-day-te wordlessly came to his side.

  Blinking his eyes clear, Lone Wolf looked up into the spring sky at the tall young warrior. The expedition leader spread his own blanket on the ground, then stepped away out of respect and his own mourning. Down the slope, Long Horn was spreading a blanket for Red Otter.

  Onto Mamay-day-te’s blanket Lone Wolf carefully laid the bones of his son. He felt colder inside with each new fragment he located in the grass of that piñon-studded hillside. Yet, it amazed him that it was a cold fire he sensed in his breast as he performed this necessary ritual. While cold, the flames of his fury for the white man grew higher still as he gathered these last tangible shreds of his favorite son.

  First one bone, then another … Lone Wolf held them to the sky, to the sun, crying out over them, releasing his grief, vowing to avenge the dishonor, the death, the murder of his flesh. The spilling of his blood—

  “Red Otter!”

  Down the slope that voice lanced through the Kiowa chief’s mourning. He blinked tears free and looked downhill at his brother. Mamay-day-te was hurrying to Red Otter’s side.

  “Lone Wolf!” the young warrior shouted up the slope. He was pointing to the south.

  “Our sentries—they see yellowlegs coming!”

  Lone Wolf stood. “The soldiers?” He was gripped with despair—yet hope took wing that his fury might here be unleashed. His heart beating wildly in that next instant, he asked, “How many?”