The Coming

by David Osborne

  * * *

  Lieutenant Woodruff struggled up the bluff and hurried toward Miles. He had been with Carter when they charged the Indian camp. “We lost eight of twenty, dead or wounded,” he said, gasping for air. “They’re pretty well dug in.”

  “Did you have covering fire?”

  “Not enough.”

  God damn it to hell! Miles looked around him, saw Lieutenant Long returning on horseback from the field hospital. “How many have we lost?”

  “Eighteen dead, more than forty wounded, by my count.”

  “Son of a bitch!” Miles looked across the swale to the east, saw more men and horses dead than alive.

  “Any orders, sir?” Long asked.

  He glared at the young lieutenant. “We can’t charge the bastards head on. We don’t have enough men left.”

  He paced, wondering how the savages had learned to shoot so well. “Extend a picket line around their entire camp,” he ordered. “I don’t want one Indian escaping.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Woodruff still stood in front of him. “What should I tell Lieutenant Carter, sir?”

  “Where is he?”

  “They took cover in a gully cut by the creek, this side of the Indian camp.”

  “Tell him to withdraw when it’s safe. If he has to wait for dark, he should wait. We can’t afford to lose any more men.”

  Woodruff saluted, turned, and trotted off toward the bluff.

  Miles had lost a quarter of his command. The sky was darkening, and a cold rain had begun. He pulled the collar of his cavalry coat up around his neck. A siege would not be pleasant in this weather, not without their supply wagons. And if it went on too long, Sitting Bull might find them. No doubt some of the warriors who had escaped were already headed north as fast as their horses could ride. He shivered, involuntarily, at the thought of a thousand Sioux descending upon them. He had no desire to follow in the footsteps of his friend George Custer, but he had the savages in his grip, and he was damned if he was going to let them go.

  He signaled to Long: “Send couriers to General Howard and Colonel Sturgis. Tell them”—he hesitated as Long pulled out a small pad and a pencil. “Tell them I have this day surprised the hostile Nez Perces in their camp and have had a very sharp fight. I have many officers and men wounded. About 250 Indians are still in their camp, which is still protected.”

  He stopped. “Sign my name, and tell the couriers to hurry.”

  No, that was hardly sufficient. Regardless of how distasteful he found it, he needed to make sure Sturgis and Howard understood they were to come to his aid. “Add a postscript,” he barked. “We captured most of their herd, but I may have difficulty in moving, on account of my wounded. Please move forward with caution and rapidity.”

  The rain turned to sleet. After dark, Thunder Rising left his rifle pit and walked toward the rear of camp, where he could hear the death wails of mourning women. As he approached other sounds mixed with the wailing: quiet voices, children crying, the scraping of camas hooks and knives as people dug into the earth. In the black night he could see the shapes of a dozen horses grazing in the bottom of the grassy ravine. There were no fires—they would only give the soldiers targets. The sleet was turning to huge flakes of wet snow now, blown almost sideways by the wind. People were cold; few had buffalo robes. Women dug shelters in the sides of the ravine; warriors dug rifle pits, farther out, to protect them.

  Springtime was digging, wrapped in an elk hide shawl. Their baby lay in her cradleboard, propped up against the steep side of the ravine. He embraced his wife, held her close for a long moment. “How many fled north?”

  “Perhaps a hundred.”

  He shuddered. He had helped Sound of Running Feet catch a horse, sent her north. Then he had given Bear Woman Daytime Smoke’s horse, told her to find their daughter and flee across the Medicine Line.

  “Your brother is dead.”

  The words hit him like a club. “You are certain?”

  “He died near here. And Lean Elk. Sound of Striking Timber. Lone Bird.”

  He held her, closed his eyes against the tears. He wanted to collapse, roll into a ball and weep. But he must not let his people see him weaken. He took a deep breath. “Let us make sure everyone has food.”

  Later, he sat with White Bird and Looking Glass in a shelter pit lined with oilcloth, out of the freezing wind. The warriors had brought in all the dead and wounded they could find within the camp’s perimeter, and the women were digging graves. White Thunder crawled through the Soyappo lines into camp. He had seen ten Nimíipuu warriors fall outside the camp, he said. All told, they had lost at least 22; another 40 were wounded. And they were surrounded.

  “We must send men to Sitting Bull,” White Bird said. “He is our only hope.”

  Looking Glass agreed. Because he knew the country best, he named the men who would go—six warriors who had hunted here with him, who knew the land. He gave them instructions and the best of the horses. They waited until the hours before dawn, when the Soyappo soldiers would be most likely to sleep, before they walked north through the ravine, silently leading their horses through the driving snow.

  SIXTY-SEVEN

  October 1877

  When Miles awoke the next morning, he was covered with snow, cold and damp in every bone. He had ordered no fires, for fear of Nez Perce sharpshooters. Like the men, he had slept in a greatcoat, this one lifted from a corpse. His trousers were frozen stiff. The tents and blankets were with the mule team, which had not yet caught up.

  He had established his headquarters behind the high bluffs to the south of the Nez Perce camp. His men had nothing to eat but the hardtack and salt pork they carried in their packs. They were subdued, wordless. As dawn broke, the shooting began again at the front, in sporadic bursts. He would have to try the Hotchkiss gun today, he thought. It probably wouldn’t do much good with the Indians dug in the way they were, but its two-pound shells might give them a scare.

  A shout came from behind him. He turned, saw three men pointing north. He stood up and searched the horizon. “Horses!” one of them shouted. Miles raised his glasses, swept the distant prairie. There was something there, something black. But it was not riders; it was three horses grazing in the distance.

  All morning there were similar false alarms. The specter of Sitting Bull created ghosts in the men’s minds. Toward midmorning, after it had begun to rain, Lieutenant Long spotted two lines of riders to the south, moving toward them. Miles mounted up and the two raced toward them. Sitting Bull’s warriors wouldn’t be to their south; could it be Assiniboines or Gros Ventres, come to help the Nez Perces?

  Miles’s heart pounded and his mind raced, calculating how he would defend their positions. Finally he raised his hand and Long reined in beside him. Both men raised their field glasses.

  “They’re buffalo, Colonel! Goddamn buffalo, in two perfect lines!”

  Miles squinted as relief turned him weak. He’d never seen buffalo walking in two lines, but he was not about to dispute it.

  Red Bear walked back through the snow, the bodies of two women who had been murdered by Painted Arrow warriors early in the fight slung across his horse. He and others had taken advantage of the white flag, while Thunder Rising talked with the bluecoat chief, to collect the corpses that lay scattered about. The soldiers were doing the same, and tending to their wounded, every one of whom the Nimíipuu had allowed to live. Seeing them this close, Red Bear was surprised how young some of them were, barely more than boys. No wonder they fought so poorly.

  Three Painted Arrow warriors had approached Nimíipuu lines early that morning, under a white flag, to tell them the Soyappo war chief would listen to their offers of peace. Then, toward midday, a white flag had appeared up on the bluff to the south and a voice had called in Chinook, “Colonel Miles see Chief Joseph!” They had met on open ground, under a white flag, near where Thunder Rising’s camp had originally been. After a few minutes they had walked back to the bluecoats’
camp.

  Now Light in Mountain and three others who had accompanied Thunder Rising were returning without him. Red Bear hurried forward, tugging on the horse’s bridle. “Where is our chief?” he called out.

  “Bear Coat holds him captive,” Light in Mountain said. “He wants to make us surrender, give up our guns. He says we can go back to our reserve when cold moons end.”

  Red Bear’s blood ran hot. The white flag had been a lie!

  A shout drew his attention to the east. Yellow Bull was dragging a soldier off his brown horse. White Bull ran to his aid, rifle in hand, and jabbed it in the soldier’s chest. “Now I will kill you!”

  “No!” Light in Mountain shouted, sprinting to White Bull and pulling him off the man. “Why don’t you kill soldiers when there is real fighting? Your courage is all in your mouth!”

  Three Painted Arrow men who had been with the soldier were edging up out of the ravine. Red Bear signed to them: You women go back to your masters! Tell Bear Coat that if our chief is harmed, this man will die!

  The soldier lay on his back in the snow, watching them. He wore a long, slick yellow coat, wet with snow, and a fur hat. White Bull glowered at him. “Why so close to our camp does he ride? Is he spying on us?”

  “Use your head!” Red Bear scolded. “We will hold this man, trade him for Thunder Rising. If you want to kill someone, fight bluecoats!”

  Thunder Rising woke on his side, stiff and so cold his body ached. Sharp pains shot through his shoulders and wrists. The soldiers had tied his hands behind his back and his feet together, then rolled him in a blanket. They had left him to sleep outside; wet snow covered his damp blanket.

  He could smell coffee and meat roasting. The Soyappos’ wagons had arrived yesterday, before dark, and they had eaten a large meal. One of the bluecoats had brought Thunder Rising a plate of beef and fry bread. It was the first food he had tasted that day.

  The wagons had brought canvas lodges as well, which the soldiers quickly put up. But still they left Thunder Rising out in the snow with the mules.

  He tried to roll, but pain shot through his shoulders. The way his hands were tied, behind his back, he could not move. He needed to urinate badly. Was he to be left like this all day, to soil himself?

  Sometime later, as he shivered uncontrollably, he heard footsteps. Two soldiers bent down beside him and loosened the blanket, then rolled him sideways to remove it. The pain in his shoulders almost made him faint. Then the one with stripes on his shoulders took out a knife and cut the cords around his hands and feet. Thunder Rising sat up slowly, massaging his wrists and ankles. He did not know if he would be able to stand. The two men reached down and each took an arm, helping him to his feet, which were wet and frozen. His teeth had begun to knock from the shivering.

  They led him away from the mules but he stopped, held up his hands, then turned back toward the mules to urinate. The men waited for him to finish, then led him toward the camp. They took him to a fire, where he could see pieces of a wagon burning. After a few minutes, they led him inside a dirty canvas lodge and handed him a tin plate full of meat and bread. He nodded and sank to the damp ground, cross-legged. They gave him a dry blanket, which still carried some of the warmth of the fire, and he pulled it under him and close around his shoulders.

  He wondered if he would live to see the end of this day.

  Miles watched the Indian walk up the swale and mount the bluff, retracing the steps they had taken with Joseph yesterday, a white flag held on a lance. Wrapped in a buffalo robe, the stout man handed a note to Lieutenant Long, who had gone forward to meet him.

  The Indian waited while Long brought the message to Miles. It was from Lieutenant Jerome, written in pencil, on a scrap of white paper: “I was given a good bed, with plenty of blankets, and a good supper. The Nez Perce have kept me safe and are treating me as if I were in my own home. I hope you are treating Joseph as well as I have been treated. If not, I hope you will commence to do so.”

  Disgusted, Miles handed the scrap to Long. What kind of idiot was Jerome, to let himself be captured? And now this whining note, as if the Lieber code applied in Indian warfare. Miles burned with frustration.

  Long handed the note back with an uncomfortable look, and Miles glared at him. “Our job is to break Joseph’s will to resist,” Miles growled. “If you know a better way, you tell me.”

  The tent flap opened and a soldier with shoulder stripes stepped in. He motioned for Thunder Rising to stand up. Would they hang him, Thunder Rising wondered? Or shoot him, since no hanging trees were in sight?

  The soldier held him by the elbow and led him out of the lodge. The sky was still gray, sleet spitting on a damp west wind, and Thunder Rising pulled the Soyappo blanket close around his shoulders. The soldier brought him to Bear Coat, who stood waiting by a large fire, still in his long, brown coat with the fur collar and thick fur hat. His blue eyes were cold and hard.

  Someone handed the soldier a white flag, and Thunder Rising’s heart lifted. The soldier and Bear Coat each took one of his arms and walked toward the bluff, then down the trail into the swale to the west of the soldier’s camp, the outline of many footsteps clear under the fresh snow. He could see soldiers in their long coats lying in rifle pits on the bluff, their guns trained on the Nimíipuu camp. When they reached the end of the swale and neared the creek a buffalo robe lay on the snow. Here they stopped.

  Staring toward the Nimíipuu camp through the sleet, Thunder Rising saw four figures emerge from the ravine under a white flag of their own. Three of them were Nimíipuu, the fourth a Soyappo in a long yellow coat and fur hat.

  A cold wind sliced at him as they waited, and the sleet stung his face. If something went wrong, he knew, the soldiers on the bluffs would cut him down, and his Nimíipuu warriors would kill Bear Coat and his officers. It would take but one angry warrior, one soldier filled with hatred, and he would be dead. But he held himself straight and stared ahead, refusing to show his fear.

  When the men reached them, the captured soldier held out his hand to Thunder Rising, who took it. When they had shaken, Thunder Rising ignored Bear Coat and moved off toward the Nimíipuu camp. Yellow Bull and the other Nimíipuu followed him.

  When they reached the ravine where the women had dug their shelters Springtime rushed to embrace him. He held her slim body close, unembarrassed. If he could not show his love for his wife on a morning like this, when could he ever show it?

  He could hear children crying. “Does our baby live?” he asked.

  She nodded, tears running down her cheeks. “But my milk has dried up, and she cries without ceasing.”

  Thunder Rising gazed at her. “We have run out of food?”

  “Yes.” She looked down, trying to hide her tears. She wiped at them with one hand, then looked up at him. “Come. We have a fire in our shelter. We are burning lodgepoles.”

  He was surrounded now by others. Looking Glass pushed to the front and asked him, “What did Bear Coat say?”

  “He wants to quit fighting. He wants us to surrender our weapons.”

  “Did you agree?” White Bird asked.

  He shook his head, sadly. “I made no agreements. Bear Coat was not happy this morning, when he had to release me.” He looked around at the other faces, saw fear and anxiety in their eyes. “This Soyappo is like all others—his promises are lies. I told him he could wait for Cut-Off Arm, we would wait for Sitting Bull.”

  Miles watched as the men lowered the tail end of the Napoleon gun that had arrived the day before into the pit they had dug for it, half a mile west of the ravine where the savages were holed up. The gun could lob a 12-pound explosive shell almost a mile. It had scared the bejesus out of the Sioux and Northern Cheyennes last January.

  It was the fourth day of the siege. He had warned the Nez Perce, through a messenger, that if they did not surrender by midmorning he would resume a heavy fire on them. He had a perfect angle into the ravine from here, if the men could gauge the distance correctly.
It was still snowing, and the visibility at half a mile was not good. But if they angled the gun for a high arc, like a howitzer, they might be able to drop shells into the Indians’ hideaway.

  Lieutenant Jerome had brought back a detailed description of the Nez Perce positions in the ravine. Unfortunately, the idiots in artillery had packed only 24 shells. They blamed the weight of the shells and the limits on how many wagons they could bring. In his disgust, Miles had decided to personally supervise the use of every shell.

  When they touched off the first one, the roar was deafening. It went far over the hostile camp, but even from this distance they could hear the howls of fear from the Nez Perce camp. “Use half that much charge this time,” Miles ordered. “You’ll kill our own men on the other side if you shoot that far.”

  They could hear rifle fire as the rest of the troops opened up on the Indian positions. When the second shell burst much closer to the ravine and the screams of fear grew even louder, the soldiers cheered. “Drop one on ’em and we’ll charge the bastards!” someone yelled.

  “Charge, hell!” an Indian voice responded. “You goddamn sons of bitches, you ain’t fightin’ Sioux!”

  Daytime Smoke lay in his buffalo robe on the damp, cold floor of the shelter pit, staring out at the clouds. It was no longer snowing, but the sky still threatened, and a raw wind bent the long strands of buffalo grass that stuck up through the snow.

  Yellow Hair lay beside him, silent. They had run out of food two days before.

  He had not taken food since the battle began, preferring to let the children eat. His head was light and he had trouble concentrating. Though he was wrapped in a thick buffalo robe, he was so cold, so deep inside, that he felt he would never be warm again. When he slept, he dreamt of his mother and Darting Swallow and Takes Plenty, calling him to join them.